The PlayStation Store is fine if you know how to deal with its idiosyncrasies, but discovery for lesser known titles is pretty poor. While the plaza will promote major releases like FIFA 21 and Fortnite pretty heavily, you’ll need a lot of luck if you’re hoping to get found as a relatively unknown indie game – as this video from No More Robots’ Mike Rose demonstrates.
He’s trying to find Descenders, the roguelite cycling title which launched today. Naturally, the release isn’t present in the primary New Games tab, although he doesn’t click the See All button which would have shown him the title near to the top. Nevertheless, the Search function proves unforgivable, with the game listed last even when you type out its full name.
To be fair, the title is displayed front and centre in the Latest Releases tab on the PS Store’s web browser page, so it’s not like Descenders has been completely obscured from view; the game definitely can be found if you’re willing to browse around a little bit. The problem is that it’s somewhat buried, and unless you’re specifically looking for it, you’re unlikely to find it.
It isn’t the first time that No More Robots has complained about PlayStation’s support for smaller releases, as it revealed that its deck building game Nowhere Prophet “barely sold anything” on the PS4. As such, it “doubts” it’ll release any more games on Sony’s system. “For how gruelling the PlayStation submission process is, to then literally be buried by movies and DLC in the search makes me feel genuinely ill,” Rose said of Descenders.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 61
Playstation store has been awful for this for a while, I'm sick of seeing FIFA and Fortnite every time I'm trying to search for a game
Here's a challenge, find the PS2 games section on the store just by navigating the menu's
I get the pain. Sometimes when I search for games it really is listed underneath all another's games DLC, Character packs etc... Sony would be better off grouping games content together rather than the search function being a large blob. One area for sure they can improve with the PS5. Nintendo eshop is also a bit of a mess. Microsoft regularly update their store page. Its not always good but at least they try.
This is sad, it seems that Sony only care about what can make the most money for the front page. Steam has it right, they have an entire section to newly released games regardless of the developer or how much money it will make. I'm sure there are many Indie games that have gone under the radar because of this broken system.
@Richm246 as stated in the article had he simply clicked view all, all the new releases are listed.
Yeah definitely needs sorting out.
The whole storefront seems so slow now as well. It's not quite PS3 levels of frustration, but doesn't really feel like we've had a decade worth of improvements either.
Hopefully they'll sort a lot of these problems for next gen.
... it's shocking... I mean I just thought I'd take advantage of the 25% off PS Now offer but wanted to see what games are on there... how difficult is it just to see the games on offer before buying? VIRTUALLY IMPOSSIBLE!!!
.. the worst thing about finding games and sales, etc. is the fact that they mix in DLC / coins / etc. into the mix - so you're trawling through truckloads of in-game purchases just to find game titles... they should be in a completely different section!
... I mean, just click "demos" for example.. the devices listed haven't even been updated to include PSVR - despite loads of demos for it... obviously PSP is still there, as it was just as well supported as the PS Vita... I mean, come on PS... whack our PSN fee up to £50 and do nothing to update the website and give us less games which are months (sometimes years) old... WHERE IS OUR MONEY GOING!?!?
.. I swear to god they better have this shizzle sorted for the PS5 launch...
@MarcG420 I get that, but it's still a pain the arse to find something and it's still prioritised by the games that make top dollar first. I guess it's different for Valve because they don't make as many games anymore (Where is HL3?) so they don't really need to prioritise games because they make money either way. but obviously (and sadly) Sony is going to prioritise Ghost of Tsushima over a smaller Indie title that is going to make a lot less money
Sony really need to take notes from Valve for the PS Store on PS5
The search system is ridiculous and I mostly experienced it when trying to search for Themes. When you go to Themes tab, click Search and type out a name of the game you get everything, from full game to every little DLC, no way to filter out what you're looking for. It's surprising how such basic features fail to function on one of the biggest gaming platforms. Hope they redesign propery in for PS5
@Richm246 haha! I assume that's a joke... I mean Steam is like wading backwards through a sea of treacle with black goggles on.. impossible to find anything these days!! it really is the template now of how 'not' to do a games store!
@MarcG420 but the point is that you shouldn't have to do that
What makes me even more worried is that Sony makes a lot of money off the ps store. I find it almost embarrassing how bad the whole thing is. I mean, PS4 is a hell of a machine, games are getting better and better, as we move towards a more digital future. And their own online store is this bad? For people to find stuff they might like is an effort. You either gotta know exactly what you want and grind a bit for it, or don't bother.
Now imagine making a game and going through this crap? Unbelievable....
This isn't news. PS4 has a horrible store interface. It's only gotten worse with time. The old PS3 layout was much better.
@OneManDroid Yeah, it was a joke, but in all seriousness Steam has A LOT more games to go thru than the PS Store
@Richm246 ever heard the saying give the people what they want. There’s a reason the most popular titles show up first and foremost.
