The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt recently turned 10 years old, and to celebrate, new special edition controllers were released, not for the controller, before they managed to sell out, I realized something unique about the Xbox store. Returning to the PlayStation store on PS5 confirmed my suspicions.

The Xbox store allows you to put your billing address in and buy consoles, controllers, and accessories straight from the system. The PlayStation store, however, cannot do that. You can only buy digital content, and this is such a missed opportunity from Sony. PlayStation does, in fact, have an official online store for physical goods with PlayStation Direct. It would be such a cool and convenient thing to buy consoles, limited edition controllers, and collector's editions of games from the store on PS5.

The Witcher 3 Had A Special Edition Xbox Controller

Once Again, Xbox Delivers

For the longest time, Xbox released many of its special edition controllers through giveaways, but thankfully, that's changed with DOOM: The Dark Ages and The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Both of these special/limited edition controllers were available for purchase, and they look amazing. Sure, limited edition controllers were affected by the recent Xbox price increase, but these are items anyway. I love The Witcher 3, and when booting up my Xbox Series X on the day the controllers got announced, I went to the Xbox store.

I found The Witcher 3 special edition controllers via a search and noticed the Elite model was already sold out. FOMO got the best of me, and I purchased the regular special edition wireless controller, a decision I don't regret because The Witcher 3 is one of my favorite RPGs. It's awesome that you can buy these special edition items natively in the console's store, but I also realized that you can't do this on a PS5.

PlayStation Needs To Have A Similar PS5 Shop

If Xbox Can Do It, Why Not PlayStation?

Unlike PlayStation, you can buy consoles (both brand new and certified refurbished), all sorts of controllers, headsets, and even more physical goods on the Xbox store. You even used to be able to buy assembly boards. This is because the Xbox store on Series X|S is actually just the Microsoft Store, which you can access on the web. That's why you can put in a billing address. Regardless, this feature is incredibly convenient and seems like a no-brainer.

Why not make these goods available for purchase closest to where PlayStation fans will often be?

There are tons of physical goods for PlayStation, and it's very odd that you can't buy them on the console. If you're thinking of upgrading to a PS5 Pro while on your base system, you'll have to take out a phone or any other device with a web browser to shop for it. Buying the PS5 Pro on your base console simply by going to the PlayStation store would remove much of the hassle. Why not make these goods available for purchase closest to where PlayStation fans will often be? It just makes sense.

PlayStation already has an online shop similar to the Microsoft Store: PlayStation Direct. This online shop allows you to buy consoles, controllers, the PSVR2, wireless earbuds, and even collector's editions of games. I used it a little while ago to purchase The Last of Us Complete Collector's Edition, which will ship out in July. Sure, you could buy the digital Last of Us Complete on the PlayStation store, but it seems like a massive oversight by Sony not to allow you to buy the Collector's Edition, which was a PlayStation Direct website exclusive.

Why not integrate PlayStation Direct into the PlayStation store for PS5? This would allow you to buy all sorts of physical PlayStation products straight from the console. I know it may not seem like a big deal to buy these items from the website store, but that PlayStation fans will be on their console for a large chunk of time.mHaving the ability to buy controllers, consoles, and accessories right next to games in the store can and will result in more sales, and that's why Sony needs to make this happen on PlayStation 5.

Source: Xbox/YouTube