Sony recently responded to the issue of charging a 30% platform commission on the PlayStation Store, saying that maintaining a developer support system requires "huge investment", which is one of the important reasons why the commission ratio can be maintained. Currently, Sony is facing a class-action lawsuit. The plaintiff accused Sony of constituting a market monopoly by restricting the distribution channels of third-party games on its platform.
Against this background, Sony executives recently explained the business logic behind the 30% commission in an interview.
According to Sony, there are currently 10,000 developers and publishers working with Sony and active in the PS5 ecosystem. To this end, Sony has established five dedicated teams within Sony to provide support to these partners.
Sony said in the interview that keeping the system running is "a huge investment," which is one of the reasons why stores charge a 30% fee.
Christian Svensson, vice president of second-party and third-party content at Sony, added: “Looking back at the history of PlayStation, from the beginning we have been a platform that places great emphasis on the third-party ecosystem.”
In other related news, Sony said in its latest earnings presentation that AI will drive the future of PlayStation gaming. In addition, the battle between physical and digital versions continues - Sony's fourth quarter fiscal year 2025 data shows that up to 85% of PS5 game sales are digital versions, and the proportion of physical versions continues to shrink.
