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[Bobo Dakes]

When armchair CEOing goes horribly wrong.

 

[CaviarMeths]

Well I certainly didn't click on this thread expecting a long argument for another Vita revision. I mean, the Vita couldn't even compete against the 3DS. The hell would it have over the Switch? Its whole selling point was that it was cutting edge mobile tech... in 2011. There's absolutely nothing marketable about it in 2017.

 

[lingpanda]

I would rather they not copy everything Nintendo does and double down on VR. I enjoy options not redundancy. I would really like a wireless lighter VR headset with better motion controls.

 

[massoluk]

How is anything about this easy... Updating a Vita that got beaten by a 3DS in hope of it beating the Switch.

 

[ChronotriggerJM]

Dividing resources isn't great for Sony, just focus on getting hardware for old games, or getting the PS4 portable, no half measures.

 

[ArtHands]

Nah. No one went "this handheld is going to grossly underperform due to memory cards the last system had".

Monster Hunter was already making the jump before the memory card issue was even announced

There's a possibility that Capcom saw the Vita behind close door, sees the memory card issue, then goes "lol nope" and sign the MH deal with Nintendo the next day back then.

Vita's doom was clear as soon as before its release. Bunch of promises and tech demos like MonHun Portable 3rd, Metal Gear Solid 4 or Yakuza, or that Bioshock lie, that didnt materialize. Almost like a pled for help

 

[Sylverstone14]

Sony has already shown that they don't care much about the handheld space anymore, and propping up Vita as some sort of Switch competitor will only be worse in the long run.

 

[Hero]

Sony doesn't understand the handheld market and their development teams don't either.

 

[Estoc]

Oh, this sounds easy, let me just tweet this at Sony. Why haven't they hired the OP yet?

No, Sony should just do what they're doing, ignore handheld and focus on their consoles.

I bought a Vita for a couple of games, and I have no regret, but come on, let it die with a little pride, hometown and life, OP.

 

[watershed]

So "relatively easy" means design, test, manufacture, market, launch, and support a whole new piece of hardware? I'm not sure OP understands the reality of what it takes to create a successful new system. Nothing about it is easy.

 

[Renekton]

Sony doesn't understand the handheld market and their development teams don't either.

Who does? 😐

Sony gave up. Nintendo was disappointed by 3DS's performance. Apple refuses to acknowledge the market.

 

[CamHostage]

There's a possibility that Capcom saw the Vita behind close door, sees the memory card issue, then goes "lol nope" and sign the MH deal with Nintendo the next day back then.

Nope, there is ZERO chance that this happened. A, Capcom would have been involved while the box and the plans were still being finalized, but B, companies prefer security. Also, platforms usually don't live or die depending on their storage systems; I usually dismiss the idea that the Memory Card issue was the nail in the coffin of Vita (it had a ton of issues to get over bigger than that, and most consumers never even gave Vita the time of day much less cared about how much its memory cost), but I would say that I can think of no platform that has been hurt by the cost of its memory like Vita was. Capcom was not seeing memory as an issue, I can promise you.

BTW, most people don't know this, but Vita was technology shopped around to developers like few hardware pieces ever produced by SCE. I have a friend who was shocked how early Sony came to their offices to talk next-gen portable and how eager they were for NGP feedback. And this was a North American studio, so that's even more rare, as I would assume Sony takes meetings in Japan but aside from a few mega-publishers it only talks to foreign studios for big-picture blueskying or to pitch essentially locked plans. There was a lot of positivism about Vita before its launch, but by the time it was ready to ship, lots of that had dried up. (You mention the Metal Gear and LP2 and Unreal demos, and yes, those amounted to nothing, but I don't think it was such the clear lie as you believe it to be.)

Also, side-note, there's a bit in an article about Japan Studio where Shu and Allan Becker talk about being a bit blindsided by Vita being neglected by development studios, and that how between 2008 and 2011 while Vita was being produced, the Japanese market totally changed on Sony. (The American and European markets were always going to coast behind whatever success Japan had, same as PSP.) Mobile finally took over. Yoshida says in the article, "We launched the PS Vita and saw few AAA titles to suit the Japanese market ... Everyone got a wake up call."

 

[autoduelist]

The memory card issue might be the biggest tell tale sign to those publishers, that this thing is going to be a flop, and causes they to not release those key IPs in the first place.

No way. Plenty of devices have launched with new storage medium. If the device is successful, it drives the storage prices down and the medium might even become 'standard' across other devices.

The problem was, the Vita never took off so economy of scale never kicked in, and the price could never drop significantly. Add in that they lowered the Vita price some by subsidizing it with slightly higher storage prices, and there was no room to lower storage quickly without raising the Vita's price.

