Support NeoGAF

[Dorfdad]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

 

[protonion]

Beta=Vita=2nd. It's like cracking the enigma code. Luckily i have 40 PS3's crunching the numbers.

I'm Greek and that's exactly what I thought when I read about the name. Didn't know it was Latin...

So PS4=PS Delta???

 

[Plinko]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

I'm puzzled by this as well.

 

[guina]

Ugh, I'm not. Hopefully it's competent. Or at least more consistent than their PS3 stuff.

Hehe better brace for impact. The announcement trailer for the NGP was: PLAY LIFE

 

[Earl Cazone]

i dont like ngp or vita. buit whatever, its just a name. i want this machine with all the ram now

 

[Krev]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

It only has traction with a very small portion of the potential user base of the system.

For some reason, when I hear Vita, I tend to associate it with diet, slimming, and becoming sexy.

Positive associations, right? That's probably their line of thinking.
Cheesy, but we'll live.

 

[Dedication Through Light]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

I cant grasp abandoning the portable playstation name. Isnt that what people wanted, their playstation experience in a portable form?

 

[French]

Seriously ?

Why would they keep Next Generation Portable ? It's a codename ( even if compared to the 3DS, it really is a generation ahead ).

And the PSP 3 would be the NNGP ?

 

[Dali]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

Most all consoles' codenames have "traction" before the official name is announced. NGP - Next Gen Portable - actually sounds like nothing but a simple project description and seems fit for nothing but a codename. I think it'd be a pretty poor choice for the actual product name.

 

[Kagari]

I cant graps abandoning the portable playstation name. Isnt that what people wanted, their playstation experience in a portable form?

Based on western sales? No.

 

[neptunes]

Never understood why they would want to change it. Sony NGP sounds good. Also it already has traction.

Sony NGP should be the final name..

It was an temporary name, just like Nintendo and the Revolution/Wii name.

 

[Plinko]

Seriously ?

Why would they keep Next Generation Portable ? It's a codename ( even if compared to the 3DS, it really is a generation ahead ).

It flows well, it's similar to "PSP," and it already is a recognizable name with gamers. Vita is a complete switch.

 

[French]

It flows well, it's similar to "PSP," and it already is a recognizable name with gamers. Vita is a complete switch.

PSV is similiar to PSP too.

Next Generation Portable as a name doesn't make any sense.

 

[Y2Kev]

"I give PS Vita a "WHAAAAAAAAT?" and a "GAH." and ten "NOT THIS TIME, DEPP."

 

[alr1ght]

NGP is a terrible name for a retail product.

 

[Plinko]

PSV is similiar to PSP too.

Next Generation Portable as a name doesn't make any sense.

My main problem with "PSV" is that every time I see it I think "Playstation Five."

I'd like to know your definition of "sense." Sony is releasing a portable handheld that is clearly a next-generation handheld. How in the world does that NOT make sense?

 

[richman555]

For some reason, when I hear Vita, I tend to associate it with diet, slimming, and becoming sexy.

Then this is certainly the wrong place for that.

 

[neptunes]

My main problem with "PSV" is that every time I see it I think "Playstation Five."

I'd like to know your definition of "sense." Sony is releasing a portable handheld that is clearly a next-generation handheld. How in the world does that NOT make sense?

Did you refer to FFXIII as "EFF EFF , Ex eye, eye, eye" ?

 

[Spiegel]

My main problem with "PSV" is that every time I see it I think "Playstation Five."

I'd like to know your definition of "sense." Sony is releasing a portable handheld that is clearly a next-generation handheld. How in the world does that NOT make sense?

It is the fifth playstation

 

[French]

My main problem with "PSV" is that every time I see it I think "Playstation Five."

I'd like to know your definition of "sense." Sony is releasing a portable handheld that is clearly a next-generation handheld. How in the world does that NOT make sense?

It makes sense now, because it's indeed their next generation portable. But when it will be released that won't make any sense.

 

[V_Ben]

It is the fifth playstation

...sh*t. I wonder if they intended for it to be that clever.

