Control Ultimate Edition Accidentally Gains Impossible PS5 Upgrade
It takes a special kind of irony for this caliber of screw-up. | Source: Steam/505 Games
- Control Deluxe Edition/Season Pass on PlayStation briefly saw their copies of the game upgraded to the Ultimate Edition for free.
- This appears to have been a temporary gaffe on the part of publisher 505 Games.
- Last month, 505 Games revealed that due to unspecified ‘blockers,’ existing owners would be barred from the free next-gen upgrade offered by the newly-launched Ultimate Edition.
505 Games seemingly achieved what it said was impossible and briefly granted existing owners of Control Deluxe Edition a free upgrade to the Deluxe Edition.
A sizable swathe of Deluxe Edition owners on PlayStation yesterday discovered that the newly-released Ultimate Edition had automatically been added to their PlayStation Store libraries , listed as ‘purchased.’ Season Pass owners who’d claimed both expansions offered up similar reports.
Similarly, owners visiting the Control Ultimate Edition listing on the PS Store were met with a ‘Download’ button rather than the expected ‘Add to Basket’ prompt.
Those who already had the Deluxe Edition installed on their systems discovered that visiting the PS Store listing allowed them to boot up the Ultimate Edition without initializing any downloads.
This suggests that the Ultimate Edition is fundamentally the same SKU as the Deluxe Edition/Season Pass (and seemingly recognized as such by the PS Network) and features the same content – the base game and both post-release expansions – running contrary to official word from publisher 505 Games.
The upgrade has since been revoked, pointing to a blunder on publisher 505 Games’ part that isn’t going down well with Control fans.
Control Ultimate Edition Upgrade Controversy
Upon announcing Control Ultimate Edition last month, 505 Games revealed that existing owners would not benefit from an upgrade to the new edition, which features a free upgrade path to an enhanced PS5 and Xbox Series S version of the game.
The publisher justified the move by explaining that these were two different versions of the game and that upgrading was only possible when upgrading from the same version. The bottom line is that existing owners need to double dip to benefit from the free next-gen upgrade.
A blog post stylized as an ‘explanation’ read as follows:
“Every avenue we pursued, there was some form of blocker and those blockers meant that at least one group of players ended up being left out of the upgrade for various reasons. As of today, we can’t offer an upgrade to everyone, and leaving any one group out feels unfair.”
With both Deluxe and Season Pass able to grab the temporary upgrade, it’s difficult to ascertain which ‘group of players’ were being left out.
The events of the past day suggest these’ blockers’ are not as prohibitive as 505 Games claims, raising concerns that the move to bar existing owners from the upgrade wasn’t dictated by technical hurdles, but instead an ulterior motive, possibly of a financial nature.
