Hopefully sony can make the updating of licenses more seamless on the ps4. Maybe if more people encountered this problem and called customer services sony would address it quicker. Interesting article..a fair view even if it doesn't affect the current majority

Bull**it.. this is so minor problem, it is not worth mentioning.. But tell me - the PS+ is supervalue for users. How is it from business point of view for Sony?

Updating licenses makes sense but I have to laugh at how the author discovered this issue. Sony sent them free indie games as if that's ever going to happen to us normal gamers.

And really, who is going to spend money on PS+ and access the free games, unsubscribe, spend more money on the very same game?

I think PSN +PLUS is awesome, if you don't want it then you still have free online play and everything you are use to, you really can't complain

PS+ every week is exciting to see what's next. My only complaint is I didn't sign up sooner.

The author is wrong about one thing. He believes there is an option to own a game by purchasing a license that never expires. While the license never expires it is still dependant on the PSN service.

When you "buy" a game from the PS Store you get a sublicense, not an actual license. This means that Sony bought the license and is giving you access. If you "buy" a game and the online service stops you lose the game. If the PS4 comes out and they decide to stop support for the PS3 online you lose your games. Why? Well because the games you bought need to be activated by the service. Backing up your games won't matter. It is useless without the activation key.

PS+ is one of the greatest services out there!
However,
My only growing concern is, will it transition over onto the PS4?
My subscription recently expired a few months ago & instead of doing the full year subscription, I did the 90 day renewal, because I don't want to have PS+ beyond the launch of the PS4, especially if it doesn't transfer over.

Any argument against PS plus is simply void.

Pay $60, get 24 games (48 if you have aVita). Some fairly new, some old, some you may already have, some you may not!!! As a gamer its a great way to experience games you otherwise would have skipped on and at the cost of only one full priced retail release. For young kids and teens who can probably only afford a handful of games each year, its especially awesome.

PLUS is the best product in the videogames history. For 50 USD you have 40 or more games (if you have a Vita),discounts and free trials.

"For single games, it means that if you download a "free" PlayStation Plus game, you can never purchase a full version of the game."

What stupid argument¡

You can create another count in the PS3 system and you can buy the game. But if you have a game for free in Plus why you want the same game twice?, You can save this money for another game¡

Also You can create an european count, pay 50 € for PLus Europe and You'll get anothers 40 Free games of the old continent, this month Hitman Absolution and Dead or Alive 5. I like very much PLUS, you dont need to be rich to have a great collection ¡ =)

I would have thought the real story would be:
If you downloaded a game from the PS+ played it for a while and liked it. Decided to buy the full version game disk at the store to get the additional features. The game saves will not be recognized by the system/disk. You would have to start the game all over again from scratch.

Could happen to some extent, but I think we all know how poorly designed/implemented games' sales are affected by these sorts of technical deficits.

More than anything, I believe it will provide a sort of "cushion" for, as they stated the junior developers, but as usual it will be the true masters who push the console once even the MIGHTY eight gigabytes aren't enough anymore :)

Those are going to be some truly mouth-watering games to experience.

The hidden problem with playstation plus is im only a small website and I want the hits.

Way to copy a story put up last week.

The hidden problem with PlayStation Plus lies in how its become a worse service since last year's explosive "Instant Game Collection."

I've been a member since day one, and we used to get a set amount of content including Minis, PSone games, and at least one full PSN game a month. This was on top of a bunch of exclusive discounts, free avatars and themes, and whatever else they felt like throwing in.

Some months had some absolute drivel for their offerings, but that's no different today. The difference is, we're not getting nearly as much content as we were when the service launched. We've not seen one free PSone game in over a year, for example, and while we're getting one or two more games a month than we used to, a lot of the time they're just extremely old games that most of the community already owns-- unlike how Plus used to work, where games were fairly often free at launch.

My biggest gripe, though, lies in the discounts. I remember regular sales that had games up to 90% off the normal price, with "normal" users getting half-off (if they got a discount at all). After last year's switcheroo, sales have been abominably boring: they're almost always 30% off for normal users, and 50% off for Plus members. That is, in reality, far worse than it was before, and the sales are much fewer and far between.

