PSN, Xbox Live, Steam and the online services for the Wii U, 3DS, Wii and DSi all struggled under the weight of new Christmas buyers, with errors reported by gamers throughout December 25th.
Yesterday we reported that the PSN and Xbox Live were experiencing some maintenance problems, but it transpires that the influx of new console owners and Steam’s Holiday Sale meant that online connectivity problems were much more widespread than initially suggested.
The PlayStation Network and Nintendo in particular were suffering problems on Christmas morning, with many running into an error message on PSN which stated that “the service is currently undergoing maintenance”, and the eShop was seemingly the cause for all of Nintendo’s online problems.
Later, Steam went into meltdown after Valve announced that they were offering Left 4 Dead 2 for free as part of the service’s annual holiday sale. Valve then had to extend yesterday’s flash sales which included Kingdoms Rise, Guncraft, King of Fighters XIII, and Dungeon Defenders, by 16 hours due to no one being able to access the store in order to pick them up.
Xbox Live ran into some problems, too, with Microsoft reporting that social and gaming aspects were “limited” on the Xbox One.
As of this morning, the PSN, Xbox Live and Steam all appear to be working as normal, though Nintendo systems are all still running into errors due to a problem with the eShop. Hopefully this is rectified sooner rather than later, and new Nintendo console owners can enjoy their Boxing Day with Mario & co.
