Today Sony have finally permitted a much demanded feature, allowing users to change their PlayStation Network ID. It was a feature that has been confirmed to be arriving since October of last year and many PlayStation users are understandably happy. Not everybody wants to keep that same ID they made when they were 10.
The announcements comes from a Sony blog post that is answering questions surrounding the name change service.
“We’re excited to announce that the online ID change feature on PSN is officially launching to all PlayStation 4 owners later today. You’ll also be able to change your online ID via a web browser, and that feature will also be available starting today.”
Not all games will support the name change feature, however. The intention for the service is that it would work for all new games as well as a set of older but still popular games. A beta program has been running since October testing games to ensure they work with the update. A full list of tested games can be found here.
“All PS4 games originally published on or after April 1, 2018 have been developed to support the online ID change feature. However, since they have not all been specifically tested with the feature, we cannot guarantee that they will support it. Do keep in mind that the large majority of most actively played PS4 games support the feature.”
As for the cost, the first name change will be free, although after that any changes will cost you $9.99 USD. For PlayStation Plus members that cost is halved to $4.99 USD. Sony also pointed out that your old ID isn’t instantly lost when changing to a new one. Your old ID will be saved so nobody can snatch it up and reverting back to your old ID will be completely free, no matter how many times you do it.
It was also explained that when changing your ID, you’ll be able to display your old ID next to your new ID for 30 days to help make the transition easier for your friends.
Unfortunately the new program is also running into some issues that is making people hesitant to change their names at all. According to Sony themselves the name change service can potentially mess up and continue displaying your old ID to you and other players in “some areas”. Perhaps more alarming is that the service may cause you to lose progress within games “including game save data, leaderboard data, and progress towards trophies.”
Sony have also warned that parts of your game and applications may not function properly and that content may become inaccessible (such as add-ons and virtual currency).
It’s actually a rather significant list of drawbacks to the new system, so certainly be careful before making the plunge. You can head on over to the announcement blog post and follow the steps if you’d like to change your PSN ID.
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Elliot Attard
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