Best of both worlds?
Physical media is under threat like we’ve never seen before, with Sony providing confirmation that it will no longer manufacture PS5 discs from January 2028.
Now, Sega’s president Shuji Utsumi has provided information on the company’s own stance in a new interview with Famitsu. In a nutshell, Sega seemingly has no plans to completely abandon physical media, but Utsumi-san stresses the importance of the shift to digital, calling it “crucial”. He believes that due to the “steadily increasing” number of people playing on PC, Sega needs to be there to cultivate the market.
This has apparently required a conscious change in mindset from Sega, with Utsumi-san claiming that the company tends to “think from a physical perspective”.
Here’s what he had to say (machine translated):
“When it comes to titles we call “full games” for consoles and PCs, we believe that a digital shift is crucial. Of course, consoles are important, but the proportion of people who play on PCs is steadily increasing. Even in areas where consoles are not widely available, there are many people who say, “I can play it on PC.” In order to cultivate that market, we believe it is important to strengthen our digitalisation. We tend to think from a physical perspective, so I think we need to be more digitally conscious and become more global.
“We were originally a platform provider, and of course, we still value the culture of physical media. Rather than completely abandoning that, we are currently challenging ourselves to shift so that we can think about and act on the important aspects of digital media in parallel.”
We’re curious to see exactly what Sega’s plans are for physical distribution in the future. With PS5, at least, we can’t really see how it has any say in the matter, and it seems likely that Xbox will also follow suit. So could Sega shift its focus more toward the Switch and Switch 2?
Its distribution on Switch 2 so far hasn’t exactly been stellar. Games like Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds have come fully on cartridge, but the recently-released Sonic Frontiers – Definitive Edition was a Game-Key Card, and there’s seemingly no rhyme or reason as to which path Sega chooses to take.
Honestly, right now, it kinda feels like Utsumi-san is saying what customers want to hear, but we suspect that it – along with most major publishers – will be glad to see the back of physical media and the second-hand market.
