Sony has decided to spoil the American fast-food chain’s party by preventing their plans to give away McDonald’s PS5 controller.
The ‘McDualSense,’ which isn’t the controller’s actual name, was meant to be an upcoming promotional item meant to be given away for McDonald’s Australia’s 50th anniversary. Maccas (what Australians like to call McDonald’s) had seemingly prepared 50 of those controllers to be given out to lucky winners tuning in to one of their sponsored streams. Press Start had listed the following streamers:
- Muselk on Sunday at 1pm playing Overwatch
- Jacko G on Monday at 6pm playing Overwatch
- X2Twins on Tuesday at 10pm playing Minecraft
- Cripsy on Wednesday at 1pm playing FIFA21
- Kiki on Thursday at 8pm playing Night in the Woods
- Crayator on Friday at 4pm playing Mario Kart
- Aiden AK on Saturday at 4pm playing World of Warcraft
Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your tastes), Sony has decided to step in and stop McDonald’s Australia from going ahead with the giveaway plan. If you thought McDonald’s would have ensured beforehand that Sony would allow customizing their controllers for the American giant’s own promotional benefits — you were wrong. After Sony decided to spoil the party, McDonald’s ended up issuing an official statement:
“Unfortunately, McDonald’s stream week has been postponed and won’t be going ahead this Sunday. We are unable to confirm a new date for the proposed event at this time. We will have some great prizing including Macca’s 50th Birthday Hoodies and 50 channel subscriptions for each streamer to give away. We will be in contact with the new timing as soon as we have it confirmed.”
“Sony PlayStation has not authorized the use of its controller in promotional materials related to the proposed Stream Week event, and we apologize for any inconvenience caused. McDonald’s stream week has been postponed, and Sony PlayStation controllers will not be included in the giveaway.”
The promo streams are therefore postponed, and they won’t include the McDonald’s PS5 controllers in the giveaways.
McDonald’s PS5 Controller: Not Sony’s First Time Party Pooping
Sony’s decision stands in line with how they’ve been handling customization ever since the PS5 was released. Last year, the firm fought off retailers attempting to sell customized PS5 plates, threatening to take legal action if they didn’t comply. Sony has begun releasing their controllers with some new colors since then, so perhaps their policy will change in the future. For now, they remain rather strict when it comes to third parties tweaking their hardware design.
It might be a while until we see anything like those McDonald’s custom PS5 controllers.