PSN download charges proving unpopular among publishers

by Ludwig Kietzmann on Mar 20th 2009 2:10PM

While it's the cost to consumers that often drags downloadable content into the internet's argumentative din, the cost to publishers and developers is generally an infrequent point of discussion. Consider that issue brought into the limelight now, with MTV Multiplayer reporting on some brewing dissatisfaction amongst certain publishers offering content on the PlayStation Network.

According to comments made by several unnamed publishing sources, Sony's "PlayStation Network Bandwidth Fee," implemented in October of last year, asks publishers to pay 16 cents for every gigabyte of bandwidth distributed through the PlayStation Store. The charge, which applies to everything from demos to game add-ons, is one difference between Sony's network and Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace that's giving publishers pause. "It definitely makes us think about how we view the distribution of content related to our games when it is free for us to do it on the web, on Xbox Live, or any other way - including broadcast - than on Sony's platform," explained one source. "It's a new thing we have to budget. It's not cool. It sucks."

Developers that choose to provide content exclusively to the PlayStation Network may be exempt from sticker shock. A publisher of popular PSN-exclusive titles told Joystiq, the fees "are so small [they do] not affect our business or attitude towards releasing games for PSN. The fees are extremely low for PSN-exclusive titles, and only slightly higher for non exclusives."

We've reached out to Sony, other PSN developers and content providers to ascertain just how not cool or possibly sucky they find the reported bandwidth fee. The real concern, of course, is whether this dissatisfaction will manifest as fewer pieces of PSN content. Now that would be decidedly not cool.

Source

Tags: bandwidth, demos, DLC, Playstation-network, Playstation-Store, PSN, Sony

Reader Comments (179)

(Waits for Xbox Live cost complainers to arrive and compare)

There's a very simple solution to this problem. Provide a list of the publishers who don't want to pay these fees, and I simply won't download their demos and DLC. No downloads = no fees. Problem solved.

I don't think any of the complainers actually have Xbox Live. I've paid for 2 years of Live so far, and I have no complaints. And I'm not biased, I've got all 3 current-gen consoles

We'll we're here, cause the money's comin directly out your pocket, and then whatever else you buy is going back into their pocket as well.

So Microsoft is going to get paid for that download whether they gettin it from you or the Developer(which they're getting it from too anyway).

It has just been compared

Maybe this explains why the PS3 gets less demos than the 360?

And no multiplaform betas?
At least I can't think of one.

Not sure, but it certainly explains why the service remains free. Sony has the publishers pick up the tab.

also explains why the PSN download speeds are the equivalent to molasses

Marty,

They only began charging them last October....

must be your connection pseudo. I just dl-d the Kings HD ep (5.1GB) in less than 3 hours

@pseudo: gotta be your connection dude. either that or you check it at high volume times. I downloaded the Kings Ep. 1 in HD and the 5.1GB file downloaded in under 3 hours

@psuedo

Ya I generally moniter my download speads as I download things off the store, Since about 7 months after the launch of the ps3, I'm averaging (literally) 1 MB per second. I'm on DSL (Bell Sympatico Ultra Highspeed i think), and like i said, everything downloads this fast. The only times its ever been slower, is immediatly after a new firmware goes live

@Noshino - What's your point?

Got to agree with you Marty. Wasn't there an interview sometime back before Home was first shown saying that Sony will consider charging for PSN eventually.

Considering LIVE costs about 17 Cents a day to play, 16 Cents per GB probably makes Sony some money for that transaction. Considering there are like 15 million PSN users right?

Now that Home is out, I never hear anyone mention it. I wonder if content providers that show movie trailers have to pay for the bandwidth used for advertisements.

Caveman once again you come on and chat nonsence.. If you dont like the ps3 why do you have to comment on every article relating to it ?

You dont just comment you blurt out misinformed nonsence..

Sony recently said there is no way they will remove the bluray drive and there is no way they would charge for PSN as it should be a free service ...

They have said this all along, they clarified it again recently.. So what was your point again ?

"gotta be your connection dude."

Which means it's not Sony's fault, it's people's connections fault when they get slow download speeds.

Well, my connection must have some magic download sensing ability to switch to a slow ass speed for psn, and then back to good speed for everything else.

Of course it's all of our connections that make PSN shit slow. Just like it's all the abuse causing 360s to RROD

John your issues maybe to do with your network, not PSN, read here:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=79&threadid=2284460 see if this helps you could be your broadband router or your ISP, but read that see if it speeds it up, then you can try and find the cause :)

By the Way.. Demos are only charged for the first 60 days, paid for content always has the 16 cents charge.. In other words if they make money from costumes that they charge £3 for and it is 1 meg in size, after 1000 downloads ( £3000 profit) they get charged 16 cents .

