Sony has confirmed that an apparent change to the PS5 dashboard–which resulted in unwanted ads and outdated information replacing games’ artwork when selected–was a bug, and is not going to be included going forward.
As confirmed by The Verge, the change has already been reverted, and a PlayStation employee said it was related to an “existing feature” rather than anything Sony intentionally added in an update.
The bug appeared to be linked to the official news feed for the games in question. For example, when the latest Spider-Man game was pulled up at the GameSpot office, the ad that came up was for a roundtable video featuring the creative team of Spider-Man 2 and and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. There are other examples included in the gallery below, as well as social-media reactions. Let’s be thankful this won’t be the norm going forward.
Some of the ads, like the one attached to Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, are also out of date. In this case, it’s for a May the 4th promotion from last May.
As you might expect, PS5 gamers aren’t very happy about these changes. The early response on social media has been almost universally negative.