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Due to the recent PSN outage and I am getting rid of my PS3. I bought my PS3 back in 2007 and I have purchased a bunch of games and add-ons over the years.

Is there any way to recover this content and sell it/transfer it to another PSN user account?

Also, is there a way to restore the PS3 back to it original factory settings?

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3  
I think that a lot of used PS3 will be available soon. – Luc M May 14 '11 at 17:43
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I just don't understand why a temporary outage is enough to completely ditch a console, ESPECIALLY if you've invested in games. Does the PSN being offline mean the games suddenly are bad? – Shinrai May 14 '11 at 19:42
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@Shinrai: It's been down for three weeks, and they're saying it'll be down for another two weeks (they also said it would be up "within a week" twice now, so who knows if it'll actually be up by then). I am seriously considering selling my PS3 as well. – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft May 14 '11 at 20:26
The question title doesn't reflect the question body. Someone please edit it. – Billare May 14 '11 at 22:15
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@Shinrai: Yes, it does mean some games are suddenly bad. For instance, I can no longer play GTA4 or RDR online, meaning they went from great replayability to 0 replayability. LittleBig Planet and LBP2 are completely useless without PSN. I'm irritated that I have to play Portal 2 on the PC to play with my friends, and if I was one of the unfortunate people who didn't buy Portal 2 in time to link my PS3 with my steam account (meaning I couldn't play it on PC), I would be extremely pissed, and probably return it. – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft May 15 '11 at 5:50
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2 Answers

up vote 4 down vote

In the settings menu on the XMB, There should be a restore option near the bottom.

Anything purchased on your account is not transferable.

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So I gotta take a bath with all the content I have purchased over the years...that is a bummer. – DarkShiva May 14 '11 at 17:58
Pretty much, all the stuff that you buy belongs to your account. – Sorean May 14 '11 at 20:06
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yep, welcome to dematerialization, which sounds quite handy till you want to sell, give or transfer those bits and bytes... – LudoMC May 14 '11 at 20:08
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its the same with any content delivery service, be it Microsoft's Live Store, or Steam. – Simon Sheehan May 14 '11 at 20:40
up vote 4 down vote

The answer from Simon is correct, however, to counter the non-transferability of many online consumables, one typically receives five licenses for each purchase. This is useful (and I have verified it by doing this) if you have a family where each person has their own PSN account, on the same PS3, downloading the content with your "master" account and then logging in as another user and installing it with their XMB.

Thus, if you wish to also sell your downloadables and have the ability to do so, create your account on the blank PS3 next to your customer's account, download all your business once more, install on their XMB, and then delete your account. No problems.

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I was under the impression the account had to stay on the machine for content to continue being usable. – Shinrai May 15 '11 at 16:05
@Shinrai I didn't think so. Do you have a reference? I'm pretty sure when I moved to Germany and removed my account from my little sister's PS3 she remained able to use the content. – Glen Wheeler May 15 '11 at 16:54
I feel like I recall reading it in Sony's documentation, actually, but like I said, just my impression. I could be wrong. (That's why I didn't vote this one way or the other.) – Shinrai May 16 '11 at 14:14
@Shinrai Of course, this is all possibly going to change any update now. If I hear anything about the games on my little sister's PS3 not working anymore, I'll update the answer. – Glen Wheeler May 16 '11 at 18:45

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