After 4,000,000 downloads (£12 million pounds sales) they get charged
4,000,000 downloads at 1 meg download = 4,000 GB bandwidth
16 cents = $0.16
0.16x4,000 = $640

A whopping 640 dollars

£12,000,000 profit and they pay $640 for the bandwidth.. You have to be an idiot to complain, considering your possible profit margins, which wouldnt even be possible without the psn.. (By the way £12 Million is equivalent to round about
$16-20 Million Dollars, which makes this whole thing completely ridiculous now)

(check the SFIV costumes this is what I am basing this off of, and they charge nearly £5 per costume pack ) If you dont download it they dont get charged, if you do download it then they have to pay peanuts for the bandwidth and make a killing with the pofit..

It is true that not everything is this tiny in size, but your average map pack is 100 MB and runs in at £10.. Demos, while they generate no instant cash for the company they are what help to sell the game and even then.. It is controlled only the first 60 days are they charged (first 2 months) .. Makes perfect sense.. Its not an extortionate $50 a year while all the while you have advertisements pumped through to you on the NXE..

"Developers that choose to provide content exclusively to the PlayStation Network may be exempt from sticker shock."

So would developers that choose to provide content exclusively to XBL then, I'm guessing.

There's no way of knowing without confirmation if XBL even charges for that. Then again, XBLs subscription probably covers these costs.

"So would developers that choose to provide content exclusively to XBL then, I'm guessing."

It is my assumption that this is the kind of thing the live subsciption fee covers.

"The charge, which applies to everything from demos to game add-ons, is one difference between Sony's network and Microsoft's Xbox Live Marketplace that's giving publishers pause"
From the sounds of the article, Microsoft doesn't charge developers for downloads.

zuburi

There is no sticker shock with developers offering any content on XBL because MS does not charge them a download fee at all.

I think zuburi means they will have no sticker shock for being exclusive XBL content BECAUSE Microsoft doesn't charge the developer?

Someone gets it!

I guess companies love the fact that microsoft charges a higher percentage given to them per sale then bandwidth charges too eh? Companies will always find something to complain about. First it was Microsoft taking 35-40% of the gross profit per game sold on Live Arcade, now 16 cents per gig of bandwidth on the PS3. If there's something to complain about THERE WILL be complaints. Can I complain about how the 360 gave my ass a rash too?

What were you doing with your 360 for it to give your ass a rash? 0_0

Well I was at my cousins house sitting on an uncomfortable couch, we were playing a manly game where HANS N FRANZ go around shooting the people. The masculine aggression was so much that the 360 started glowing red and nailed me in the ass. It gave me red ring burn. My bung hole is still sore from the onslaught of masculine aggression that the 360 is.

I think my IQ just dropped 4 points after reading that comment.

0_0

...

-_-

Mine dropped banana points. Wait, what?

"The masculine aggression was so much that the 360 started glowing red and nailed me in the ass"

I think that's what John Romero wanted to acomplish with Daikatana.

So...did it use lube?

Remember kids, nothing is ever REALLY free.

Tell me about it.

M$ came up with a somewhat innovative idea with Windows by bringing over the mac interface to the PC. THATS it. Since that GREAT "innovation" it has stagnated the OS market ad infinitum. M$ has introduced poor quality into the PC OS , browser, console, and lately the Mobile OS markets. This restricts competition and thereby choice of the consumer. I work at a university with a prolific comp sci dept and they generally look unfavorably at M$. In fact, most of those professors who have had interactions with M$ have attested to the anti-competitive actions and threats made by said corporation. Yes, the stories of how M$ threatens smaller firms with innovative products and forces them to join or die at their market power are true. Ask yourself, as PC HARDWARE prices have plummeted, why has the software price of Windows OS stayed relatively the same? Superior OS' such as Linux cost a fraction if not free. Need I remind you of the greatness of Vista? Oh, the consumer's memory is approximately 1 minute (hyperbole acknowledged, as it is really 21 minutes, the length of the average sitcom.)

Here is something called data, to back up but one of my claims. PLEASE if you want to rebut my information, do it with DATA, not with your feelings (which you think are opinions).
Why Microsoft and Intel tried to kill the XO $100 laptop
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article4472654.ece

Thanks for sharing that excellent link Bissy. Remember people don't read information. They REACT information.

OMG 16 cents! These publishers can afford this so this really shouldn't such a big deal.

Think about a big, highly anticipated retail demo (something like RE5). Those demos can run up to a gig in size. If one million people download the demo, the publisher has just spent $160,000 on distributing that demo through Sony.

The RE5 demo, at last count, had been downloaded a total of 4 million times across both the 360 and PS3. So figuring on multimillion downloads for a demo is not unreasonable.

Now, if you can distribute that same demo for free on the 360 and PC, but it's going to cost you several hundred thousand to distribute it on the PS3, do you think you would complain?

consider it part of the cost for advertising. If people didn't get the demo, they may have never bought the game in the first place.

@greg - that's true, it is technically advertising. The problem is that unlike any traditional form of advertising, there's no way to cap it off at a certain cost. If you only expect 100,000 downloads, and you get 1,000,000 instead, your budget just increased ten fold... something most companies could not cope with.

Exactly! "Oh, no! Sony won't let me advertise my next blockbuster for free!"

