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Sony Has Patented NFC Tech to Block Second Hand Games

by on January 3, 2013
 

Sony Has Patented NFC Tech to Block Second Hand GamesPublishers have been fighting a battle with second hand games for a while now. The fact that money is changing hands on their products, without them seeing a penny has led to infuriated rants among many within the industry. 

Today, a NeoGAF user has found a patent that that was filed by Sony Japan, that proposes to stop second hand games sales. The patent, which was filed on December 9 and we saw on Eurogamer, appears to be for NFC tech that will recognise whether an inserted game has been played by another user, under a different account. If that is the case, the system basically blocks you from playing said game.

It should also be noted that the patent claims that this idea cannot be implemented when the player is not connected to the internet, meaning that “second-hand sales and purchases cannot be eliminated reliably.”

Sony Japan’s patent goes into further detail about how this tech would deter the second hand games market much more powerfully than the online pass, for instance. Temporary access to a product or/and a limit on the number of uses a disc would have, are also mentioned with regard this technology.

No specific console is name-dropped in the patent, but the mind can’t help but think of the next PlayStation. Patents are constantly being filed by all of the major games companies, and it must be noted that they don’t all come to pass. However, the games industry as a whole, hasn’t been hot on second hand games, making this patent just a little more scary.

We all have our own opinions on this matter, so why not let us know yours in the comments section!