SONY The PS3 production was reported as being ended following a ten-year lifecycle last year

UPDATE ONE: Sony have now clarified the situation surrounding the end of the PS3 production in Japan. A statement from PlayStation confirms that PS3 shipments in Europe terminated March 2016. Shipments in US terminated Oct 2016, while Asia has terminated at the same timing as Japan. "PS3 launched over 10 years ago in November 2006, with state of the art technologies including a high capacity Blu-ray drive and pre-installed HDD. With the performance to deliver entirely new visual experiences, PS3 also provided users worldwide, with a unique network service and access to online games and digital content downloads. "SIE’s vision to deliver the best entertainment experience to consumers has not changed and with more and more users shifting to PS4, and with PlayStation Now available in countries including North America, UK, Japan, Belgium and Netherlands, allowing users to easily enjoy PS3 games on their PS4 and PC (PC available in Japan at a later timing), we have decided to terminate the shipment of PS3. "Moving forward, we will focus on delivering PlayStation experiences to a wider audience via PS4 (and PS Vita in Japan and Asia) taking advantage of its unprecedented power and speed as well as its deep social integration."

SONY The PS3 console production has now ended in Japan

The news was posted to the official PlayStation website, listing the popular PS3 console shipments as having ended this week. This includes the standard 500GB model of the PlayStation 3, apparently the last remaining PS3 console still in production in Japan. It was announced back in March that the tech giant planned to end their support of the production of the PS3, which is reported to have sold over 85m units since its launch. NEWS: MAJOR PLAYSTATION 4 TITLE SKIPPING E3 2017 That’s after being on the market for over a decade, with PlayStation 3 originally launching in Japan in November 2006, before its release in Europe the following March. Sony recently indicated that they plan to make changes to their PlayStation Plus subscription service, which currently offers up two PS3 games-a-month for free download. While a popular feature and something that keeps Sony on par with Microsoft and their Games with Gold service, it’s not always possible to please everyone.

PlayStation Plus June 2017 PS4, PS3, Vita free games screenshots Sun, May 21, 2017 PLAYSTATION Plus subscribers will be able to download the likes of Life is Strange and Killing Floor 2 on PS4. Play slideshow SONY 1 of 11 PlayStation Plus June 2017 PS4, PS3, Vita free games screenshots

Each month sees six games featured, with two titles each for PS4, PS3 and PS Vita. But now it seems that Sony are ready to mix things up a little. The Sony Corporate Strategy Meeting briefing has shed more light on the company’s future plans, which appear to include a boost to the PS Plus service. Sony management talked more on the subject, revealing that they wanted to make PlayStation Plus a more attractive prospect to fans to subscribe to. These changes will be deployed to help grow subscriber figures, which apparently includes 70m monthly active users and 26.4 million PS Plus-paying members.