Let me find these guys some cheese.

Basicly what they're saying is, they prefer a system where the cost for advertising is passed on to the consumer. Fair enough. I prefer that the company trying to SELL me something has to pay for advertising.

Like I said, there's an easy fix. As a publisher, make it known that you are opposed to these fees. Then, we the consumers, will do you the favor of not downloading your demos and such. Then, you incur no fees. Everybody's happy.

@Troy

I would say that the issue here is that the pubs are comparing their options. You have two that are free, and one that costs. It will be hard to control costs, as Marty said. You could only cap what you want to spend by pulling the content after a certain time, which seems like a bad solution for both pubs and consumers.

This is an issue for Sony, as they need to compete against the 360 and PC for content. If they have a system that encourages pubs to keep content off Sony's system, that's bad for Sony and PS3 owners. We aren't just talking demos here. Videos, free DLC, everything you could download. If I ran a game company, and these were my options, the path seems fairly clear.

@Courtney

And that's completely fine for the publishers to compare their options. Because, guess what, as a consumer, I'm also going to compare my options. And I'm probably going to lean toward a company that is willing to work for my sixty dollars as opposed to a company that acts like they're entitled to it, or worse yet, that it's a PRIVILEGE for me to hand over my money to them.

But, hey, that's just the way I think.

And, last I checked, hadn't the cost of games gone up $10 this generation? Mr. Publisher, go find your 16 cents in there. WTF?!!?

All these people who are justifying these complaints aren't making the correct comparison. If the developer wants to avoid the $0.16/GB fee, then they shouldn't make a version for the PS3 at all, because I guarantee you demos (for decent games) prompt more sales than otherwise. It is stupid business to develop or even port a PS3 game (MILLIONS of dollars), and then decide that they are not going to release a demo because of tens of THOUSANDS of dollars (based on the million download figures people are tossing around). When one sale covers 100-200 demo downloads (as someone else suggested), how do you not justify the expense? This is short-sighted complaining to the extreme.

A similar line of complaining should come from 360 developers, who spend MILLIONS on developing multiplayer for games, but all that money is wasted on silver members, of which there are plenty, who don't care at all about that content. That'd be like them claiming that Microsoft should pay them for every nonsale to a silver member, because half the game didn't appeal to them and maybe they would have bought it had online access been free.

These are things known as the cost of doing business. If it's too expensive, don't do business.

Troy said:

"I'm probably going to lean toward a company that is willing to work for my sixty dollars as opposed to a company that acts like they're entitled to it, or worse yet, that it's a PRIVILEGE for me to hand over my money to them."

This is hilarious coming from the guy who is always waving the PS3 banner, the hypocrisy is delicious.

"people will want to work more hours to buy our system"

"next generation starts when we say it does"

Hilarious.

Can someone explain how PC demos are free? Last time I checked you had to pay for good servers, ISP, electricity, etc.

While I think 16c/GB is a bit absurd (especially in todays HD GAMIN), someone has to pay that cost.

What publishers SHOULD do, is from now on increase prices on both 360 and PS3, so that they make up for that tax, and they make even more on XBL without any complaining.

Bandwidth is never free. Someone pays for it.

On 360 it's the consumers (well some of them, silvers still get access to most of the same content if a week late) On the PS3 it's the Devs.

From a developers POV it's obvious which is the better deal so which platform they will have a preference of putting content on.

If the 16 cents per Gig is accurate a piece of DLC that sells 1 million copies and is about a gigabyte of space for each will cost the company $160,000 on the PSN... that's not chump change.

Pulling a cheap game out the PSN Hat - Noby Noby Boy.
Sells for $5 at 300MB. So $20 per 1GB.
So say it sell's your 1 million copies, thats 250,000GB(or 250TB)
So its makes $5million and pays $40,000 in Bandwidth cost's.
Sure $40,000 is a big number, but $5million is even bigger.
Also take LBP sackboy costumes, it's like $.5 for a premium costume, at about 55KB each they can sell nearly 200,000 costumes for 1GB of bandwidth cost.
Thats $100,000 for every 16c of bandwidth charges.

Fair enough.

Now put... oh let's say... the HAWX demo, which came in at a clean gig (why it was selected)

Now let's say it is downloaded by Eager PSN users 250,000 times.

That's money that must be made up in Sales of the Game... so that's more copies of a multi-platform game that need to be sold on the PS3.

I believe the result could be instead of talking the pants hit Developers will just not put demos on the PSN... which is bad for PS3 users, but less of a hit out of overall profit for the Dev.

@hunter2223

It's bad for PS3 users? Or, is it bad if you want to SELL your game to PS3 users. THEY need US to download their demos more than we need to play them. For them to say, "Well, I just won't put a demo on PSN" is basically saying, "Well, I won't advertise my product over here." Then, most likely, my sixty bucks is going to go to a company that thought it WAS worth 16 cents to advertise to me. No problem with me.

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PSN download charges proving unpopular among publishers

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