‘Expired’ PS Vita and PS3 digital games are now unplayable

Players on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita are having trouble accessing their digital purchases after a strange expiration date suddenly appeared on certain games, as first reported by Kotaku. The issue appears to mostly affect classic titles, preventing users from playing chrono crossAnd Chrono playerAnd Final Fantasy VIbecause the games are now “expired”.

But here’s the weird part: expiration dates are dated half a century in the past. Twitter user Christopher Voss Share a picture for him chrono cross The download, which signifies the game’s expiration on December 31, 1969 at 7:20 PM. He says that the problem only occurred after re-downloading the game, and that he is now unable to play it on PS3 and PS Vita.

GamesHub Editor Edmund Tran similarly found He was unable to play chrono cross On PS3 thanks to an expiration date of 52 years. And while Tran says he can still play the classic title on his PS Vita, he was unable to find the listing on the PS Vita Store, an indication that Sony may have deleted it. else users on reddit And Twitter I also reported the issue with Rune Ocean FactoryAnd Super Street Fighter 4: Arcade EditionAnd Gex: Enter the geckoAnd for some Their entire digital library.

As pointed out in various threads and posts about the issue, some players say they have tried factory resetting their consoles, subscribing and unsubscribing to PlayStation Plus, and restoring their game licenses, all to no avail. PlayStation has not yet acknowledged the situation, and the game company has not responded immediately the edgeComment request.

However, there is one possible reason for this to happen. Kotaku It indicates that the issue may be caused by a bug that caused the PS Vita and PS3 to revert expiration dates of game licenses to the Unix era, or an arbitrary time and date set by developers to set the console’s beginning of life.

Even if this is just a glitch, it raises concerns that Sony is dealing another blow to PS3 and PS Vita stores. distance The game company almost closed both stores Last year, it made shopping for them even more difficult Take away the ability to use credit cards or PayPal to make purchases.