Well I was going from my own experience. I really wanted a vita, I thought the streaming feature was incredibly cool. Then there was this black friday sale and it had it at a stupid cheap price (it was under 150 don't remember how much exactly). I went to the store was about to buy it and remembered the memory card thing. I left the store so disappointed. And weren't the software issues because it didn't sell too well? I always figured the memory card thing was what put the vita on the path it ended up taking.

Eh. I bought my vita on Black Friday, maybe even the one you're talking about [white assassin creed bundle]. At that price, even with the 8 gig card I picked up the price was quite reasonable, especially given that with ps+'s instant game collection, I already had some killer games [Uncharted, Wipeout, Gravity Rush, and a couple other games]. That was a -killer- price, all in.

I eventually sold the 8g, got a 16g, then upgraded to 32g, and then sold that and bought a 64g for $90 imported, which I got for dirt cheap because at that time the 32g were hard to find for a bit so the used price was inflated in the US.

I love my Vita with a passion. I think the problem it had was it was competing against the 3ds. Both started slowly, and then Nintendo did something about it, trying to kick start the 3ds and succeeded. Sony only did half measures -- the instant game collection sold me a Vita on the strength of the free games I'd already acquired but clearly that didn't work for everyone. Perhaps if they hadn't lost MH, announced a few strong titles, and reduced the price [even to the point of taking a loss] they might have turned a corner. But they didn't. But I don't think memory cards had much to do with it, even if it's the thing people like to yell about the most nowadays.

But hey, i'm the demographic. I even use my PStv all the time.

 

[Blood Diamonds]

Let the Vita ascend please, it is tired and it just wants to rest for all of eternity.

 

[Soul of the Beast]

Let's be honest, Switch's success is nothing compare to PS4's.
The money they make isn't even comparable, just look at the incredible amount of PlayStaion Plus users, the PS4 is literally printing money every second.
The Switch is very insignificant and niche compare to PC, PS4 and Xbone. The fact that most 3rd party triple-A developers ignore it is the best example.

Just telling it like it is, I am a Switch lover, and I love everything about the Switch, but it's the truth.

It's like comparing a disney film to an anime movie.

 

[Wildo09]

Except the vita isn't and has never been a failure. A failure was the Virtual Boy, which ended production with only 22 games ever released. Vita was at the very least a modest success, not a blockbuster, and not enough for them to risk another go, probably.

If the Vita wasn't a failure than Wii U isn't a failure. And we know how that goes.

 

[hzsn724]

Tell that to the Kinect.

 

[ArtHands]

No way. Plenty of devices have launched with new storage medium. If the device is successful, it drives the storage prices down and the medium might even become 'standard' across other devices.

The problem was, the Vita never took off so economy of scale never kicked in, and the price could never drop significantly. Add in that they lowered the Vita price some by subsidizing it with slightly higher storage prices, and there was no room to lower storage quickly without raising the Vita's price.



Eh. I bought my vita on Black Friday, maybe even the one you're talking about [white assassin creed bundle]. At that price, even with the 8 gig card I picked up the price was quite reasonable, especially given that with ps+'s instant game collection, I already had some killer games [Uncharted, Wipeout, Gravity Rush, and a couple other games]. That was a -killer- price, all in.

I eventually sold the 8g, got a 16g, then upgraded to 32g, and then sold that and bought a 64g for $90 imported, which I got for dirt cheap because at that time the 32g were hard to find for a bit so the used price was inflated in the US.

I love my Vita with a passion. I think the problem it had was it was competing against the 3ds. Both started slowly, and then Nintendo did something about it, trying to kick start the 3ds and succeeded. Sony only did half measures -- the instant game collection sold me a Vita on the strength of the free games I'd already acquired but clearly that didn't work for everyone. Perhaps if they hadn't lost MH, announced a few strong titles, and reduced the price [even to the point of taking a loss] they might have turned a corner. But they didn't. But I don't think memory cards had much to do with it, even if it's the thing people like to yell about the most nowadays.

But hey, i'm the demographic. I even use my PStv all the time.

Those devices are not Sony's portables though in the first place, and they are not overpriced.

 

[ArtHands]

Nope, there is ZERO chance that this happened. A, Capcom would have been involved while the box and the plans were still being finalized, but B, companies prefer security. Also, platforms usually don't live or die depending on their storage systems; I usually dismiss the idea that the Memory Card issue was the nail in the coffin of Vita (it had a ton of issues to get over bigger than that, and most consumers never even gave Vita the time of day much less cared about how much its memory cost), but I would say that I can think of no platform that has been hurt by the cost of its memory like Vita was. Capcom was not seeing memory as an issue, I can promise you.

