Sony, Please Fix PSN

It’s time to put this issue center stage. I have never seen a service go through so many maintenance and stability updates only to fail at the very thing it’s trying to improve.

[DarkOcelet]

I dont know how people expect everything to happen in less than a year , come on , do you really think they are not working hard in doing that . How about you have some patience and sip some tea while they work on it .

[DLConspiracy]

I think the main problem is that because PS4 is dominating the console market its network (edit: expected to be as savvy and) is still not able to catch up to the same sales stats. This causes frustration. Rightfully so since its a paid service now.

[Eonjay]

I game nightly and I don't run into the barrage of constant issues this article alleges. There are problems, but from my own experience, it isn't as bad as people are making it out to be either. It goes down less frequently than N4G.

Edit: I would only like to see them have a less impactful maintenance routine.

[xHeavYx]

I must be very lucky. I haven't had any issues with PSN since I got a PS3 (other than the maintenance stuff)

[DLConspiracy]

@Eonjay

Fortunately it doesn't effect you as much. It can be frustrating for many others though.

[MysticStrummer]

I don't know what the difference is, but normally when I see an article on here about PSN being down it isn't down for me and that's been true in two different cities. I had a crappy connection in one of those cities so that's not the difference maker. I just don't see the problems with PSN that others evidently do.

Is it like a bug, where one person can see it while another doesn't? I had almost no problems with Skyrim on PS3, while Dead Island was almost unplayable for me both online and off. Others had the opposite experience with both games.

*shrug*

I expect Sony to put PS+ money toward generally improving things, but since I don't have many problems with PSN I can't get too worked up about the state of the network.

[DLConspiracy]

@MysticStrummer

In all fairness. People need to understand that you can't just have millions of servers instantly. It takes time and it takes a lot of years of subscription money to make that happen. It will happen. Just give it time. Last gen is significantly different than this gen. Perhaps, there is money that is paid to each of the games they give away on ALL the PS platforms. That may cost more than we know.

[donthate]

Sony just does not have the resources, infrastructure or even the expertise to match Xbox Live.

Sony's strength lies in hardware, and not software. It shows!

[nX]

I'm like 99% of the time connected to PSN in the grand scheme... yes they should improve their network but it survived Destiny without problems which was probably the biggest possible "normal" stress-test. The DDoS attacks crippled it for the most part.

[jebabcock]

Sony must really love mississippi, because I seem to miss all these widespread outages. Must be because this state is such a massive technical powerhouse... Not saying they don't happen, cause i'm certain they do, but I believe these articles as much as i believe the same ones that report how xblive is having widespread outages... every couple weeks both networks seem to be out of commission completely... I really wish these Chicken Little articles would stop...

[BitbyDeath]

Some added media functionality would be a great improvement.

[Gaming247allday]

Well when PSN was free, the issues with PSN where excusable, but now that we have to pay to play Online like Xbox LIVE i expect the quality of the Network to improve greatly and immediately, they expect me to pay immediately so why do i have to wait for the service to improve? makes sense right

C,mon Sony, its 2014, get your Online Act together please

[AliTheSnake1]

I was on PS4 right now. Messages take forever to be received and sent. Friends list sometimes takes a while to load, or some friends tabs are empty. Accepting friends requests is the opposite of smooth.

[rainslacker]

Since the PS4's release I play it(or the PS3 or Vita) daily for an hour or two minimum. For all the articles I've seen about how it keeps going down, I've only experienced not being able to connect three times, and once was that LS DDoS attack, other than scheduled maintenance.

This leads me to believe that some of the issues that are being stated may be overblown, or not as widespread as some make it out to be.

I don't get into online games, so can't speak to when new big online games release, but that may not be entirely on Sony.

[hay]

Game Fanatics, Please use the f*cking support form instead of attention whoring.

[SilentNegotiator]

The amount of time PSN has been down this year is being extremely exaggerated here (and of course all of the Xtrolls that don't even have a Ps4 are pretending like PSN has been down "all day everywhere" several times). PSN could use some improvement, but it isn't in need of any serious "fixing"

[Dontworrybhappy]

Yea when I had a PS4 I had lag alot in TLOU and Blacklight. Very frustrating DX

[DLConspiracy]

@silentnegotiator

No offense to you but downplaying any problems a paid service is supposed to have covered while blaming anyone and everyone who disagrees as an "xtrolls" seems a bit too easy. There are those that genuinely have issues with the service and expect more for their money. There are also those with both paid services who actually own both consoles who notice too. Its not always a console war preference. Could it be that maybe they have a preference because they know the difference? I know that's not what you want to hear but a least allow that into your theory.

