Update: Gaijin has now confirmed that the War Thunder cross-play was a bug that has been removed from the game. “It was an unforeseen side-effect of enabling cross-play squads for Xbox One (with PC), which happened on 25th of October (last Thursday), and although we specifically tested that it was not allowing cross-console-play with PlayStation 4 players, we have missed some corner cases,” Gaijin said in a statement provided to GameRevolution. “The issue has been fixed already on a server side. In the meantime, we continue to wait for when this will be allowed officially for our game.”
Original Story: With its recent re-release on Microsoft’s flagship console, some are finding that War Thunder Xbox One PS4 cross-play is now possible. Stranger still, it doesn’t appear to be a widely-known feature. The Xbox One version of the game went free-to-play just recently, which may have supplanted Sony’s relative (until recently) unwillingness to open up games on the PS4 to other platforms.
A user on ResetEra has found that War Thunder Xbox One PS4 cross-play is a reality. They were able to add their PSN account as a friend through the game’s own friending system. The user was even able to join a party with themselves and play a full match.
This is rather interesting considering the aforementioned resistance from Sony to cross-platform play. Earlier this year, the Japanese company received a lot of criticism over not allowing Fortnite players to play with each other. This issue extended even further to the point where if someone had played the game on the PS4 before, they could no longer play it on any other platform with the same account. According to the company’s CEO, this was because “PlayStation is the best place to play” games. This attitude seems to have changed in recent months, however. This is because Sony now allows, in beta form, cross-play of Fortnite to other consoles. With the change in tack on War Thunder, too, it is possible that Sony is opening its doors just a little wider when it comes to cross-play.
Many developers have also spoken out about this issue as well. The most recent figure to speak out the lack of cross-play is Pete Hines. The senior vice-president of marketing and communications at Bethesda spoke about his frustrations over the lack of PS4 cross-play earlier this month. He said that cross-play was indeed important and that, as an industry, cross-platform progression is still valuable.
War Thunder became free-to-play on the Xbox One on October 23 with a new update. It initially launched on PC back in 2013, with a PS4 port the next year.
