Sony Underfire Yet Again for Blocking Marvel Tokon in 132 Countries on PC

One disaster to another - It has not been a good week for Sony, and things just keep getting worse and worse. Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls fans have been co... @Oram77 These seem to be the widely accepted reasons as to why PSN isn’t available in 137 counties: Market Strategy: Sony Interactive Entertainment may focus on regions where they see the highest potential for revenue and user engagement. Infrastructure: Some countries may lack the necessary internet infrastructure to support online gaming and digital services effectively. Regulatory Issues: Different countries have varying regulations regarding digital services, which can complicate the launch and operation of PSN. Localization: Providing localized content and support for multiple languages can be resource-intensive, leading to limited service availability. Some of these reasons actually seem far more reasonable than others. Regulation for example is a tough one to work around, as is internet infrastructure, but this news surprised me as I’d been thinking further strides to open it up to more markets had been made, apparently not! I don’t think there’s many excuses for Sony on this personally, but posted what I could find here in case someone finds it interesting to breakdown. @Oram77 Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, The Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, The Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Cote d’ Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Cuba, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Estonia, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Republic of the Congo, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, San Marini, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Serbia, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, The Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Sudan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Syria, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tonga, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe. When I was living in Albania every game I bought was a physical import, Sony kept detecting my VPN. While visiting Egypt recently it flagged my account and it took two-weeks until I could make purchases again. Most of it was either diplomatic/business but time and time again I ran into problems outside of the UK/EU and still do. It's actually why I started playing the Switch and Steamdeck so much, sanctions also affected my second main account, but that's obvious. Most Russian gamers I know VPN their way through it but being out of the region is costing Sony a lot of wasted revenue and now we have State sanctioned piracy too. 80 to 100 million gamers, that's a lot of people and a lot of physical imports. We're a black market economy so they can't really track the numbers but everyone on my other network is VPN'ing the PSN/Xbox/Etc and the stores are stocked with physical imports. Even in Monaco for the Grand Prix I couldn't use my Portal and when I did get it to work it wouldn't recognize the DLC, so back to the Steamdeck. Geneva was similar, I had to keep restoring licenses. It could also be that my account constantly travels as I do and it looks suspicious so Sony flag it. Either way I don't think I'll be supporting Sony much once the PS6 lands, maybe I'll increase my retro efforts instead. It's not the price it's the principle, regions, restrictions, controlled media, just let people play the games they want to play. A German gamer shouldn't need to buy Dead Island on a UK account to get red blood and some removable limbs. I want to support Sony because they were my first introduction to gaming, but at the same time I'm not sure if I should. @Oram77 Im pretty sure you can't legitimately buy a PS5 in a country with no PSN support. Here's how the situation works though. You can easily import a PS5, and you can set your PSN account to any region you want. You actually don't need a VPN--Sony simply don't check it(unless this was changed very recently). You cant chose the UK though(reasons...) but basically can chose anywhere else. People get annoyed about it because theoretically your account can be revoked for giving false information. I'm not aware of anyone who has though. Its kind of a an accepted grey zone operation. This grey zone operated on Steam to begin with too and then someone created a fuss about how you actually need to break the TOS to play some games, so Sony responded by simply not selling any game in territories with no PSN. People should just have accepted the grey zone and got on with their life. Now they have a much worse deal. @8thDoctor That’s a great question, and it seems to vary country to country. If Steam is available (which it tends to be in many more countries than PSN or XBL), then the first barrier of entry is technically done. The main issue here seems to be the link back to XBL or PSN and there seems to be very little flexibility on who gets an “in” so to speak. I will say, XBL seems to be easier to work around, but I think that’s because Windows has had to make such great strides in counties as an OS, technically a lot of the legal challenges Sony face Microsoft have solved in some ways. You know, like a government using Windows and being provided server allocation to backup their documents and security and so on is a lot more likely to approve a request from Microsoft to allow their XBL to slip through. I mean what’s Sony going to offer them, a DSLR, or a TCL TV for their meeting room? I jest, but you get my point haha. When I left working for the man so to speak the last I heard is that Sony were trying to make headway with this subject, I’m really surprised to learn they haven’t remotely made a dent really. But then China has had to have a completely different version of Fortnite for years, so if the deal for Sony is they can be in X amount more countries but they have to change various elements or a lot of elements, or cut the game entirely, cost wise it doesn’t make sense. There’s no point to Sony venturing into a country, amending their library and those allowed then being amended game content wise to fit religions, laws and so on, only for 50,000 people to purchase it. Then that’s not getting into the element of support, ideally to support say X country in Africa, okay well then you need systems in place to do that. Systems to speak to the countries laws, data protection laws, LGBTQ laws, financial regulations and all sorts. So yeah, it’s a massive pain in the rear to expand into some territories. Though for obvious reasons I’m hesitant to defend Sony as such right now on anything, on this it’s something I think they should work to improve but it’s sure as not something that’s remotely easy to achieve. But I’m speaking as someone who worked in assets such as texturing compression and 3D modelling, so I’m hardly going to be privy to whatever lunacy Sony had to deal with worldwide to get into markets.

The story has drawn attention across the politics landscape, with experts pointing to its immediate implications for policy, markets, and public confidence.

Beyond the headline update, analysts are closely watching how institutions and local stakeholders respond over the next week as timelines, priorities, and accountability measures become clearer.

For readers, this development is part of a broader shift that has been unfolding over recent months, and the next round of announcements will likely define its long-term impact.