[Tetsujin]

My only actual complaint with PSN on the 4 is waiting minutes for messages to appear and/or requests taking forever to show up. I know the system and my internet are working since we did tests at other locations with various games just in case. I already knew there would be issues with it being the first attempt at a paid service on a new generation, and didn't anticipate such a successful launch so quickly.

If it was deep into the gen, then I'd be concerned, at the beginning into the first year, I'm not as concerned. PS3 took about a year before its online started becoming more stable, with the PS4 I feel it's the same way.

[matrixman92]

this happens to me too. I can send a friend a message, wait 5 minutes for a reply to pop up, then the message says it was sent from my friend 4 minutes ago. Not sure whats up with that delay

[Palitera]

And there I was thinking it was happening only to me. Not the friends thing, it is a giant issue since last week, but the message delay.

It is annoying as hell.

If it was one Xbox One, we can't even imagine the s***storm that would be happening over these issues.

-

It comes in a bad moment, since Bungie had the "awesome" idea of not putting matchmaking for any of the high level endgame options of the game, forcing people to add (guess what?) strangers and making their fireteam this way.

The work around for the issued friends funcionality, for those who don't know, is to make a party on the PS4 main menu and add the strangers to it, then they can click on your nick and ask to join your game. With this, they join your fireteam, but you have first to set the fireteam privacy to public.

[XtraTrstrL]

It wouldn't be that bad if it didn't feel like everything was being subbed or paywalled out the ass. I mean, who really believes its just taking this long to add DLNA/MP3 support? It's clearly being held back so they can make more Music/Video Unlimited subs out of frustration. Yoshi has known people were all worked up about no DLNA/MP3 support from when it got out before launch that we wouldn't have it. He didn't even promise to add it then, he said something vague like, "We'll look into it."

That's how you know they were screwing us, he couldn't even promise to add something simple we've had on PS3 forever because they planned on making us pay through them to get streaming on PS4. Now there's another vague estimation of when it'll arrive, being early next year. There's too many paywalls going on this gen, along with Season Passes, Day-1 $DLC, and overpriced microtransactions in general.

[Jumper09]

This is why i switched to the XboxOne.

I know Games will look better on PS4 yada yada yada

But the Xbone has features now that the PS4 is still missing.
Im using the newly added DLNA function and Media Player mostly every day now.

And dont get me started on Sony's transparancy regarding Firmware Updates...
What happened to 2.0? Still MIA.

[GamingSinceThe80s]

It was more easy to put up with a sip tea as you say when it was still free.Now they are charging us to play online so that is what makes all this unexceptable.Sony said they were going to put all the money for charging us back into PSN something I'm pretty sure they lied about.Seeing all the money they are raking in from it.And it still sucks.

[AngelicIceDiamond]

@Dark Answer this guys question.

"It’s time to put this issue center stage. I have never seen a service go through so many maintenance and stability updates only to fail at the very thing it’s trying to improve."

Updates that come through that make the service more stable which should involve more security protocols and improved infrastructure to the system.

But a DDOS attack is enough to bring it down or heavy traffic purchases. Which asks the question what it Sony really doing behind the scenes?

"It’s time to put this issue center stage"

If your a true fan of something, ask the question rather than make excuses. Sony, MS or Nintendo will never know (or think its ok) if you don't criticize them about anything.

Sony doesn't address PSN problems because we don't speak up just make excuses and say no its fine. Be a real fan and criticize when necessary.

[Palitera]

THIS!

So much noise is made about little stupid stuff, like Peter Dinklebot's voice, Bioshock's cleavage or Lara Croft's hair, yet when something that really impacts experience appear, it is overlooked.

Sheep mentality strikes again? Fanboyism?

I am playing 99% of the time on my PS4, I have seen issues like both my DS4 going kaputz, infinite autoejecting, the console almost never turns down without the infamous beeps, Tomb Raider disappeared from the HDD, messages delay, friend requests delay, not being able to find friends on the search, not being able to watch streams by uStream and much more.

Are these issues given attention on the internet?

No.

Then again, why?

Because it is more important that X1 runs with 1 frame rate per second less or has a different lighting system?

Anyway... We bring it on us. It took more than a week without the friends funcionality working even decently to appear the first article about it. It will keep coming.

Remember the definition of insanity.

[Spotie]

Sorry, but a ddos can bring down anything, regardless of security.

Why not ask JP Morgan Chase why they didn't have better security?

Oh, wait. They had damn good security, and STILL got hacked.

