Sony veterans Shuhei Yoshida and Adam Boyes met each other at the PlayStation booth at Tokyo Game Show 2026 this week and recreated their viral PS4 moment from E3 2013 dunking on Xbox One DRM. The only difference was that this time, neither of them is holding an actual game disc.
That’s likely because neither of them happened to be roaming the convention floor with one in hand. But the resulting image ended being a poignant inversion of PlayStation’s messaging from over a decade ago in light of Sony’s current plans to ditch physical games in 2028.
Met with a best friend 😀 @amboyes @PlayStation_jp #TGS2026 pic.twitter.com/2ZjsrLMNaP
— Shuhei Yoshida (@yosp) September 18, 2026
The 22-second “Official PlayStation Used Game Instructional Video” on YouTube in 2013 was a spur-of-the-moment piece of genius guerrilla marketing that capitalized on Microsoft’s very unpopular plans to make used game discs on Xbox One require DRM checks. Now on the eve of the PS6 generation, Sony is set to leave discs behind at the same time as Microsoft is using its abandoned DRM checks to give players digital licenses for their physical games.
But the old video is also a reminder of the way a very different kind of PlayStation used to communicate with its community. Over a decade later, Sony remains much more reclusive and has stayed away from having its most public faces discuss and defend its evolving ecosystem priorities.
Boyes left PlayStation in 2016 and Yoshida departed in 2024. Both are now consultants for the broader video game industry, though I’m sure plenty of hardcore PlayStation fans wish they were still at Sony.
