Since late April 2026, the gaming internet has been in full meltdown mode over a silent change Sony quietly pushed through in the PS4 and PS5 firmware. Digital games purchased on the PlayStation Store from March and April 2026 onward started displaying a "Valid Period" tag, showing a start date, an end date, and a countdown timer. The short version: if your console doesn't connect to the internet within 30 days, the game license expires and the title becomes inaccessible until you get back online. The one who raised the alarm was Lance McDonald, the modder famous for patching Bloodborne to run at 60fps. He posted on X saying a "hugely terrible DRM" had been rolled out across all PS4 and PS5 digital games, requiring an online check-in every 30 days. And the kicker: setting the console as Primary, the setting that normally allows offline play, does not exempt players from this requirement. Sony stayed silent for days, but customer support eventually confirmed the timer was real. In a screenshot that circulated online, a support ticket detailed that games purchased digitally after the March 2026 update have their license expire if the console doesn't connect to the internet within 30 days, making the game unable to launch until a connection is restored. But hold on, because there's a twist. A well-supported theory from the community suggests the check is actually a one-time thing that happens once the refund window closes. If your PS5 connects to the internet 15 days after purchase, the check runs, the license becomes permanent, and you can go offline forever after that. The problem only kicks in if you stay offline for 30 days or more right after buying the game. What's frustrating people isn't just the mechanism itself, it's the historical irony. Back in 2013, Sony publicly mocked Microsoft for the Xbox One's always-online DRM policy, which was ultimately retracted and helped cement the PS4's dominance even before that console generation began. Now PlayStation's own players are drawing that exact comparison. Game preservation advocates warn that even if the system seems harmless today, the real concern is down the line: if Sony's servers ever go dark, games purchased with real money could become permanently inaccessible. At its core, it's a question of ownership. When you buy a digital game, you don't own the game, you own a license, and Sony can technically revoke access to it. What's making the community even angrier is that the change was rolled out silently, with no official announcement whatsoever. As of now, Sony has not issued any public statement on the matter.