New PS5 update clogs menu screens with ads and people aren’t happy

PS5 menu screen from Warhammer Space Marine 2 — Goodbye clean artwork (Sony/Twitter)

Sony’s latest PlayStation 5 firmware update has come with an unexpected new addition, as game splash screens have been replaced with ugly news updates.

While the lack of themes and general customization on the PlayStation 5 dashboard has been an issue for many since the console’s launch, a new update has made navigating your game library even more of an eyesore.

Earlier this month, Sony announced plans to roll out a new ‘Welcome hub’ on the console’s dashboard – complete with customizable widgets and wallpapers. At the time of writing, it has yet to roll out in the UK and is currently only available to console owners in the US, although it will also be released in other territories in the coming weeks.

While this seemed to be a way to address the lack of customization options, some players have noticed that ads and news updates, which you can disable in the Welcome Hub, have now taken over games’ splash screens.

As fans on Twitter showed, the background screen of Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 now no longer shows the artwork, but a news update related to the title. In some cases, such as Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Star Wars Battlefront 2, advertisements for other games in the franchise appear.

While Britain doesn’t have the Welcome Hub update yet, the splash screen update is already rolling out here – but only for select games. We found that the Elden Ring page now promotes the latest patch notes, while Tekken 8 shows an ad for the upcoming DLC character Heihachi, but others like Astro Bot remain unaffected.

So it turns out that the recent PS5 UI update that lets you disable all ads on the dashboard was too good to be true. Now EVERY SINGLE GAME on your home screen shows you an ad in the background without letting you remove it lol https://t.co/Nts6eCq8Eb pic.twitter.com/29p56mYn34

— Count Turlet (@alfredobofa) September 29, 2024

@Sony @PlayStation I recommend reverting this PS5 UI update so that it returns to displaying the game art instead of the latest news when you mouse over a game.

The best solution would be to leave PS4 themes in the background of the “Welcome tab”, but when you hover over… pic.twitter.com/uaKnvUnTOq

— William R. Aguilar (@WilliamRAguilar) September 29, 2024

Noticed it yesterday.

It’s strange to see Gran Turismo 7 advertising its update 1.49 patch [from 3 months ago] come back to my dashboard. (Normally that’s reserved for major updates)

This appears to affect games that use the official news channel, but now it happens automatically. pic.twitter.com/3c9qDsAIgb

– Al. Lopez (@AL2009man) September 29, 2024

Some fans have reported that the promoted news item on some games, such as Gran Turismo 7, are promotional updates that were released months ago, so it seems like this isn’t working properly yet.

While it’s a minor annoyance in the grand scheme of things, it’s certainly a downgrade from the static, clean artwork that came before. Some PlayStation 5 owners have already called on Sony to reverse the change, so we’ll have to wait and see if Sony pays any attention to that.

As for the near future, Sony will launch the PS5 Pro on November 7, 2024. The 30th anniversary edition of the console is now selling for thousands of dollars on eBay.