Now that the Sony Playstation 3 PSN network is fully up and running again, have you logged in and taken advantage of the Welcome Back Program?

If not it is worth it. Log into the PSN Store and you will see a link to it from the right-hand side of the front page. For eligibility for the welcome back programme consumers must have been an account holder on 20 April 2011. All existing PSN registrants have 30 days from when the welcome back programme goes live to redeem their content.

What do you get:

30 Day PS Plus Subscription (for non subscribers) - Or if you are an existing subscriber you get 60 days free subscription added to your account (roughly what you lost during the downtime).

If you are not currently a "Plus" subscriber don't knock this because it will gain you access to the free and discounted Plus content in the store, and this month Sony are offering a completely free download of Burnout Paradise, which is a great bargain if you don't already own the game.

2 Free Commercial PS3 Games

Also on offer is the choice of 2 completely free commercial games from a selection of 5. These are all very good games and definitely worth taking advantage of this offer for. It's not so great if you already own all 5 of these games, but great if you don't.

In Europe the 5 games being offered are:

  1. Infamous
  2. LittleBigPlanet
  3. Dead Nation
  4. Wipeout HD/Fury
  5. Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty

In the USA the selection is nearly the same, but with Super Stardust HD offered instead of Ratchet and Clank.

And in Germany Infamous and Dead Nation are replaced with Super Stardust HD and Hustle Kings.

A great selection of older titles you have to agree. And if you didn't already also own Burnout Paradise, with the free 30 day PS Plus subscription you are in effect really getting 3 full commercial games for free, plus some other mini and PS1 games from the PS Plus downloads.

2 Free commercial PSP games

If you also have a PSP registered with PSN then you also get to download 2 free commercial games from a selection of 4.

In Europe the games being offered are:

  1. LittleBigPlanet PSP
  2. ModNation PSP
  3. Pursuit Force
  4. Killzone Liberation

For the German market, Pursuit Force and Killzone Liberation will be replaced with Everybody's Golf 2 and Buzz Junior Jungle Party in the selection of PSP games. Killzone Liberation will not offer online gameplay functionality.

30 free days for Music Unlimited

For existing Music Unlimited subscribers, you will be given 30 days free subscription.