@OneManDroid yeah... given indie Devs make the exact same criticisms of the Steam store, using it as an exemplar of UI, UX and IxD seems a tad bizarre. However, if you know it's Byzantine idiosyncrasies it does work fairly well, if you know what you're looking for. I guess the same could be said of the PS Store too.
Either way the current situation does often tend to bury smaller releases, and I do think it needs tidying up. I also find it bizarre that the store doesn't act more like Amazon given the metrics Sony have with which to tailor a personalised experience. I literally am getting TLoU2 recommended to me in the store, even though a cursory check against my play history would tell Sony I've platinumed the game, and thus use that space to advertise something I might buy. Either way the store is garbage and could do with an overhaul.
@theMEGAniggle when you have as many games releasing as there are on PS4 some will not be showcased front and center. There are just too many to do that to. The most popular do and should be given prominent position as they’re more likely to be looked for.
That's pretty bad it's under dlc and movies. I get that Sony will present search results for popular games but for it to be hidden under content that isn't video games is awful.
Why don't companies have a calendar list of games releasing in that week? Netflix have just implemented something similar so you can select things to go into your list when it goes live and it's a god send.
I only use website version of psn. And now I can't login on my iphone using safari (notification from psn website: due to recent web browser update, this browser is not supported), I never have problem login on safari with nintendo/steam/epic/gmail/yahoo/others website.
@Richm246 @theMEGAniggle now with that being said I do believe they should have more filters. I should be able to just look at games or just add on content (from a search I mean) etc...
@wiiware means you need an update probably...
Edit: or there was an update and psn hasn’t caught up yet possibly
@wiiware Who still uses Safari? Using Safari (regardless of device) Is like using Internet Explorer, the purpose of it is to download a better Browser.
@MarcG420 Yes, Steam is a big mess of God knows what, but at least the filters are there for people who want to find something specific.
Actually I might have something to add here, a friend published an indie game to multiple stores and received feedback from MS that his problem might be that his game had too many tags and that can cause a problem with where his game appeared in searches. I would have assumed more tags = better visibility, but apparently not. Maybe it's the same with the PSN?
Third game to show up when I tried it
@MarcG420 yeah for sure. More filters are needed, there are times I'm looking for a specific type of game but I have to search it on Google first. The store is a far cry from what it used to be tho 😅
And everyone thought the eShop was bad...
Nintendo eShop is just as much of a trainwreck, if not even more so. The Nintendo 3DS iteration of the platform used to shuffle things around, but nowadays it's mostly a showcase for Nintendo Selects and Switch stuff.
The Xbox store has only now solved the long-standing issue of "if you want to buy a 360 game, buy it on a 360". I used to have fond memories of the PS Store, but ever since the PSP dropped its support those are long gone.
I imagine the spots FIFA and Fortnite have are paid for, and there are a lot of games released each week so it would be very difficult to showcase all of them... but yeah it could be improved.
I usually go to games>all games>released in the last 7 days to check out what's new
Yeah thats not right, sony get your *#@$ together. So let me get thus straight, even though (almost daily) i go into the store on my ps4, choose games, then choose new games, then choose sort by newest.... Its still not showing me all the new games???
Why didn’t he click “see all” in new?
It’s like he didn’t want to find it.
Obviously they need to sort the search out, it's rubbish. But not clicking view all under new games is his own fault, it's not like that is a small button you can easily miss. How many titles are there on the ps store I wonder? Honestly don't know an easy way to present all that info. Moving all DLC to a sublisting under the main game might help reduce it a little.
If you go to See All in New then it's right there on the first line.
This is where I go straight away and he knows it's there for sure but just didn't click on it.
@OmegaStriver Yeah, he obviously ignored that for dramatic effect, but I do think he still has a point. Obviously it's not as bad as he makes it look, but it could still be much better as well!
Old news plenty of developers (large and small) have complained to Sony in the UK about the store.
Not forgetting the amount of times that I have witnessed myself of the store actually having to shut down because of what I can only assume was a software issue!
PS Store is a big mess as pawn shop, no doubts.
@AlexSora89 at least with the eshop you can clearly see all the new releases and its pretty easy to search by publishers as well. The sales page needs sorting when there's something like 800 games on sale but most are trash
but its still 1000000000000 times better than the ffffffffffffffffffffff nintendo farce shope
@get2sammyb I agree overall with you but how he purposely misrepresented the problem and made it seem bigger than what it is doesn’t sit well with me. People doing this annoys me. It happens all over the internet with different topics.
Honestly I'd buy the game just because he had ff9's tetra master minigame music playing in the background.
It’s garbage but nowhere near as garbage as the Nintendo switch store.
@Richm246 I like using safari on my iphone.
@MarcG420 No, only psn have problem with iphone safari, I already delete my cache and psn still give me the error.
Then don't release your small titles on PS4, problem solved. The dude didn't even select 'see all' under new games. These smaller developers need to understand that we live in an era where making video games is easier than ever. Theirs easily 10 to 20 new games that hit the store every week. Theirs no way your small title unless you bring something seriously unique to the table is gonna be displayed prominently on the PS store.
