While analysts believe that Sony is unlikely to change its mind about ending the production of PlayStation discs in January 2028, they still think that the decision will ultimately deal some damage to the entire industry’s value to some extent. According to CNBC, analytics firm Dataintelo estimated that the market for second-hand games alone is globally valued at around $7.2 billion as of last year. The end of disc production would also see this market essentially disappear for new games.
The firm noted that the second-hand games market is still expected to grow quite a bit, with a rate of 7.5 percent from 2026 to 2034, eventually hitting $13.8 billion. The market largely exists due to the issue of affordability in gaming, especially in more recent times where hardware and software have all seen increases in price.
“In 2025, more than 38% of all video game transactions in the United States alone involved a pre-owned or used title, reflecting deep structural demand for the secondary gaming economy,” noted the firm.
Wedbush Securities’ managing director of strategic planning, Michael Pachter, has said that “there can be no question that the consumer pays the tax in terms of less optionality,” despite it saving Sony some money in disc production costs.
Bringing up the company’s previous support of the used game market as part of its PS4 announcement, Morningstar’s director of equity research, Kazunori Ito, called the company’s recent announcement “a truly ironic turn of events”.
Founder of industry consultancy firm F-Squared, Michael Fuffter, called the move “an extremely anti-consumer decision” that “has no legitimate justification and communicates a disdain for players in their ecosystem.” Talking about how consoles are closed systems, unlike PCs, where the physical games market has all but died, he said, “Sony would love for us to believe that the PC market’s shift to digital is the exact same thing as consoles going down that path. It simply isn’t.”
Dataintelo’s figures come in light of analysts discussing the lack of sales success for physical releases of more recent games. Recently, Circana’s Mat Piscatella pointed out that only two games sold more than 10,000 physical copies in the US in the entire week ending on July 11th. Along with this, he said that only seven games so far have sold more than 100,000 physical copies all year.
Similarly, Kantan Games CEO Dr. Serkan Toto expressed the belief that Sony is simply waiting for the “storm” of player discontent to pass by. Niko Partners’ Daniel Ahmad said that, while Sony is unlikely to reverse its decision on the matter, it will likely offer more details in the coming months.
When it comes to retailers, the biggest criticism of Sony’s announcement has come from the UK’s Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA). CEO Kim Bayley said in a statement that the decision would harm retailers as well as gamers, and called it “a triumph of corporate convenience over consumer choice.”
For its part, Sony said that the decision to end disc production was made to align the company with consumer trends in the modern market.