It's about time you people get off that BS. If XBL seems to not be attacked as often, that's because it's not attacked as often. As a whole, that is; individual accounts are still assaulted daily, but somehow that doesn't count.

There's a difference between criticizing when needed, and blowing regular occurrences out of proportion.

[AngelicIceDiamond]

@Spotie Ok then. What do you tell the writer the guy who's having these issues then? Just because it isn't happening to you doesn't mean its none existent.

Think of others in this situation. But Ok your right though I brought up some accurance for the sake of making my argument.

You mentioned XBL but I rather stay on topic this isn't about Xbox this is about PSN.

The writer isnt happy with all these problems, problems that should be addressed damn nearly immediately. What are you gonna say "he needs to get over it." "Its fine for me it works just fine." "Or Sony's on it just give them time"

It isn't just his problems its most of the problems that people are having.

PS4 is payed online now so you would expect improvements to come quicker then usual. But with all the funds it looks like Sony is using it to strictly give out free games to people rather than focus on PSN's problems.

But your probably not gonna admit it or see anything wrong with it. Only vocal minority of PS fans will admit PSN has problems that needs solving but they just get shut down by actual PS fanboys and its sad man it really is sad.

[rainslacker]

The DDoS attacked the backbone servers which fed the Sony servers. They never actually got to Sony's servers. This was confirmed by the guy whose's plane had the bomb threat against it. That's what he meant when he said the attacks were upstream(The most common way to perform a DDoS attack). There was more than just gaming servers being affected by the attack, it just wasn't as noticeable since it was just random websites.

As far as purchases, I would have to agree though. They do seem to have some bandwidth issues under heavy load from time to time, but I've never noticed any actual ping lag.

Sony generally is pretty open nowadays about problems with it's network. Not always, as they don't want to give out too much info as it means attackers will exploit it, but they update their server statuses and give possible fix times a lot quicker than they used to...even if the issue isn't widespread.

I think Sony is in the process of building a much bigger infrastructure. It would make sense given their ambitions with PSNow. But those things take time. Heck, I remember when MS Live was kind of crap too, and at times it still is, although XBL seems to be pretty solid most of the time.

As far as addressing the writer, if he's going to make comments like this, then he should research if the problems HE is having are so widespread that they require an article to downplay an entire network that it seems a great number of people have no problem with.

My guess would be that his problems may not be all Sony's fault, and quite often, some of his problems may be fixable by doing some research on Sony's forums where they deal with a lot of problems and have a guy who will individually help you or point you to the right thread to fix many issues.

So my point is, Sony's supposed network issues just aren't as widespread as all these articles are making it out to be. I'd wager that 9 out of 10 of the articles we see about it on here are due to local connection issues.

[Assassingamer136]

Umm xbone players don't have an issue or Wii U owners.

[ChuckTheIceMan]

PSN has been broken for several years now. They either can't fix it, or don't give a rats ass enough to fix it. That's the simple fact of the matter.

[DLConspiracy]

This will surely go over well. I have had similar experiences in the past. Its better in a lot of ways but still far behind in a lot of other ways. It will get there. I notice my videos load exponentially slower than other services. Then hiccup the entire time I watch them too. On a 100mbps connection.

Edit: I know I know. How dare I be dissatisfied.

[Eonjay]

As you have stated, it has gotten better and one imagines they are constantly looking to improve it. Given the job listings that popped up a few weeks ago, I think it is best to remain optimistic but continue to put moderate pressure on them in the mean time. My experience has been mostly positive.

[DLConspiracy]

I always try to remain positive that it will get better. I personally don't have as high expectations as a lot of others though. At least not starting out. It's still newer than last gens network. I can still see a lot of frustration of NEW adopters to the service as they may be used to another type of expectation or variety of online providers. It's always a touchy subject regardless because we all pay for internet first and then pay for these subscriptions on top of that same service.

[Paprika]

I so badly wanted to make an account on N4G named Sony. And just reply "OK, why not"..... its one of those days I guess!

[TGF_Zero]

that would be hilarious. but on a serious note, it's really irritating that a nextgen system is doing half the job the ps3 is doing.

[Eonjay]

If you are referring to the media options, such as playing my own video content and music, I have to agree that improvements are definitely in order.

[GamingSinceThe80s]

I know right!How about the DRM on the PS Plus games,paying to play online,and no mp3 support.At the opening of PS E3 2013 they played radioactive
'Welcome to the new age" New age indeed!lol

[StormLegend]

It's nothing wrong with PSN I honestly don't see the problems you guys are having. I had ran into some things before but it wasn't nothing major.

