Xbox and Rocket League Respond to Sony's Excuse for Blocking Cross-Play
Alright Sony, we're going to keep turning up the fire 'neath your butts until we get a clear [...]
Alright Sony, we're going to keep turning up the fire 'neath your butts until we get a clear answer as to why PlayStation can't have Minecraft and Rocket League cross-play with Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. In case you guys missed the news, Minecraft and Rocket League both want to go fully cross-platform, allowing players from Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, and PlayStation 4 to all play together. It's a dream come true, right? This is what we've wanted ever since consoles went online.
That dream is so close to coming to fruition, but Sony is blocking it from happening. Sony has declined to allow its players to play Rocket League or Minecraft with Xbox One and Nintendo Switch players, and the internet thinks it's because Sony doesn't want to do Microsoft any favors. Sony's official reason, though, is much worse than that because it's trying to come off as a hero. See what Sony's Jim Ryan had to say in an interview with Eurogamer:
"Yeah. We've got to be mindful of our responsibility to our install base. Minecraft - the demographic playing that, you know as well as I do, it's all ages but it's also very young. We have a contract with the people who go online with us, that we look after them and they are within the PlayStation curated universe. Exposing what in many cases are children to external influences we have no ability to manage or look after, it's something we have to think about very carefully."
So PlayStation doesn't want its players mixing and mingling because it has to... protect the children? Come on, Sony, no one is buying that. Not even Xbox Boss Phil Spencer, who responded directly to this comment. See what he had to say below:
Phil Spencer's Response
Basically, Phil Spencer finds a way to tactfully say what we're all thinking. In essence, "That's BS." I put that in quotes, but that's not actually what Spencer said. In case you're somewhere where you can't watch the video with the volume up, this is in essence what Spencer had to say:
"The fact that somebody would make an assertion that somehow we're not keeping Minecraft players safe... I found, not only from a Microsoft but from a game industry perspective, I don't know why that has to become the dialogue. That doesn't seem healthy for anyone."
"I found the whole discussion around safety with our game and that somehow we wouldn't take that as a top priority... Frankly through our parental controls on Xbox Live and everything else that we've done shown that that's incredibly important to us as a platform. And Nintendo...! The doors open. I'd love all Minecraft players to have the full Minecraft experience. We take the safety of Xbox Live, the players across all of our games... It's incredibly important to our team."
Even the developers of Rocket League fired back at Sony over its decision to block cross-play. See what they said:
prevnextPsyonix Response
Psyonix (Rocket League) publishing boss Jeremy Dunham weighed in on the issue, emphasizing as Phil Spencer did that the safety of its players is always a top priority, and that excuse just doesn't hold any water for Sony. Here's what he said in a statement to VentureBeat:
"I understand that stance. We want to take care of our players. But from our perspective, if PlayStation already allows cross-network with PC, which is the least regulated of any of the partners, then in theory, having Xbox and Switch in there should be fine. They're a lot more regulated. From our perspective that concern is already handled. That's taken care of."
Alright, Sony. The ball is in your court once again. You tried to offer up your best excuse for keeping players, for the first time in history, to all play together across all consoles and PC. It's something we all want. All of us, except for you. So what's the deal, and how long will this go on?
Do you guys want to see true cross-play between all platforms? Let your voice be heard, and weigh in on the poll below. We'll let the numbers speak for themselves.
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