BTW, most people don't know this, but Vita was technology shopped around to developers like few hardware pieces ever produced by SCE. I have a friend who was shocked how early Sony came to their offices to talk next-gen portable and how eager they were for NGP feedback. And this was a North American studio, so that's even more rare, as I would assume Sony takes meetings in Japan but aside from a few mega-publishers it only talks to foreign studios for big-picture blueskying or to pitch essentially locked plans. There was a lot of positivism about Vita before its launch, but by the time it was ready to ship, lots of that had dried up. (You mention the Metal Gear and LP2 and Unreal demos, and yes, those amounted to nothing, but I don't think it was such the clear lie as you believe it to be.)

Also, side-note, there's a bit in an article about Japan Studio where Shu and Allan Becker talk about being a bit blindsided by Vita being neglected by development studios, and that how between 2008 and 2011 while Vita was being produced, the Japanese market totally changed on Sony. (The American and European markets were always going to coast behind whatever success Japan had, same as PSP.) Mobile finally took over. Yoshida says in the article, "We launched the PS Vita and saw few AAA titles to suit the Japanese market ... Everyone got a wake up call."

Capcom has no care about Sony handheld. They know its impossible for Sony to win against the 3DS no matter what, so they bailed out early

 

[DeanBDean]

It's like comparing a disney film to an anime movie.

You had me going until this line

 

[watershed]

You had me going until this line

Lol, I was gonna post the same thing. There are so many great anime films, I don't get the comparison at all. And, the Switch just launched. It could build up a 3ds-like install base in a few years or even larger, like what Nintendo hopes a strong console would do. It's silly to think that because it is under-powered, it won't sell extremely well.

 

[JinjoUnchained]

Like others have said, Sony will only "compete" with the Switch if it starts cannibalizing PS4 sales. Even in that unlikely event, they'd be better served doing a portable PS4 hybrid.

 

[MatrixMan.EXE]

Or they could just continue to sell PS4's. They don't stand a chance with a new handheld, please stop with this delusion, people.

 

[ggx2ac]

Like others have said, Sony will only "compete" with the Switch if it starts cannibalizing PS4 sales. Even in that unlikely event, they'd be better served doing a portable PS4 hybrid.

If Switch eats into PS4 sales, not cannibalise. Sony doesn't own Switch, Switch would be a predator, not a cannibal.

 

[MCN]

The Vita is dead, and if Sony have any sense they're not going to try the handheld market again.

 

[c0de]

You forgot one thing: pay Nintendo billions of dollars to port their games to Vita Pro.

 

[MrBS]

I had a reply geared up to ask how much a vita successor would cost that would have to outclass the Switch, then I saw that whole overclock the existing model.... uh yeah. No chance OP, like, at all.

It's over, go home.

 

[Lyon N. Laap]

You had me going until this line

I think their idea is that while lots of people enjoy anime films, the vast majority of the movie going population, and thus the money, will go towards a Disney film. Scale and niche rather than quality.

Though I disagree with calling the Switch insignificant. It's had good success considering stock issues, clearly has mindshare with its properties like Mario, and the Xbox One's worldwide sales leave much to be desired.

 

[Haunted]

They should just put out some motion controllers and they'll easily crush Nintendo with the superior hardware in the PS3 and the power of the cell

haha checkmate, Wiitards

 

[Luigiv]

-the only thing Sony(but even more MS if only they were interested imo) could do in some years is a PS4 lite, the opposite of the PS4Pro, a weaker PS4 handheld/hybrid that plays all the PS4 games at lower resolution, details, fps etc.

Only if they invent magic, because otherwise that's not how any of this works. Every game engine is different, you can't just universally lower game settings for every game without explicitly going out of your way to tailor a unique solution for every game. Doing that at the OS level would be super hacky and expensive (and would probably break things left right and centre), and asking developers to officially patch all their games to support the weaker hardware would get Sony laughed out of the room. It's not even remotely realistic.

If Sony wanted to make a portable that can play all PS4 games, they'd literally have to make a portable PS4. Though ,by the time that's actually possible, it would be a totally pointless thing to do, as we'd be well into the PS5 or possibly even PS6 era.

 

[Newline]

They should just put out some motion controllers and they'll easily crush Nintendo with the superior hardware in the PS3 and the power of the cell

haha checkmate, Wiitards

God, wiitards... Brings back memories

 

[Quasar]

Vita is dead.
It's time to move on.

Someone better tell Japan then.

That said, its why I've wondered if Sony would also go down the hybrid road so they can stay relevant in Japan.

 

[Quasar]

Only if they invent magic, because otherwise that's not how any of this works.

And I'm not sure you could build a handheld on x86 hardware.

