Ubisoft’s Yves Guillemot says killing PS5 discs may cut costs starting January 2028

Sony’s plan to discontinue PlayStation 5 discs for new games starting January 2028 just got a high-profile shrug from another major games executive. Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot said, speaking during the company’s most recent investor Q&A, that killing discs “has upsides,” even as the move sparks a huge wave of backlash from players and a massive petition.

Guillemot’s core argument was that the shift to digital can expand the overall market and reduce friction for consumers. “What we saw on the PC is that it helped to grow the market,” he said. “There’s also some pressure for the future on the cost of machines and being able to be only digital will help to have a more accessible machine, I would say.” In plain terms: if consoles have fewer expensive physical components, the hardware could get cheaper or easier to buy, and that can grow the audience.

That said, Guillemot did not pretend the transition is one-sided. He framed Sony’s decision as a tradeoff: “There are plus and minus.” He then went further, arguing the broader industry likely won’t be thrown into chaos. “But we think it will not disturb too much the industry,” he concluded. For executives watching platform strategy, that is a useful read on how peers are mentally modeling the impact. Even when users rage online, business leaders often measure the “industry disturbance” by whether demand, budgets, and distribution economics meaningfully shift. Guillemot is essentially saying Sony already has the distribution lever, and the rest of the market will adapt.

The context behind Sony’s decision is straightforward: digital is already where most purchasing is happening. Sony’s own rationale, as described in a post on PlayStation Blog by Sid Shuman, Senior Director, Sony Interactive Entertainment Content Communications, points to shifting consumer preferences and the broader entertainment industry moving away from physical discs. The specific policy is that “physical game disc production for all new games releasing on PlayStation consoles will be discontinued starting January 2028.” After that date, “new games will be available on PlayStation Store and at retailers in digital formats only.” And importantly, the transition “has no impact on games that already released, or will be releasing, prior to January 2028 in disc format.”

Sony also used the language of “natural direction,” saying it wants to “align more closely with how most of our community prefers to access and play games today.” Translation for boards and strategy teams: this is not being positioned internally as a punishment to disc fans. It is being positioned as an operational response to where consumer demand is already drifting.

Still, the backlash is not imaginary, and the preservation and ownership concerns are not just internet theater. The source notes that the most vocal advocates for physical releases are pushing issues like game ownership and preservation. This week, a former God of War developer reportedly revealed Sony knew the disc-kill decision would spark outrage, and that Sony issued staff “strictest” social media guidelines to stop public comments on the controversy. Sony also reportedly began reassigning staff involved with disc production. Whether or not fans get what they want, the company is signaling that it intends to treat this as a completed strategic shift rather than a reversible controversy.

So why does Guillemot think it will not disturb the industry too much? Because the economics of digital distribution are where the platform operators flex. The source lays out how Sony’s money flow differs between physical and digital. For a first-party PlayStation game such as The Last of Us, Sony keeps around 65% of the money from a physical copy, with about 30% going to the retailer and roughly another 5% on manufacturing costs. For a third-party physical game, such as the Activision-published Call of Duty, Sony gets a licensing fee, likely around 15%. For digital sales, the source says Sony keeps 100% of first-party game revenue, and a far better cut from third-party titles. That is the blunt incentive behind the policy: disc-free distribution simplifies the margin story and aligns it with how Sony likely wants to fund ongoing investment as console costs come under pressure.

A second-order implication for executives is how quickly customer sentiment converts (or fails to convert) into measurable revenue risk. The source includes comments from analysts and a thought experiment from Dr. Serkan Toto, CEO of Japanese game industry consultancy firm Kantan Games. He said that even if half a million people canceled PlayStation Plus in protest, it would be only a small fraction of the business. He noted Sony has “over 120 million active PlayStation users,” and that “Around 50 million people subscribe to PlayStation Plus.” His example calculation: if 500,000 cancel, that is “just 1% of that business gone,” adding that “Digital is just too lucrative.” He also told IGN that Sony will not reverse the decision, saying Sony “of course knew what the online reaction would look like” and that it is waiting for the storm to pass.

For peers, the strategic stake is clear. Sony is betting that operational and margin gains from digital will outweigh the reputational cost with a vocal segment. Guillemot’s remarks essentially validate that bet from outside the Sony camp: digital-only can support accessibility and growth, and the industry should not be thrown off its trajectory. The executives who should care most are platform and publishing leaders making decisions on pricing, hardware BOM assumptions, and distribution strategy, because the disc decision is not only about format. It is about who captures value, how consoles are priced, and how quickly a platform operator can move from consumer preference to business model reality.