The best thing PlayStation could do to support smaller scale games is to bring The Drop post back to PS Blog.
I discovered a lot of lesser known games that way, and I am still baffled that they have not brought it back. Seems like a really simple way to get me and others to spend money on games.
I have never had an issue with the store or finding something I’m looking for. In fact, when I’m looking for something, sometimes I find another jewel of a game that I didn’t even know existed.
I had to contact Sony support recently as I couldn't see 'Black Desert' the standard edition in My library or on the PS Store UI.
I had to go into my account and do something like restore licences and then lo and behold I could see it and several other games that I couldn't before!
I think the PS Store needs to be a bit smarter than that. Only advantage it has over the PS3 version is the speed.
Found his game in 20 seconds and also his game it does appear on top of the new games tab. The search function is far from perfect but it's not as bad as he pretend to make it look.
it took all of 10 seconds to find the game, it's third in the Games/New/See-all section. if the previous game "barely sold anything" to 100m+ users, it's rather patronising to assume it must be the store's fault and nobody has figured out how to view new releases. like any store, the stuff that sells big and sells best is going to get a more prominent display. maybe they should just put an option in the menu along with Featured/Whats Hot called "New Releases".
As for the search - the algorithm might be using a weighted score, which is pretty common.. though not exactly perfect. in this case because the game is new, it might not have received that many "hits", so weighting produces an ordering that seems at odds with what is searched. a lot of fuzzy text search algorithms would probably assign the same value to descend, descendant, descender. if he had searched for his studio name, "no more robots", his two games come out first and second in search order.
I hate the store. I remember when I got a Pro and went to that section in the store and it was basically just every PS4 game ever, only in no particular order.
Then there's the fact that I can never view screenshots and every time I leave the store my PS has lag issues navigating the UI for the next minute or so.
There's also the mix of games and themes/add-on content problem in the sales. Drives me crazy. Would be fine if the filters worked right but they don't so...
This is another reason why I just buy physical media mostly.
ps store is terrible my ps4pro lags like crazy on the store, using search sometimes impossible as it can't find what i want. Steam has the best store shame my pc is crappy. the new xbox store is better than it was but no as good as steam.
I'd quite like a "hide game" function so I don't have to have so much of the initial pages of the store taken up by FIFA, Fortnite and Apex Legends, etc. You could even have a "hide genre" function. I mean, it's extremely rare that I play an FPS and never play sports games. Though I can see potential problems when a game is a mix of genres, like if blocking FPS also blocked Deus Ex or Cyberpunk 2077, games I'd play for RPG elements rather than FPS ones.
It ain't that bad. All he needs to do is go to what's hot and look at the new releases and he'll see it listed with other new releases by date. It would take less than 10 seconds.
This is something that doesn’t get talked about enough. The PSN Store is set up to only promote new games and unless you specifically search for it you’re never gonna find it. It is obvious that companies pay for visible space much like in a supermarket aisle. For instance when Disney+ launched it was straight to the front of the pack in the menus. Money is exchanging hands - and that’s ok! But.... when the consumer experience suffers because of these choices it’s pretty bleak.
It's mind boggling how bad the PS store is and it needs a complete redesign. Almost every feature is a decade behind modern e-commerce. Try it on mobile for an even worse experience that will amaze you with its technical brokenness and lack of features.
That's a shame. I only buy physical copies - being pragmatic, and all. 🤷🏻♂️
The only way Im gonna see your indie game is when its on sale. I buy just about all of them but only when I see them onsale. So that would be my message to this developer. PUT IT ON SALE and then Ill see it and buy it.
This was the same issue Indie Devs had with the store on PS3 but for PS4 you've got this guy who can't find his own game as easily as he wants. But you I've had that black tiger game show up on my recommendation list because I played something else.
Asset flipped games that shouldn't even be on the store in the first place because it's just con artists taken the pis s like they did and still do on Steam.
The store is like the company I work for which is food retail, brands pay for the best space so it's in your face as you walk in, take this in question high end publishers who can afford it pay for the slot at the top
Doesn't bother me i won't be buying their games anyways
If you do not have competition then you can provide a sh1t user experience and everyone just has to accept it.
Come on Sony, would it really be that hard to have a separate new releases tab devoted to just Indie games?
On one hand, yes, all three parties have utter ***** store interfaces. Recently, for the first time this generation got to play around with the Xbox One X's interface. I expected, since it's an X, it'd be quick and snappy. So damn clunky, so slow. There's no excuse, next-gen, not just the store interface, but the whole OS should move as quick, as snappy, as fast as my phone, PC or tablet does. This is ridiculous. On Switch I'm wasting entire minutes waiting 10 seconds for each 6 more entries to load. Why would anyone have the patience to scroll through the lists of games you make and discover new games if it's such a horrid experience?
On the other hand, I played this game on GamePass. No disrespect to the developer, but I would not want games like that covering the front pages of the store. Maybe some indie section somewhere. I was excited about this game, because it looks fun to play, but overall feels like an unfinished university project. It'd be a fine release for something in Early Access.
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