It seems that if your PS3 is unable to connect to Sony’s servers or that if the battery powering its internal clock is dead (also known as CMOS battery) or has low charge, you won’t be able to access any of your digital PS3 games. This includes PS1 classics as well as PS3 digital downloads. At best, some digital purchases may revert to trials which was a little used feature that allowed you to play a game for upto an hour and save your progress and trophy over to a purchase of the aforementioned game.
2/2 As it stands, my PS3 has a dead Pram (cmos) battery. When disconnected from the internet and changing the date, I am not allowed to launch any of my purchased digital content. Here is a video clip demonstrating this issue. This problem will affect millions of PS3 owners. pic.twitter.com/h7hz6savOz
— Hikiko YT♨️ (@HikikomoriMedia) March 25, 2021
This was brought to light by YouTuber Hikikomori Media who also provided proof of the issue in the tweet above.
Although it’s relatively easy to replace the CMOS, when Sony decides to take down its PS3 servers reactivating your PS3 to play games still poses a massive challenge.
“I want to know what Sony will do to allow access to my digital titles when my devices can no longer connect to Sony’s servers to authenticate the time?,” the user tweeted.
These findings come at a time when Sony’s policies regarding video game preservation are under fire. They follow a report from TheGamer that stated the PS3, PSP, and PS Vita storefronts would be permanently shuttered.
All of this has the gaming community wondering what to expect from when Sony eventually shuts down the PS3’s digital dependencies. Sony’s poor design choices could result in millions of PS3s serving as e-waste. More so with the PS3 selling 87.4 million units lifetime to date. For reference, the PS4 has sold 114.9 million and that too has been plagued by equally poor DRM choices.
PS4 DRM Is Much Worse — It Kills Physical Game Purchases
PS4 owners have it worse as IGN India reported earlier this week. If Sony decides to take down its servers, you also lose access to your physical game library. According to trusted hacker Lance McDonald this is because trophies on the PS4 need the console’s internal clock to work correctly so as to prevent users to change date and time values and exploit the PS4’s trophy system.
His tweet regarding this was in response to Does It Play — an account dedicated to video game preservation. The account stated that when “ the PS4 CMOS battery dies (and it will) it renders all PS4 digital files unusable without a server reconnection and in PS4 it also kills disc playback.”
This error is because Trophies on PS4 require the internal system clock (the one you can’t see / alter) to be correct, so people cant change their PS4 date/time to make it look like they got trophies earlier than they really did. If your PS4 clock battery dies, all your games die https://t.co/8y9aZzL9vC
— Lance McDonald (@manfightdragon) March 23, 2021
Although it’s relatively easy to replace the CMOS, when Sony decides to take down its PS4 servers reactivating your PS4 to play games still poses a massive challenge.
“CMOS can only have it’s time fixed by PSN or hacks,” says Does It Play to IGN India. “The fact it kills discs is lunacy.”
We’ve reached out to Sony for comment and will update this story if we hear from the company.
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