Sony has released its new PS Plus gift cards at retailers, but has somehow managed to spoil the job.
In the run-up to its revamped PS Plus service, Sony appeared to be pulling its PS Now and old PS Plus gift cards from stores. In the rush to buy cards and stack them for discounted subscriptions, the decision to pull them off retailer shelves made sense.
Now that the revised PS Plus has been released, gift cards are showing up in online storefronts. But Sony did a really shoddy job or didn’t provide retailers with the proper information because the listings are causing serious confusion. God help the hapless parents who enter uncharted gaming territory to buy one.
seen by push square (opens in new tab)the new cards appear to be a combination of direct PS Store credit, gift cards explicitly for PS Plus members, and PS Store gift cards that are clearly supposed to be for additional membership tiers that don’t mention PS Plus anywhere. .
if you go to Amazon UK (opens in new tab), you can see the listings and how confusing they are. You have your PS Store gift cards in the usual denominations – so £10, £15, £30, etc. The usual fare. Then there’s a very handy trio of cards for a one, three and 12 month PS Plus Essential subscription. So far so reasonable.
Scrolling down though, a PS Store gift card priced at £84 randomly appears. A little weird. But that’s the UK price for a mid-tier 12-month PS Plus Extra subscription ($99.99 / £83.99 / AU$133.70). There’s also a £32 gift card on the list, which covers the £31.99 ($39.99 / AU$53.50) quarterly cost of peer membership.
Buy for (opens in new tab) seems to have the same problem with their listings, and Sony official website (opens in new tab) it’s not help. It simply tells you that gift cards are available for purchase, but the rest is up to you to figure out. Want retailer links? Forget it. That’s buying on hard mode. Git gud or quit.
So the new scheme appears to be selling gift cards priced to let you redeem them for specific PS Plus Extra membership tiers, though the text on the cards doesn’t make it clear that’s the reason for the price. Whether you’re just buying a card or a subscription, this is a bizarre system to navigate.
We hope the listings will be updated, until then, take a look at our PS Plus guide, linked at the top of the page. We have pricing options for PS Plus Essential, Extra and Premium with information on each. You must be able to match gift cards with the membership you want. Good luck!
