PS5 becomes Sony’s most successful console generation

PlayStation keeps making more money as it keeps raising prices

While the major gaming showcases have wrapped, the Tokyo Game Show is still going strong for a few more days, closing out the last big gaming festival of the year. After that, it’s straight into fall’s next wave of major releases—yes, we see you, Digimon Story: Time Stranger.

Over at TGS 2025, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Hideaki Nishino delivered the keynote, focusing on the PlayStation Store’s growth and dominance. He highlighted a chart showing revenue steadily increasing with each PlayStation generation—even though PS5 sales are only slightly ahead of the PS4’s pace. So what’s fueling that revenue jump?

Part of the answer lies in the surge of microtransactions, particularly from free-to-play juggernauts like Fortnite. Another factor: the expansion of subscription services like PlayStation Plus. Add to that the still-active PS4 player base, and Sony now has a broader footprint of users spending money across generations. And of course, there’s the rising cost of the consoles themselves.

With all these revenue streams climbing, it’s fair to ask: did Sony really need to bump the PS5’s price by another $50, nearly five years into its lifecycle?

As debates continue over whether console makers will eventually go platform-agnostic, it raises a bigger question: will the PS6 just be a PlayStation-branded PC? Or is Sony, like Nintendo, still firmly committed to proprietary hardware for the long haul?