One of the coolest “features” inherent in buying PSN games is that you could, using Sony’s lax rules on account sharing, share the games you’ve purchased with 4 other activated consoles.. It’s a bit grey, because although it’s intended to allow you to share your purchased content amongst your own consoles, it’s been abused by people to share downloadable games with friends.
Well, that’s changed.
Sony has implemented a new policy regarding the number of consoles content can be shared across – and reduced that number to just two. This is active from today, and affects PS3 and PSP purchases. Those of you’ve previously shared content needn’t worry – games previously tied to other consoles will continue to operate just fine. Don’t be too surprised; Sony Network Entertainment VP Eric Lempel posted this information up on the PlayStation Blog earlier this month.
Sony plans on releasing a web-based tool to allow you to activate and deactivate consoles from your browser, making the whole “sharing” process easier. While I’m never keen on rights or features being taken away, this change is pretty understandable; sales of PSN games could potentially be 5 times higher than they are.
Last Updated: November 18, 2011