Besides PlayStation, “everyone is exiting” the business of physical disc production, a source has told Kinda Funny’s Greg Miller.
During the latest episode of Kinda Funny Games Daily podcast, host Greg Miller reached out to a source in order to clarify whether Xbox relies on Sony’s Digital Audio Disc Corporation (DADC) disc manufacturing services. The question arose after the ongoing fallout surrounding Sony Interactive Entertainment’s recent announcement to transition away from physical disc production of PlayStation games beginning in 2028.
During the discussion, Miller initially suggested that Xbox used Sony’s DADC facilities for manufacturing its game discs. However, after receiving corrections from viewers during the live broadcast, he reached out to a source familiar with the matter. The anonymous source responded by saying, “Xbox does not use the same. But it’s the same issue. Very few exist and everyone is exiting.”
“So Xbox does not print their discs with Sony’s DADC,” Miller elaborated. “However, everybody else in the system is also exiting from making discs.” As such, the number of companies that are manufacturing game discs appears to have seen a steep decline, and those that remain are continuing to leave the business.
Miller noted that the overwhelming majority of game sales have already shifted to digital distribution, making physical production increasingly difficult to justify from a business standpoint. In his recent video, Bloomberg investigative journalist Jason Schreier shared a similar sentiment, explaining that digital sales are simply far more profitable for PlayStation than physical, as the math proves.
Schreier referred to a 2020 analysis by Dr. Serkan Toto, CEO of Kantan Games, to explain the financial incentives. For a 70 US Dollar first-party PlayStation game, the console maker earns about 53.8% more revenue from every digitally sold first-party game than from a physical copy. The difference is even greater for third-party games, as the company earns twice as much revenue on every third-party game sold digitally instead on disc at retail.
