Pachter Dismisses PlayStation Now as a “Joke”

Yesterday, we learned that industry analyst Michael Pachter feels GTA V would not be successful on next-gen consoles. Today, we learned that he doesn’t hold out high hopes for PlayStation Now, which will allow players to stream games to their Sony consoles, tablets, Bravia TVs, and more.

He didn’t exactly mince his words, either. When interviewed by Game Informer on the matter, Pachter told them:

PlayStation Now is a joke. There is no publisher that is going to license content that’s less than two years old because they would be concerned that they can’t sell as many copies if they make it available for subscription or rental. This has no prayer of working. None.

Despite his analysis, PlayStation Now has seen generally positive reactions and predictions. According to John Koller, the marketing VP of SCEA, publishers are quite interested in the service.

Pachter could be right about developers not wanting to release new games to the service, but we think he’s being rather harsh nevertheless. He’s also overlooked a very big part of PlayStation Now’s appeal—the ability to stream old games. After all, a lot of fans are interested in PlayStation Now because of its potential for backwards compatibility.

What do you think? Will PlayStation Now see success, or is it doomed to failure?