[ps5fanboy]

Psn is bad enough to make valid an opinion piece about it?

I don't think so.

[avidgamer1]

A game like destiny kinda forces you to go online to search for random raid and strike friends, to have to wait for the messages to go through psn is frustrating. It is the most frustrating when you have people online ready to do strikes with you but you cant because psn cant allow you to add friends at certain times.

[TGF_Zero]

Hit the nail on the head. There is so much yes in your comment that i feel compelled to award you a bubble.

[Volkama]

would you be willing to give up some of your "free" games to see some more of that money invested in the infrastructure?

[AngelicIceDiamond]

That's a good question.

[averagejoe26]

I also have had zero issues besides the major/lizard squad stuff.

[DragoonsScaleLegends]

It's only been down for me twice and the first time was when those dudes on twitter did a DDOS, other than that it has been pretty stable. But I wish my PS4 had more features but besides that it's pretty great as long as you ignore the few over-hyped games so far. I have never seen PSN not work unexpectedly on PS3 though except for the hack a few years ago.

[isarai]

You do realize PSN was attcked to the point of crashing the entire service twice in one month right? An attack that virtually no online service has a good defence for, that's why theres been a lot of issues and maintenance recently, to undo what the LizardSquad fucktards did

[rainslacker]

Sony's servers weren't in danger of crashing. The attacks were upstream of Sony's servers, no tangible attack actually made it to Sony's servers. The reason it seemed to be affecting Sony's servers was because most traffic couldn't make it through the upstream server. This is how most DDoS attacks actually achieve results.

[tlougotg]

It is rarely down with me, even when the lizard squad struck i was online, playing fine. However i agree Sony needs to keep improving its online. For some reason the msgs take forever to load sometimes, so does online list, and i recieve messages often times minutes after it was sent to me (i know this because my phone app always gets them way before).It defintely isnt my connection bcus im using QuantumFios with 75 mb download/Upload and everything else works fast.

[CorruptBoyd]

Yeh psn is garbage i get random error codes all the time. my 360 was a much better experience.

[vongruetz]

I'd be happy if they could just fix their store, I'd be happy. Scrolling through the Vita's storefront, you have games mispelled, PS1 games in the wrong category, and PS Mobile games are just impossible to find.
Spell the game's name correctly and put them in alphabetical order. How hard can it be?

[Artista]

I know where I'll be doing my online gaming this fall.

On an actual reliable service

-------------------

What a joke.
This is probably not the last time the netwrok will be DDOSed or breached.

At this rate, it'll be 2011 all over again.

On the bright side, you're getting "free games".

[captainexplosion]

Xbox's are not reliable.

[Bassmint]

You know Xbox live was taken down by DDOS attacks aswell right?

[rainslacker]

Yeah, or it could be like in 2008 when Xbox didn't work over the Christmas holiday. So much reliability.

If you're gonna troll, make sure who you're trolling for has no skeletons in their closet.

BTW, DDoS isn't a server breach, and XBL is just as susceptible to it as PSN is. Did you know that all of MS Japanese Live services were taken down in Japan in 2011 due to a DDoS...xbox and other live services.

[Elda]

It's not bad at all,it's better now then before & it'll get even bettter.

[ricochetmg]

psn has been perfect for me although I do live in civilization.

[PS3Screwed87]

Yeah PSN going under not to mention sonys taking away playstation home that virtual platform is was kept PS3 users But Now not so much i've delt with Sony after they blocked my 1st account due to hackers yet 2014 i gave them another chance in now PS3 users pretty much screwed now i know cause im one of them >.<

[captainexplosion]

I went through 12 xbox 360s. I never had one work for more than 3.5 months. I never had the rrod. They all were the unable to read disc error because the console couldnt spin the disc fast enough to get it to play. I sent two in for repairs and a little after I got them back Microsoft tested a background update to a small minority of users that was designed to determine if consoles were hacked. The background update was faulty and determined mine were hacked even though they weren't. The update was made to brick hacked consoles. I contacted Microsoft and they told me it was there fault but they weren't authorized to send me new replacement consoles. Another time when I called in for a paid repair I was told to call back the next day because they were going to improve warranties starting the next day. So I called back and that day they started reducing warranties from 12 months to 3 months. And the last time I sent a console in for a paid repair about a year ago I was told that I would get a 5 year warranty because I had been though so many consoles. So I sent my console in but it came back unable to read discs again. I waited about 3 months to send it in and when I called they said it only had a 3 month warranty and it had been 3 months and 1 day so they refused to honor. I have had more problems with Xbox's than anyone. I got a XB1 for my son a couple of months ago even though I didnt want one and I need to send it in for a repair already. Both of my brothers got XB1s that wouldn't power on out of the box. On top of that I can not get it to stream Netflix in HD. I did have one PS3 that broke but other than that I have not had problems with PS's. And I don't know if it is just luck or what but I can always access PSN just fine. Today and yesterday my son was having problems with Live when trying to play PvZ Garden Warfare. So I hear people complain about PSN being down every once in a while and I have to laugh because my Xbox's never work for me.