 

[Grecco]

NGP is a terrible name for a retail product.

Well, Sony already released MAG so terrible retail product names arent something new for them.



Playstation Vita is a terrible name but console names have very little impact really. PS vita will either succeed or fail on alot of other things not on its name.


If Names were that important then the Atari Jaguar would have been a succeess. come on thats a bad ass name

 

[DR3AM]

PSV sounds good but vita does not

 

[Krev]

...sh*t. I wonder if they intended for it to be that clever.

They would have spent ages deliberating over the ins and outs of a ton of names, so I'm sure the thought occured to them, whether it was deliberate in choosing 'Vita' or not. I'm sure the guy behind 'Vita' got a lot of high fives around the office and pretended that was what he was going for right from the start. ; )

In all seriousness, maybe that's influenced the emphasis of the 'PS' bit.

Playstation Vita is a terrible name but console names have very little impact really. PS vita will either succeed or fail on alot of other things not on its name.

I actually think the 'Wii' name played a significant role in the machine's success.

 

[Wolves Evolve]

I get the feeling that this E3 is going to be very shocking for us. You get the sense that Sony are heading into the Android thing knowing what the stakes are, even if they are screwing the pooch elsewhere. I wouldn't be surprised to see Farmville and Angry Birds demoed on stage with the Vita. (and the Cafe to be honest.)

 

[LamerDeluxe]

PSV is the name of a Dutch soccer team, I'm pretty sure many soccer fans here would refuse to buy it because of that.

Other than that "Vita" is associated with health products here, so that also wouldn't work.

 

[PjotrStroganov]

PSV... Should be received well by the soccer loving Dutchies!

 

[Barack Lesnar]

Based on western sales? No.

Didn't PSP sell really well in NA? especially considering it was their first handheld and they were going up against a competitor with 100% market share. Software not so much but that's a different story.

 

[Plinko]

Did you refer to FFXIII as "EFF EFF , Ex eye, eye, eye" ?

No, and your statement kind of verifies my argument:

FFXIII is clearly supposed to be "Final Fantasy 13." The Vita is going to be the fifth in the line of playstation consoles/portables--it seems perfectly natural to read "PSV" as "Playstation 5."

If that's what they were going for, then fine (although there is absolutely no way that's what they're doing as it will bring questions as to what the 4th Playstation was). But don't fool yourself into thinking they're going to call it the 'PSV.' It will be referred to by the company as the "Playstation Vita."

 

[lowrider007]

PSV sounds like a glue sniffers dream come true.

 

[kairu]

Vita, hunh? I'll still buy it. Names are irrelevant, show me them games!

 

[Plinko]

Vita, hunh? I'll still buy it. Names are irrelevant, show me them games!

Agreed. They could call this thing the Playstation Bowel Movement and it wouldn't deter gamers. Nobody really cares in the long run--it's the games that sell the system.

 

[Dedication Through Light]

Didn't PSP sell really well in NA? especially considering it was their first handheld and they were going up against a competitor with 100% market share. Software not so much but that's a different story.

The games that sold well were essentially portable playstation versions of their console counterparts, which baffles me on the whole thing.

 

[gofreak]

Hehe better brace for impact. The announcement trailer for the NGP was: PLAY LIFE

There's that theme again.

I mentioned this slightly on Twitter, but I hope Vita - 'Life' - will be a reference to integration with your 'real life' in terms of community and competition in games.

Like, Vita should basically have a foursquare style foundation that transparently discovers communities of people playing the same games as you in the places you go to, and let you join them if you want. This should be a service exposed by the near application to all games.

So if, say, a few people go to the same Starbucks and they all play Wipeout on their Vita, it would invite them to join what would basically be a Wipeout club for that Starbucks.

Global competition is intimidating for most people - most will never touch the top of global leaderboards - but here you could constrain competition and engagement to scopes related to places that are actually to some degree meaningful for you - like your office or university or local bookshop or whatever. Make competition more 'local', intimate, and give more satisfaction to more players by letting them rule their own local roosts, so to speak.

