Report: PlayStation Store to return May 24

By Trevor Mogg May 19, 2011

PSN users will have had plenty of time to read the content of Sony’s “Welcome Back” package, offered as a result of the massive data breach in April and subsequent loss of services. And most gamers will have probably already decided which free games they would like to have, offered as part of the apology. So all they need now is for the PlayStation Store to actually reopen so they can claim those freebies.

Although most other PSN services were restored this week, the virtual doors of the online store have remained firmly shut. And of course, it’s not just gamers who are waiting for normal opening hours to resume – this outage affects game developers too. They will have lost an important source of revenue with the suspension of the PlayStation Store and will be keen to see it up and running again soon. Well, it appears that there’s some good news on the subject.

According to a report on the Gamasutra website, the PlayStation Store should be back online May 24. In a memo obtained by Gamasutra that was sent by Sony to game developers and publishing partners, the Japanese company outlined a tentative publishing schedule for partners explaining when their games, expansions and other releases will become available to gamers. It appears that the gaming giant is planning to catch up with the backlog of content by doing two content pushes per week for the next two weeks.

In the memo, PSN content manager Jack Osorno said, “We thank you for your patience as we work to resume service of the PlayStation Store.”

The first push, on May 24, will include content that was originally meant for distribution on April 26. The next batch, originally set for May 3, will go live on May 27.

According to the memo, Sony is willing to be as flexible as it can if software developers have a particular issue with their newly scheduled release date. “If there are concerns, we are willing to consider adjusting the release date of your content on this schedule,” Osorno says in the memo, adding, “Adjustments will be made on a case by case basis.”

If the store does reopen next week without any glitches, and the network as a whole continues to function smoothly, then Sony will have fulfilled its promise to restore all services by the end of this month. Sit tight gamers – normal service will be resumed shortly (hopefully).

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Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…

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