With the coronavirus pandemic causing many people around the world to now have to work from the comfort of their own home, internet access has become more important than ever before for some. For those in Europe, shared bandwidth is something that has particularly been an issue recently, which is why Sony is now taking action to help combat potentially slowing internet speeds.
In a new message on the PlayStation Blog from Sony Interactive Entertainment’s President, Jim Ryan, it was said that Sony will now be working with internet service providers within Europe to “manage download traffic to help preserve access for the entire internet community.” In particular, Ryan said that download speeds for either games or updates on PS4 or other PlayStation products will be slower now as a result. However, online experiences will still run at their normal rate and won’t impact gameplay.
“We believe it is important to do our part to address internet stability concerns as an unprecedented number of people are practicing social distancing and are becoming more reliant on internet access,” Ryan said in his statement. “Players may experience somewhat slower or delayed game downloads but will still enjoy robust gameplay. We appreciate the support and understanding from our community, and their doing their part, as we take these measures in an effort to preserve access for everyone.”
For some, this message is somewhat ironic considering how long PlayStation has been griefed by fans for having slow download speeds in the first place. On the PS4, in particular, downloads always seem to take forever, even if you have incredibly fast internet speeds. This is more due to the PS4’s hardware limitations, however, than it is the downloads speeds themselves.
Netflix has restricted bitrates to limit the demand on networks caused by people staying at home due to COVID-19.
I can announce that we have taken similar precautions with PSN download speeds, except ours started over a decade ago.
— Ex-CEO Kaz Hirai (@KazHiraiCEO) March 22, 2020
Still, jokes aside, it’s good to see that Sony is doing its own part to help this situation in Europe. While many might be turning to video games more often in this time of self-quarantine, it’s still important that those who actually need to access high-speed internet for work or other needed purposes can readily have it at their disposal.
Just know that if you do live in Europe and you’re going to need to download something any time soon on your PS4, you may want to queue up that download sooner than you have done in the past. Considering many physical releases (such as Final Fantasy VII Remake) might also not be hitting store shelves on time, this will prove to be especially true when it comes to pre-downloads from now on.
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