I kind of feel cheated, because Sony ditched the contract we originally had with Plus without even letting us know (a big reason I signed up was for monthly PSone games) and made their sales a universally "meh" experience. Still, it's a great deal, and I'll remain a subscriber for as long as they offer the service. You can't argue with free games on a monthly basis-- I just don't buy as much as I used to, in order to avoid disappointment.

...I won't bother bringing up Europe's superior offerings, since I know that'll probably flood this page in an hour or two.

Whats up with all the recent "PS Plus has secret issues" articles?

This is another reason why it is beneficial to have a 2nd account on your PS3 hardware.

Log in as the secondary person, get the desired item. Download and install. Log in again as primary account user and the licenses should be updated.

I did this with SF4 costume packs. Capcom released a few small packs of costumes and then one large pack later on. If someone had purcahsed even one of the smaller packs, then the large (complete) pack would not even show up on the PSN store. Log in with a second account, get the items you want (with the licensing you want). Download and install on the secondary account. Log in as the primary account and the licenses should have been updated.

I bought the pack with SF4 Zangeif costumes and was unable to purchse the entire roster pack later, unless I signed onto the secondary account on my machine and purchased it that way.

Not a solution, but it is a work-around. Hope it helps.

PS Plus needs its own download button at the purchase page, separate from the buy button. I have always wondered about this.

It's a minor problem. But yeah it would be good for Sony and us if Sony makes it possible to buy/upgrade free PS Plus games with perhaps a small discount(5-10%) on the original price.

Everyone wins.

Maybe I'm missing something here but can't you just make another account which hasn't had PS+ and purchase the full game through that?

I don't see what the problem is. PS Plus is less than a full priced game. Just don't stop getting it and no problem. It's definitely worth the $50 a year.

It's not a bad article, but it misses the basic point. The selection criteria for PS Plus games is their sales over the past few months, the reason games like Cave a appeared on PS Plus after only a few months is because it sold abysmally in its first 2-3 months. Sony offers incentives to developers for putting their games on PS Plus, in other words it's a last blast of income for devs' unpopular games, so it's a win-win situation for developers whose games aren't selling and gamers who want premium treatment for paying for a premium service.

Like people said above just wait until your subscription runs out and erase the free version and then buy the game.Can't you do that?

smh.... more complaints over free shit.
I have bl1 thru ps+ free and got a discount on bl2 basically paid 19.00 for both.. wheres the prob? if you dont continue the service then you lose bl1... a game that, by now you should have beatin already. if you didnt then you weren't THAT into if to begin with.
so "SCOFS" (Stop Complaining Over Free Shit)

I was a PS Plus fan initially, but as the offerings got scaled back I became less enticed to keep the sub. I dont have a Vita so I felt I was paying for everyone esle to get free Vita gamres, and thats not cool. I also only had a few games on my list that I hadnt finished that I would like to play again. Shank 2 was one of them. When I tried to purchase the full version of the game, it said I alrready had it downloaded and would not let me purchase the full version. In order to get access I guess I need to paty the $50 a year to play it even though I just want the full $10 version. Is this an oversight? Maybe I wouldnt have let my sub run out if they would give some qality games again. I dont see the point in taking away the free PS1 games and Minis in order to give Vita game. What about those who dont have a Vita? our subs have less value becasue we didnt purchase your failing handheld? No thanks sony, you can keep your Ps + "freebies".

Why dont these people get a hobby then they might not moan about such things..oh hang on a minute?

who subscribes to ps+ and doesn't renew?

I can't even keep up with all the great games, even ok ones, that they give you. Then I get discounts on other games?

Why would I complain?

Author of this article needs to find something valid to talk about.

im not worried im keeping my ps+ for as long as I can its a great deal for $60 a year.

Wow, as an on and off PS Plus member, I didn't know this. Cheers for the informative article.

I haven't read the whole thing but from what I understand.
If you got Borderlands 1 as part of the PlaystationPlus freebie and then bought the Borderlands 1 & 2 bundle you just delete the Borderlands 1 freebie and download the one you bought.
Everything you buy in PSStore (including PSPlus freebies) can be downloaded multiple times so if you stopped paying for PSPlus, delete the Game Data (this isn't Game Saves) and then delete the games and download Borderlands 1 from your Bundle pack in the Store again.

If anything ps plus also revitalizes the online component in most games that show up on the service. Just another thing that would effect you even without being a subscriber to +.

Rarely have I seen so many level 1's at the same time this past September.