The consumer has lost. The death of physical media has finally arrived. On July 1, Sony announced they would no longer produce video games in physical form as of January 2028. Sony is currently one of the two leading home video game makers in the world, right behind Nintendo. The announcement sent shockwaves through the video game industry, with all major news companies commenting on the announcement. Sony has been the darling of the video game world since the original Sony PlayStation video game system hit the North American market in 1995 at a time when Nintendo and Sega controlled the industry with an iron fist. Back then, few analysts would have predicted that Sony would successfully defeat Sega, who stopped manufacturing video game hardware in 2001, while the Sony PlayStation 2 rose to dominance. Even Nintendo was caught off guard with the success of the Sony PlayStation brand and was forced to come up with new ways for consumers to play home video games because the company could not compete with Sony in sheer processing power alone. To be fair, over the years, competition between these two heavyweights has been great for consumers. But as any critic of capitalism will always ask, how big is too big and what happens when a company achieves almost total market dominance? This is just one of the questions video game collectors are finding themselves asking, and some are now even wondering if allowing Sony to have this much power was ever wise to begin with? The video game industry found itself encased in its own bubble with the development of the internet and, more specifically, the ability to offer interactive entertainment via digital content. Younger generations, who quickly started to discover video games at an earlier age than older generations, were not used to having to buy physical video games at retail stores or via Amazon. The video game industry quickly learned that if they could sell games through their own digital store fronts that were set up on the same day the consumer brought home their shiny new video game console, then they could potentially save costs by not having to manufacture physical games. The end consumer could simply just log on, enter their credit card number, and download the game of their choice right to their system. When this option first came available back around 2006, most consumers treated it as an afterthought. After all, stores that catered to the trading of home video games were commonplace at this time. It took a lot of convincing from the major video game companies to get consumers to give up physical media, but slowly and surely, people did. Just like how much privacy we as consumers handed over to major technological monopolies just to be able to use social media, most gamers didnt even notice the transition that was taking place, but over time digital software sales started to outpace physical software sales, and it wasnt just the younger generations that were doing all the downloading. I was one of the many critics of an all-digital future and still am. As a collector, I have many vintage video games in my collection, and I can play them any time I want. Physical media means ownership. If any readers own an Atari 2600 that was released in the late 1970s, all those game cartridges sitting in your basement covered in dust can still be played today like they could back in 1980! That is the power of owning the actual games, and yes, some of those old games are worth money on the secondary market. I started my first business in the antiques and collectibles trade with the rise of eBay by selling collectible video games. Back in the 1990s, I helped predict the current boom we are seeing in collectible home video games. My generation (Generation X) was the very first generation weaned on electronic interactive entertainment. My parents will tell you that even though I was born in 1976, by 1980, I was already becoming a prominent Pac-Man player, and it was my first arcade video game I ever played (this makes perfect sense, as Pac-Man only used a simple joystick and was one of the easiest games for little kids to learn how to play back in the day). Video games have always been in my blood and at my core. So what does this announcement from Sony really mean? Well, as someone who is deeply ingrained in the antiques and collectible trade, it means that after January 2028, we have zero chance of any newly released Sony PlayStation game becoming collectible in physical form! I dont want to even think about a day when digital goods may be seen as serious collectibles. Longtime readers will note my disdain for NFTs (non-fungible tokens) and cryptocurrencies. I am a traditionalist. If I cant personally hold it, I dont want to collect it. I have financial assets comprised of ones and zeros sitting in a brokerage account for that. I expect my collectibles to be tangible and in physical form: the rare coin, the key vintage comic book, the scarce action figure, the limited-edition trading card, the vintage Nintendo video game. I have no desire to collect what amounts to be digital tokens of some kind contained on a hard drive or lost somewhere in a blockchain. I am confident those of you either around my age or older will agree with me. However, I do lose sleep worrying about the younger generations of collectors who disagree with me. Physical media wasnt supposed to die like this. A greedy, faceless corporation making a bad decision to save a few dollars, and now the market for home video games will change entirely come January 2028. I already made the decision that I wont be part of this. There are literally tens of thousands of video games released in physical form that I have yet to fully play or own. I will not be buying the next PlayStation system come 2028. It is sad that the future of physical games lies solely with Nintendo. Nintendo hasnt exactly been kind to physical media over the years either, but thats a story for another day. However, at least as of right now, I should be able to buy a new Nintendo video game in physical form come January 2028. Nintendo, if you are reading this right now, please keep that a reality. And to the younger generations who helped usher in this new digital-only future (or what I call a technological hell), I dont think you fully understand what they have taken from you. I can assure you though, just ask anyone who remembers video movie rental stores and the memories that were made by browsing the selection of new movies at 8 p.m. on a Friday night. Those who were there remember. And sadly, all it will ever be is a moment in time, much like tears in the rain. Thank you for allowing me to quote a line from the movie Blade Runner in this article. How fitting. A movie about a technological dystopia being quoted in an article about a faceless greedy tech company destroying physical media. I have to find something more uplifting to write about for my next article to make up for this. Shawn Surmick has been an avid collector since the age of 12. He currently resides in his hometown of Boyertown, Pa., and is a passionate collector of antiques and collectibles. His articles focus on various topics affecting the marketplace.