While Sony continues to try and counter low supply chains for its PlayStation 5 hardware, the company has continued to evolve and expand in other ways. This includes acquiring other studios like Jadr Raymond's Haven, to join the ranks of its first party developers and continue growing exclusive titles for players. While fans likely won't see the results of this acquisition for some time, Sony has also made more immediate changes, such as the evolution of its PlayStation Plus program.
This past June, Sony completely overhauled its PlayStation Plus subscription service, offering multiple tiers for players to opt into. For those who want more out of the service, including access to a larger backlog of games from past generations, there's the Premium level, while Extra offers more PS4 and PS5 games, and then the Essential tier, which operates exactly has the service has for years. Now, Sony is giving back to its players with a newly announced loyalty program.
In an announcement on the PlayStation Blog, Sony unveiled PlayStation Stars, a free loyalty and rewards program that launches later in 2022. After becoming a member, players can complete activities and campaigns, which reward points. The challenges themselves range in difficulty like the "Monthly Check-In" that requires players to play any game, to more complex versions which require that players earn specific PlayStation trophies, participate and win tournaments, or be the first player in a timezone to earn a platinum trophy in a major title.
Once earned, players can spend points in a rewards catalog that Sony has confirmed will feature a host of items from PSN Wallet Funds, select PlayStation Store products, and more unique rewards. In fact, PlayStation Plus members earn an additional benefit, which earns points when purchasing items from the PlayStation Store.
The last piece to PlayStation Stars is the concept of digital collectibles. According to the blog, these are rewards that are digital representations of things like figures of iconic PlayStation characters and devices from "Sony’s history of innovation." The blog didn't get into specifics, but did confirm that there will always be new collectibles to earn, including ultra rare versions.
While the news should please PlayStation fans, it aligns well with Microsoft's reward system for Xbox users. Members can also take part in all sorts of activities and challenges to earn points, from simple daily challenges, to lengthy weekly and monthly tasks, to others which usual involve checking things out in the online store or marketplace. Similar to Sony, Xbox users can also spend accumulated points on a variety of things like Xbox Store credit, subscriptions to Game Pass, limited time raffles, and much more.
Source: PlayStation Blog