Persona 5 Royal owners on PS4 can’t upgrade to PS5 version

By George Yang Published July 21, 2022

Atlus Japan has revealed that those who already own the PlayStation 4 version of Persona 5 Royal will not be able to upgrade to the PlayStation 5 version. The game will have to be purchased again at its listed price when it launches on October 21 along with the PC, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox versions.

Atlus Japan’s recent FAQ post asks, “If I purchased Persona 5 Royal for PlayStation 4, can I upgrade to Persona 5 Royal for the PlayStation 5?” The answer is a resounding no, saying, “We’re sorry, but there are no items for purchasers of Persona 5 Royal for PlayStation 4 in this game. When you play on your PlayStation 5, we hope you can purchase Persona 5 Royal for PlayStation 5.”

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It’s unclear whether the upgrade decision also applies to Smart Delivery on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S. Xbox’s Smart Delivery program allowed seamless transitions between cross-generational games while PlayStation’s upgrade path from PS4 to PS5 often involves having two separate SKUs.

A good example of this was when Marvel’s Avengers got its PS5 and Xbox Series upgrades last year, many PlayStation users had trouble migrating their data to the new versions while the process on Xbox was much easier as the platform recognizes the game using the same identifier.

This isn’t the only debacle involving upgrades on PlayStation. Earlier this week, players found out that they were unable to play the Intermission content in Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade through PlayStation Plus if they already owned the base game on PlayStation 4. However, Sony has since fixed the issue and now players should be able to access it without further problems.

George Yang is a freelance games writer for Digital Trends. He has written for places such as IGN, GameSpot, The Washington…

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