With Civilization VI coming out on PS4 and Xbox One on November 22nd, many fans were excited about being able to have cross-play across various platforms and to have cloud saves available on both the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One.
Sadly, neither of these things are to be.
In a tweet from the official Civilization VI Twitter account in answer to a fan who wanted to know if both cross-play support and cloud saves would be supported on PS4 and Xbox One, the answer was “There is no cross-play multiplayer between platforms, though Cloud Saves are supported across all versions of the game except for PlayStation 4“.
There is no cross-play multiplayer between platforms, though Cloud Saves are supported across all versions of the game except for PlayStation 4.
— Civilization VI: Gathering Storm (@CivGame) October 2, 2019
Disappointing for many PlayStation 4 players who now won’t be able to save the progress of their game in the cloud, even though players on every other platform can.
And equally disappointing for both PS4 and Xbox One players, and everyone else of course, as cross-platform play in Civilization VI will not be supported either.
As for why Civilization VI won’t have cloud saves on PS4 there was no explanation given. Just that it wasn’t possible.
Fans, however, linked to an article with a possible explanation as to why Civilization VI cloud saves won’t be possible on PS4 and it has little to do with developer Firaxis Games.
Instead, it seems likely that this has more to do with Sony’s restrictive policies when it comes to both cross-play and cloud saves. Restrictive policies that have been angering fans for quite a while.
In which case, as several fans commented, it may be better to buy Civilization VI on Xbox One or PC and, in the long-term, move all your gameplay off the Sony-owned PS4 system and onto either Xbox or PC.
Is that likely to happen, though, and will the lack of Civilization VI cloud saves on PS4 damage sales of the game?
Probably not.
After all let’s face it, PS4 players are more slaves to their system than they are likely to stand up against Sony’s restrictive policies so, yes, it’s highly doubtful sales will be negatively affected that much.
Not with more than 91 million PS4s already having been sold.
Related: Best Civilization VI tutorial for beginners? — Check this one out, it’s in-depth and awesome
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