PS Now gets its first-ever day one release - but it isn't as great as it seems

techradar.com:

Shadow Warrior 3 will launch on PS Now on day one, developer Flying Wild Hog has announced. It's the first time a game has ever done so on Sony's subscription-based service, as the game will otherwise cost $49.99 / £39.99 when bought from the PlayStation Store.

The announcement happened over on the official PlayStation blog, where Shadow Warrior 3 lead producer Bartek Sawicki detailed gameplay of the shooter, launching on March 1, as well as concluding with the fact that the game will be ready to play for PS Now subscribers on the day of release.

PlayStation Now, up to this point, has allowed players to both download and/or stream games from an extensive library featuring many of the best PS4 games, as well as a healthy selection from the PS3 and PS2, lending an impressive amount of backward compatibility available to PS4 and PS5 players for a monthly subscription fee.

PS Now has become a fine service over the years, offering a solid alternative to Xbox Game Pass for those who prefer to play on PS5 or PS4. However, it's never quite been able to stack up to Xbox's excellent subscription service, which is consistently updated with new titles on a regular basis, many of which are also day one releases from Microsoft Game Studios, third-party developers as well as smaller indie creators.

It's almost bizarre, then, that Shadow Warrior 3 is the very first game to launch on PS Now, from day one, in the subscription service's eight-year history. Hopefully, though, if Shadow Warrior 3 is well received and proves to be a popular PS Now title, it could set a trend for more day one releases on the service further down the line.

And that's something PS Now could certainly use. We're likely never going to see Sony's AAA first-party efforts