PlayStation Now was announced on January 7, 2014 at the 2014 Consumer Electronics Show. At CES, Sony presented demos of The Last of Us, ', Puppeteer, and ', playable through PS Now on Bravia TVs and PlayStation Vita. The closed beta began in the United States on January 28 with PS3, and on May 19 was extended to PS4. To implement the service, Sony created a single motherboard equivalent to 8 PS3 console units into a server rack to allow the games to function, as opposed to software emulation, due to architectural complexity. PlayStation Now was launched in Open Beta in the United States and Canada on PS4 on July 31, 2014, on PS3 on September 18, 2014, on PS Vita and PS TV on October 14, 2014, with support for select 2014 Bravia TVs coming later in the year. At Gamescom 2014, SCE announced that PS Now would arrive in Europe in 2015, with the United Kingdom to be the first European country to access the service. On December 24, 2014, Sony announced that PlayStation Now would expand to the other electronic brands. On CES 2015, Sony confirmed that PlayStation Now would arrive in North America on PS4 as full release on January 13, 2015. On March 7, 2015, it was revealed that PlayStation Now was accessible in Europe. Official beta invites for Europe started going out to PS4 owners on April 15, 2015. On February 17, 2017, Sony announced it would discontinue PlayStation Now on PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation TV, Sony Bravia televisions, Sony Blu-ray players and all Samsung televisions by August 15, 2017. On September 20, 2018, Sony announced that users on PlayStation 4 would be able to download PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 4 games offered via the service as Sony started to gradually roll out the new feature to subscribers. On January 23, 2019, Sony announced that the service would be launching in Spain, Italy, Portugal, Norway, Denmark, Finland and Sweden later in the year. A beta for these countries launched in early February and the full service launched on March 12, 2019.
Games
PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 games on PlayStation Now can be streamed to PlayStation 4 and PC. As of 2020, there are over 800 games available, with over 300 of them available for download to PlayStation 4. New games are added every month. After a 7-day free trial, there are three pricing options available for the subscription service. A separate subscription fee for online multiplayer is not required for PlayStation Now games. The three pricing options give access to both single player and online multiplayer components.
Availability
PlayStation Now is available in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
