In-game saving has always been an important element of gaming. As modern games grow in size, space, and complexity, player convenience features ensure players can jump back into the action without missing a beat.
Sony recently removed the ‘Resume Activity’ feature from its games, making this even more apparent for PlayStation 5 users. PS’s update, however, forces gamers to rethink how they save progress. While that’s hardly a major issue, it’s causing frustration across the community as gamers are now forced to rethink how they play their games.
Why PS5’s removal of Resume Activity impacts your gameplay
Sony’s decision to remove the ‘Resume Activity’ feature has surprised many players. Previously, this feature had allowed users to skip back into a game from where they left off without having to boot into the main menu. Through having the Activity Cards, players could skip long splash screens and dive right into the action. But despite that, the latest system update has removed this option, and the only way to play is to start fresh from the main menu each time I power up my console. This is a step towards the removal of convenience in gaming in general, and now, with how important quick saves are to modern play, this seems like a move in the wrong direction.
This change has met with an overwhelmingly negative reaction from the community. One frustrated gamer told us, “I don’t even get why you would randomly take a quality-of-life feature already there.” Large, open-world games specifically had a timesaving feature that got many people: skipping past the initial game screens and jumping to the actual gameplay.
However, Sony has yet to provide an official explanation for why this was decided upon. It also raises speculation about how it may be used to boost the console’s overall performance, but there’s no proof of that. This loss isn’t a feature loss as it is a user experience downgrade, especially compared to the competition.
Interestingly, Microsoft has a similar feature whereby your games will allow you to simultaneously resume as many games as you want, which is something Xbox does, meaning Microsoft has an edge here. Xbox is popular with many PlayStation users who enjoy the game’s more flexible system, which maintains this seamless transition between games. As one PS5 player noted, “One of the few things Xbox has over PS is how quickly you can jump back into multiple games exactly where you left off.” This is just another disappointment for PlayStation’s dedicated fanbase.
While Sony clearly changed this with good intentions (to improve system stability or performance, for example), removing the ‘Resume Activity’ feature hasn’t gone down well. While gamers may become more prone to pick up a console, the ability to progress in a new console without frictional friction has never been more important. No one knows yet if this will work for Sony, though the alienation of their user base is strong confirmation that convenience features should be treated as important.
Ultimately, the question is: Will Sony hear from its community and bring back the beloved feature, or is this change here to stay? For now, though, it’s just too bad. Only time will tell why such an obvious replacement was removed in the first place.
Image credit: PlayStation/Ideogram
