In case you somehow missed all the hullabaloo found within the gaming community, Sony has proverbially bit the hand that feeds them by solidifying PlayStation’s future as a digital-only console. In that same breath they also announced they’d be shutting down the PlayStation 3 and Vita storefronts for real this time, something they attempted back in 2021, but public backlash led them to postpone the closure.
Nintendo, however, is unlikely to follow this trend, according to a respected analyst speaking with Video Games Chronicles. Circana’s Mat Piscatella expressed how it was bound to happen eventually, but was shocked that it was that day. Additionally, it’s obvious that XBOX will follow suit with Project Helix now that they aren’t the ones driving the real digital-only push.
“Sales of new physical video games have fallen every year since the late 2000s. You may have seen the chart I posted over on Bluesky that has the US data for 12 months ending May. The US physical market has recently seen the slightest growth because of Nintendo Switch 2, but that won’t last.
Through a combination of consumer preference and manufacturer strategic decisions, we are now seeing Sony announce it will cease production of physical discs in January 2028. This will result in lower sales of video game software at retail (although publishers will still certainly sell code in box or special editions in physical boxes at retail for as long as it makes sense to do so), and it is now safe to assume that both PlayStation 6 and Project Helix will be digital-only devices.”
All of this, though, and Piscatella’s gut tells him this won’t be end of physical on the ever-so-closed-off Team Red—Nintendo. The Japanese game maker has made waves in the retail space as of late, especially with the Nintendo Switch 2, which right now only has a basic edition and some bundles, but if we can expect anything, it’s that Nintendo will ride the wave—creating some mid-gen refreshes along the way—for some time before finally introducing a new console.
You might be asking how this happened, but it’s actually very simple—painfully so—how people buy games has changed. For all the jokes lobbed at Sony, they have a valid point surrounding how people are buying games. During Sony’s Q4 report, it was revealed game sales were at an 85% digital sales, leaving only 15% of room for the physical market.
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