PlayStation’s Xbox Game Pass equivalent revealed, launches in June

PlayStation unveiled its answer to Xbox Game Pass on Tuesday. PlayStation Plus will add Premium, Extra and Essential tiers in June, giving you access to a catalog of hundreds of games spanning from the original PlayStation to the PS5 eras. It follows months of rumors regarding Sony’s expanded gaming subscription service, which was reportedly codenamed Spartacus.

The Essential tier is the cheapest option, and is the same as the current PlayStation Plus, giving you access to online multiplayer, cloud storage, two monthly downloadable games and exclusive discounts. 

The price remains the same too, at $9.99 a month, $25 for three months or $60 for a year.

The Extra tier adds a library of around 400 PS5 and PS4 games to download, as well as the perks of the Essential tier. It’ll include Death Stranding, God of War, Spider-Man, Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Mortal Kombat 11 and Returnal at launch, and will be “regularly refreshed” with first- and third-party games.

It’ll set you back $15 a month, $40 for three months or $100 for a year.

The Premium tier is the big one, adding 340 classic games on top of the cheapest tiers’ benefits. PS3 games will be available to stream, while classic PS1, PS2 and PSP games will be available to stream or download. It’ll also include time-limited game trials and the ability to stream PS4 games, as is currently available on the separate PlayStation Now service.

This will cost $17.99 a month, $50 for three months or $120 a year.

Unlike Xbox Game Pass, it seems PlayStation’s major first-party games won’t launch into PlayStation Plus’ Extra and Premium libraries.

“It’s not a road that we’re going to go down with this new service,” CEO Jim Ryan told GamesIndustry.biz on Tuesday. “The level of investment that we need to make in our studios would not be possible, and we think the knock-on effect on the quality of the games that we make would not be something that gamers want.”

So we won’t be getting the upcoming God of War Ragnarok on PlayStation Plus at launch; you’ll need to buy it separately if you want to play it on release date. Xbox made Halo Infinite available on Game Pass at launch last December.

The expanded service will roll out regionally starting in June, kicking off in Asia, followed by the US, Europe and the rest of the world where PlayStation Plus is available. It’s aiming to have it available in most of these by the end of the first half of 2022, while its cloud streaming service will also be extended into new territories. 

PlayStation Now will cease to exist in its current form, with existing subscribers automatically moved to the Premium tier. it currently costs $9.99 a month, $25 for three months or $60 a year, so the price will double at the three-month and yearly rates (but you’ll get the extra perks). Existing PlayStation Plus subscribers will remain on the Essential tier.