With Sony fielding a class action lawsuit claiming its store terms suggest ownership but convey the licensing of digital games, aptly named consumer rights group Consumer Rights Wiki has seen PlayStation fans assemble an incomplete but in-depth list of PlayStation verbiage indicating that users do, in fact, “own” the games they buy.
The Consumer Rights Wiki has a freshly updated page dedicated to the “Sony PlayStation digital game ownership lawsuit,” which hinges on a California law (per AB 2426) requiring digital vendors to clearly tell consumers that they are purchasing licenses, not purchasing products. Steam maker Valve seemed to adjust its own verbiage after the law’s passage in 2024.
In a response to the lawsuit, Sony argued “reasonable consumers would not be misled” by its terms. This follows a serendipitous email reminder telling PlayStation users “software is licensed to you, not sold.”
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Sony’s terms of service do clearly state this, but the PlayStation Network itself, where users actually make purchases, is filled with allusions to owning digital games. This goes for PlayStation Store product listings and myriad help pages, dozens of which have been collated by Consumer Rights Wiki contributors, with links to live versions of those pages and archived web snapshots available for each.
For example, the explainer for how to “Upgrade an eligible PS4 digital game on a PS5 console with a disc drive or PS5 Digital Edition console” specifies that you will need “an eligible digital PS4 game you already own.”
On the main UK PS5 hub, now branded with a warning that PlayStation will abandon physical games in January 2028, Sony writes: “Track your PS5 journey with info on your total play time, games you own and more.” This bit is tucked underneath a section showing the disc drive-equipped and all-digital PS5 consoles, but is less of an explicit reference to digital games.
A common PlayStation Store DLC blurb – here, dutifully represented by a $2 costume for Dead or Alive 5: Last Round – clarifies: “This costume was previously distributed by some retailers as a gift with purchase of DOA5LR. Be careful not to purchase content you already own.”
Upgrade pages tell a similar story. The blurb for the Final Fantasy 7 Remake upgrade for PS4 version owners reads: “You are eligible to receive a free PS5™ digital version of FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE at no extra cost if you already either (i) own a PS4™ digital version of the game or (ii) own a PS4™ disc version of the game and also own a PS5™ console with a disc drive (you must insert the disc each time you wish you to download or play the PS5™ digital version of the game).” This includes a “digital application or game.”
It doesn’t get much more digital than cloud-streamed games, yet an explainer for “how do I use PS5 Cloud Streaming” notes that “Select games that you own can be streamed direct to your PS5 console or PlayStation Portal.”
The list goes on and on. By my count, there are 34 examples of PlayStation pages mentioning, in some form, how players “own” games, many of them clearly defining digital games.
This may sound incredibly clear-cut, as AB 2426 prohibits “a seller of a digital good from advertising or offering for sale a digital good, as defined, to a purchaser with the terms ‘buy,’ ‘purchase,’ or any other term which a reasonable person would understand to confer an unrestricted ownership interest in the digital good, or alongside an option for a time-limited rental.”
However, the bill also spells out exceptions: “unless the seller receives at the time of each transaction an affirmative acknowledgment from the purchaser, or the seller provides to the consumer before executing each transaction a clear and conspicuous statement, as specified.”
It’s here that Sony may argue its agreed-upon terms cover any store purchases, and its claims thus far echo this point. Sony has also bizarrely argued that people can’t own digital games because then only one non-fungible digital copy could exist. But really, Sony just wants to kick this into arbitration, which resolves cases outside courts and historically leans toward the side of big companies.
Yet the bill also states “each transaction” must see user affirmation of terms of licensing, restrictions, and the risk that a digital purchase may be “unilaterally revoked”; or “a clear and conspicuous statement” informing users “in plain language that ‘buying’ or ‘purchasing’ the digital good is a license” and in some way links or embeds more detailed terms and conditions. All this talk of ownership and “buy” buttons may actually give plaintiffs some ammunition, even if class action gaming lawsuits don’t have the best track record in, or making it to, court.