[Game0N]

Damn that's awful

[Mrveryodd]

12 sorry I think that is BS .... And I have the very first 360 and it still goes . It was repaired by Microsoft at there expense and the warenty went from 12 months to 36 months because of the RROD the 360 I have is a day one edition. By the way 12 that makes you a lier or a fool.

[captainexplosion]

I am not exaggerating a bit. Actually I was under-exaggerating. I've had 14 technically. The 12 that broke (I got the first in late 2008 and missed the rrod problem and they all had the unable to read disc error) and one I bought used off EBay that broke but I didnt count that because it was used and the 14th one I bought in December. The 14th one still works I believe but it has probably only been used for about 20 hours. Of the initial 12 I bought none worked for more than 3.5 months. And they actually reduced there warranties.

[jspsc123]

i believe it. the 360 was built like shit. look at it wrong and it will brake

[PrinterMan]

The PS4 was built for playing games not for a media center. If someone bought the PS4 to play MP3's perhaps they should have read the label so to speak. The PS4 is a gaming console, anything else is just a bonus. Ya I know the Xbone can do yadda yadda so go buy one. 'Xbox On' big deal. Killzone, Infamous , Blood Bourne etc is a much bigger deal.

So everyone get their Jollies comparing apples to oranges I'm going to go play a game.

[swishersweets20031]

Ps4 service is slow as hell. Takes about 10 minutes to get the message and then another 5 minutes to send one back. Then it takes another 5 minutes of spamming Delete Message to get it to get out of my inbox. They need to hold up to their promises about using the money we are being forced to pay for multiplayer for a better psn servers. I'm not even getting my full potential of speed on the damn thing when it's wired directly into the modem. Step up your game sony or get off the crack hype machine you built around yourself.

[LAWSON72]

I love my Xbone, but for the past few months I would like to ask MS to fix Live. It seems like the whole damn thing has some issue loading and is usually slow on my 100mbps. It is ridiculous and happens on a daily basis.

[KingKevo]

Yeah, PSN on PS4 seems like a beta product in terms of reliability in some areas.

Thinks that won't work properly are friends lists and all that has to do with that, loading profiles, loading parties, party stability, sending messages and invites, loading while in-game/app, the what's new section or whatever it's called and lastly the entire notification section has problems too from time to time as well. Also, it is just weird that invites and messages appear first on my PS app on my phone than on my console and that (even though the app has loading errors as well from time to time) it is easier to check stuff on there, since loading the friends list will work almost all the time on the phone and weirdly seems to trigger it to load on the PS4 very often.

It is just weird that they make so much money with the PS4 and PS+ yet there are all these basic problems that mainly come from the UI and architecture of the system. They should really start patching asap and also release smaller patches instead of one huge patch every 6 months or so.

But tbh, I still think the PS4 was originally planed to release this year and that is why so many things (PSN, UI, media files support, DLNA and BLu-Ray playback) are still either missing or very basic, or even poor. It is weird that one of the leaders in the Blu-Ray player market that even co-developed the format releases the PS4 that has such limited and basic options. They should hire more people to work these problems and it should be a main priority, period. I'm still happy with the PS4, but they need to get their stuff together quicker.

[Assassingamer136]

Its like the PS4 players and xbone players switched sides lol wtf is going on?

[d0x360]

Its a double edge sword. On one side Sony should have their act together by now. Psn is in its 3rd generation. At the same time Sony only started charging for PS+ not that long ago and building infrastructure takes money and Sony doesn't have extra money to build it out so its going to be a slow process. At that same time like them or not Microsoft is a massive company with incredibly smart people who have way more experience with software, servers and services so its basically expected that xbl will be a better run service.

I'm sure Sony will get there sooner rather than later. Every time psn is down it makes them look worse and they don't want that and we don't want that. Just have Patience.

[Flames76]

PSN has been broken from the start on the ps3.So what makes you think their gonna fix it now?Anly difference now is on the ps4 they charge $50 a year to not be able to play online

[JasonX43]

This looks like a good place to post this:

http://youtu.be/M3w1_E1V46M