 

[Trace]

And I'm not sure you could build a handheld on x86 hardware.

Sure you can. Just depends on if it's worth it or not.

 

[Rats Off To Ya]

I'm okay with Sony ceding the portable market to Nintendo. I liked the PSP and Vita because they both offered something Nintendo didn't at the time: a relatively high-spec handheld experience. Now that the Switch is a thing, I don't know that Sony has anything to bring to the handheld space.

 

[CaviarMeths]

Someone better tell Japan then.

Japan knows.

 

[biglittleps]

No chance for upgraded vita. It has to be portable PS4 with 720p to get success like nintendo as it needs regular flow of big games.

 

[Celine]

Do you remember what games the 3DS had at that point in it's life? Vita was in a good position right out of the gate. Yeah they fumbled as time went on, and Nintendo starting gaining ground with new games and the massive price drop.... but around Vita launch it was still up in the air.

Around the time PS Vita launched in Japan, 3DS had already available Nintendogs+cats, Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask, Super Street Fighter IV: 3D Edition, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D, Mario Kart 7, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate which all would become million-seller.
A few months later 3DS got Ace Combat, Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D and Resident Evil Revelations which weren't blockbusters but highlight how 3DS was pouching games/resources away from Vita since those were the kind of games typical of PlayStation.

Again what was there to push PS Vita?
A spinoff Uncharted game not made by Naughty Dogs?
Inferior version of blockbuster series like Call of Duty and Assassin Creed made by third string developers?

 

[FingerBang]

I disagree OP, I don't think an OC Vita would survive in the current market. Handheld sales show a clear decline, even the 3DS is far behind the DS (and it might never reach the PSP either). Nintendo is still strong because of its brands and people will keep buying Nintendo consoles for Pokémon and co.

The hybrid idea is great, the Switch is great, but the only way Sony could compete is by putting out a hybrid PS4. And it's not going to be possible/affordable for at least a few years.

They could go with something like a PS4 portable, that plays PS4 games at 720p but... would people buy it?

 

[aadiboy]

Let's be honest, handhelds are pretty much dead. 3DS has sold 90 million less units than it's predecessor. Nintendo had to change things up by creating a hybrid console in order to do well, and they're supplementing their business with mobile games. Who knows how well the Switch will do long term. There's really no point in putting out another handheld at this point.

 

[ScientificPizza]

What is it with GAF and wanting Sony to be the dominant company in every space

 

[Quasar]

Let's be honest, handhelds are pretty much dead. 3DS has sold 90 million less units than it's predecessor. Nintendo had to change things up by creating a hybrid console in order to do well, and they're supplementing their business with mobile games. Who knows how well the Switch will do long term. There's really no point in putting out another handheld at this point.

I am curious to see how long the Switch momentum continues.

It would be hard for Sony to follow and make the PS5 a hybrid, especially if they want it affordable. Maybe they are better off spending more resources on mobile games to stay relevant in Japan.

 

[TedMilk]

For any chance at success, it'd need to play PS4 games.

 

[Vinnk]

What is it with GAF and wanting Sony to be the dominant company in every space

They don't. GAF just wants Nintendo at the bottom.

Spoiler

Not really serious. But it does feel like that sometimes.

 

[LAA]

I'd be up for it, but it'd probably be very costly.
I think the only way they could really do it, is if they made it essentially a portable PS4, capable of running all PS4 games, however there's just too many problems around that. Imagine the memory you'd need to store the games, memory alone would be a significant cost and would it have to ditch physical, and if so, would it need like 50GB flash cards, or bring UMD Blu rays (Which I can't see happening). Think of the battery life too.

Not sure I can see Sony making a dedicated handheld anymore sadly, I think they'd have to bring into their console ecosystem, and currently, it seems there's too many costly problems around doing that.

 

[autoduelist]

Those devices are not Sony's portables though in the first place, and they are not overpriced.

I have no idea what this has to do with the post you quoted. Did you read the first sentence and ignore the rest? It's not like Sony doesn't have experience launching new storage mediums.

 

[ryanofcall]

Why would we want (another) two similar consoles though?
It's like PS and Xbox - I have one of them only for every generation because they're almost the same except for the exclusives.

 

[Xe4]

Even if the Vita magically did well and competed with the Switch, portables are a console type that now has to incresingly compete with mobile phones. It's just a bad idea all around to invest in the switch.

 

[Nictel]

They are going to release Zelda for it? Because that is mainly the reason for the success of the Switch.

 

[Quasar]

Why would we want (another) two similar consoles though?
It's like PS and Xbox - I have one of them only for every generation because they're almost the same except for the exclusives.

I assume in theory so we can play third party console games on the go.