From login problems to slow downloads and missing buttons, it can be difficult to locate your PSP, Vita and PS3 libraries
After hearing the news of the closure of the PSP, Vita and PS3 store last week, I was disappointed, but I was not as enthusiastic as some. More as a whole upset and tired. Are we really doing this, Sony? Well, all right.
With the recent clarification that we will still be able to download our purchases after the store closes (for now, at least), I planned to postpone putting my libraries in order. July 2 – the PS3 and PSP store closing date – seemed far enough away that I didn’t have to take action.
With that “I’ll fix it later” mentality, on Friday, I started scouring various forums and communities to cool off in that only digital games and economical shopping are worth looking at before it’s too late. Tomba costs how many on disk today? Okay, of course, another PS1 Classic to the list. The next thing I realized was that I was doing a lot of research and I couldn’t help it. I went a little crazy.
In front of the PSP and Vita, I have a PlayStation Portable, but it no longer has a functional battery (the bulge caught me). And although I never had a PlayStation Vita itself, I did get a PlayStation TV when they were super cheap – I just never bothered to do much with the box after a quick look.
My PS3 is the type that doesn’t play PS2 discs, and I picked it up at the end of the cycle, so I never ended up winning a lot of titles for it. Funny, most of my PS3 games are just cool, quirky and laid-back PlayStation Network indies – the exact sort of thing people are rushing to pick up before stores close in 2021.
You don’t need to know all of my personal PlayStation history, of course, but I am mentioning it briefly just as a starting point. After setting up my systems again, I found some games I didn’t expect – when the hell did I buy Ring of Red? – and I also realized that I didn’t have everything I thought I had.
Whether you have renounced Sony or are still open to the idea of buying digital copies of older PlayStation games, while you are allowed to do so, I recommend that you make a decision sooner or later. With the inability to check your “legacy” console libraries in a web browser, the accounting process is a huge pain. I say this as someone who, again, doesn’t even have that much digital stuff.
My first wake-up call was when I tried to log in to these systems. I started with PlayStation TV, and while my account information was still there, my password gave me an error. It turns out that I needed to authenticate my PS TV and PS3 login using a semi-obscure Sony page to generate a password.
(If you have 2-Step and are fighting like me: go to PlayStation Store, click on your avatar at the top, then Account Settings, Security and, finally, Device Configuration Password. This will help you to login.)
After logging in, I took an inventory of my PSP, Vita and PS3 games and ran them through this very useful collection of game recommendation lists on ResetEra. Another good one: this list of games that you can play on your Vita, but only if you buy them on a PS3 and then transfer them.
If there is a theme for this article, it is that everything involved in preparing for the PlayStation store to close is more time-consuming and painstaking than it should be – in an order of magnitude.
In this case, the “add to cart” button (and, as a result, pricing information) is invisible to me on the PS3 store.
I had heard complaints about it recently, but seeing it for myself was wild. As a workaround for the missing button, every time I landed on a game I wanted to buy (a process in itself), I had to go down and highlight the “Overview” button and then press up once and press X to confirm. I also read about purchases that were not completed, but I did not find any of these errors. Fingers crossed.
If you’re like me, you’ll want to fill in the gaps in your PS1 and PS2 classic collections on PS3 and Vita. It’s less than ideal, but in many cases, it’s better to search for games manually than to rely on incomplete PlayStation Store lists. For the first, search for “PSOne”; for the latter, “PS2”. This should bring an alphabetical list of classics for you to read. I would also take notes as needed to let you know which of your games are already installed – the Download List is not useful. It is still a clunker in 2021.
At the risk of rambling more than I need, there is also the question of browsing the PlayStation Store and downloading, installing and fixing games in general on these platforms. And it all A lot of slower than I remembered, and to begin with, I had no particularly fond memories. Enter this process hoping to take care of everything – even in the best circumstances, it will look like a project.
I ended up with a dozen more PS1 classics, including Mega Man Legends, Suikoden, and The Legend of the Dragon, as well as the resident Evils (I’ll laugh if Capcom makes modern doors later this year for the series’s 25th anniversary) and unmissable titles like Ogre Tactics: Let’s hold on. When will I play any of these things? This is a topic for another day – but I will try, honestly!
I did just the bare minimum, that is, I got the games I wanted (and some probably didn’t), but I didn’t back up anything or dedicate extra time to prepare my digital for future purchases. These conversations are taking place online, however. If you invested in your digital library for PSP, Vita and PS3, I wouldn’t necessarily encourage you to start buying a bunch of old games that you may or may not need before Sony hangs up on new purchases, but I would start to discover one plan.
For anyone who is moving away from the PlayStation ecosystem due to these shutdowns – or at least reconsidering their position on Sony’s digital purchases – I feel you. The brand had a great success.
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