When Sony announced that it would be closing its PS3, PSP, and PS Vita stores later this year, the number of games potentially affected was not noted. According to a new breakdown, the closures will put hundreds of digital-only games permanently out of reach for PlayStation gamers.

According to the VGC analysis, 2,000 digital-only games will become inaccessible to PlayStation gamers later this year. Fortunately, most of these games are available on other platforms, including the Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Unfortunately, there are 120 games that were digitally distributed exclusively on PS3, PSP, and PS Vita that could disappear altogether.

As VGC itself admits, the analysis is not perfect. Without warning, Sony shut down its web store front, making it impossible to browse its digital catalog on a personal computer. Therefore, VGC had to use other sources, such as information from PlayStation Trophies and other reports, to get some sort of count.

The following is a breakdown of the number of digital-only games for each system:

Again, the above counts should only be viewed as estimates. For example, the 630 to dozens of games for the PS Vita is based on 2017 counts and does not include indie titles that have slowly emerged for Sony's cult portable console since then. In fact, there are still indie developers making games for the Vita, much to their sadness, as they were not informed of the closure by Sony.

PS3 games account for a total of 730 games via PlayStation Trophies, not including games that may have been delisted in the past 15 years. Still, this number is not likely to be far off the mark.

The PlayStation Store was a boon for classic gamers who wanted to experience games from the PS1 and PS2 era but had trouble finding physical discs. Some games are difficult to find discs for, and the few discs that do exist can be prohibitively expensive. (According to GameRant's tally, some of the rarest games can easily sell for $100 or more on eBay.) Furthermore, the problem of "disk rot" means that physical versions of these games may become completely unplayable over time.

And this is the case for 120 games that were digitally released exclusively on PS3, PSP, and PS Vita. These games will be lost forever, a potential nightmare for game preservationists. These games include: "Infamous", "Festival of Blood", "Echochrome", "Infamous", "Infamous": "Festival of Blood", "Echochrome II", "Lumines Supernova", "The Last Guy," "Rain," "Trash Panic," "Pain," "PixelJunk Racers," "Tokyo Jungle," "TxK," and "MotorStorm RC.

Sony has not announced any sort of extensive backward compatibility with the PS5.

There is Sony's game streaming service PlayStation Now, which will continue to remove some PS3 games. However, games on that service could change at any time. However, we should not forget that Microsoft is a software giant and also has the Azure cloud platform. Considering the amount of data Microsoft manages for the world's biggest companies, it doesn't matter that there are a few Xbox games floating around.

Sony and Nintendo do not have elaborate server systems like Amazon and Microsoft. Keeping these servers active requires resources, money that would be better spent on maintaining the PS4 and PS5 servers.

Those who are holding off on purchasing certain games may want to download them soon; the PS3 and PSP will close on July 2, and the PS Vita on August 27.