Sony has made some interesting moves following the release of Stellar Blade on PC.
As we reported last month, Shift Up promised to fans they would talk about removing region lock for the game for its PC release. They were able to sway Sony to do so, and to great results – the game has now sold 1 million units on Steam.
As reported by Wario64, dataminers noticed that several Sony published games on PC were getting their region restrictions removed on SteamDB. As this writer is from the Philippines, we did a quick check on what PlayStation games are now available and where. Bear in mind that we’ve passed on games that were published before they started the region lock, as their regional availability didn’t change.
- Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut – available on Steam, not on Epic Game Store
- God of War Ragnarok – available on Steam, not on Epic Game Store
- Helldivers 2 – available on Steam
- Horizon Forbidden West: Complete Edition – available on Steam and Epic Game Store
- Horizon Zero Dawn: Remastered – available on Steam, not on Epic Game Store
- Lego Horizon Adventures – not available on Steam or Epic Game Store
- Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 – available on Steam, not on Epic Game Store
- Midnight Murder Club – not available on Steam or Epic Game Store
- Rise of the Ronin – available on Steam
- Stellar Blade – available on Steam and Epic Game Store
- The Last Of Us Part II: Remastered – available on Steam, not on Epic Game Store
- Until Dawn – not available on Steam or Epic Game Store
As you can see, the selection of games that are available and not seem scattershot and not necessarily logical either. We can’t vouch for availability of games in other countries and regions, but it’s enough to make two observations:
For one, most of PlayStation Publishing’s biggest games and sure hits have now been opened up to be played on PC for regions without PSN. This is particularly good news for Helldivers 2, which has suffered for nearly two years from having its potential user base cut down. While we assume most Helldivers 2 players who got region locked got their refunds, we imagine many of them will jump back in and spend to play the game again. Hopefully, Arrowhead Game Studios sees an uptick in their player base as a result.
Secondly, PlayStation Publishing didn’t put the effort for these games on Epic Game Store, and it doesn’t seem to be for lack of trying. As random as it seems, Stellar Blade and Horizon Forbidden West: Complete Edition are fully available on both Steam and Epic Game Store. Most other games didn’t get their regions unlocked, and that may indicate Sony’s low interest in Epic Game Store as a whole. This may be a decision that makes sense for Sony, if it doesn’t make them much money, but it’s not great for breaking up Steam’s near-monopoly on PC.
If you were a PC gamer who had these games region locked on you, you may now have the option to play these games as well. We recommend you go directly and check these games for yourself.