That would be a interesting foundation to build the online/community side of things on, and you could layer all sorts of other things on top of that, like the treasure hunt idea, AR, etc. And it would be a very different spin on things than's possible on PS3, would be welcome differentiation that makes sense of why you'd want certain games on a portable that you might not otherwise want to play there.

/digresson

 

[Carl]

Agreed. They could call this thing the Playstation Bowel Movement and it wouldn't deter gamers. Nobody really cares in the long run--it's the games that sell the system.

Now that i'd like to see

 

[clifftrapremover]

Based on western sales? No.

My thoughts exactly. PSP as a brand didn't work in the west. A rebranding won't hurt in Japan and will bring some new life into the device. You only get a sequel if the original was a big enough success.

 

[Krev]

There's that theme again.

I mentioned this slightly on Twitter, but I hope Vita - 'Life' - will be a reference to integration with your 'real life' in terms of community and competition in games.

Like, Vita should basically have a foursquare style foundation that transparently discovers communities of people playing the same games as you in the places you go to, and let you join them if you want. This should be a service exposed by the near application to all games.

So if, say, a few people go to the same Starbucks and they all play Wipeout on their Vita, it would invite them to join what would basically be a Wipeout club for that Starbucks.

Global competition is intimidating for most people - most will never touch the top of global leaderboards - but here you could constrain competition and engagement to scopes related to places that are actually to some degree meaningful for you - like your office or university or local bookshop or whatever. Make competition more 'local', intimate, and give more satisfaction to more players by letting them be rule their own local roosts, so to speak.

That would be a interesting foundation to build the online/community side of things on, and you could layer all sorts of other things on top of that, like the treasure hunt idea, AR, etc. And it would be a very different spin on things than's possible on PS3, would be welcome differentiation that makes sense of why you'd want certain games on a portable that you might not otherwise want to play there.

/digresson

That is a shockingly brilliant idea. Wow.

If Sony maintained the service well enough, that could make Vita a success with people who otherwise wouldn't consider getting one. It makes serious portable gaming seem fresh, accessible, fashionable even.

Alas, probably too good to be true.

 

[Elios83]

I wonder if further news (launch details, price, specific games announcements) will be discovered before the conference, probably not because of the June 2 event and because Sony wouldn't like a PSP Go part two situation at their conference
VITA in the end could prove to be a well thought name, it reminds to Playstation Life(style), it's PSV (the fifth Playstation platform), like VAIO and BRAVIA it could be the acronym of something related to the features of the product ( Visual Integrated Touch Architecture?), and most important of all, it will make people get curious about what kind of product it is compared with PSP 'something'.

 

[Dorfdad]

Well my initial reactions to VITA was I thought it was vista. Gave me a bad feeling from my days working on that OS.

I prefer the NGP much like the PSP = Playstation Portable

Sony: Next Gen Portable works for me. I like the flow of saying I got a Sony NGP yesterday than saying I got a Sony Vita yesterday..

Also when they make a PSP3 thay can call that a the Sony NGP2


However if what Krev posted above is true I can life with it... That does sound cool.

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

I get this feeling that it's going to be a "Wii" situation, but there will be no grudging acceptance of the cleverness of the name, as its not really that clever.

 

[Shai-Tan]

There's that theme again.

I mentioned this slightly on Twitter, but I hope Vita - 'Life' - will be a reference to integration with your 'real life' in terms of community and competition in games.

Like, Vita should basically have a foursquare style foundation that transparently discovers communities of people playing the same games as you in the places you go to, and let you join them if you want. This should be a service exposed by the near application to all games.

So if, say, a few people go to the same Starbucks and they all play Wipeout on their Vita, it would invite them to join what would basically be a Wipeout club for that Starbucks.

Global competition is intimidating for most people - most will never touch the top of global leaderboards - but here you could constrain competition and engagement to scopes related to places that are actually to some degree meaningful for you - like your office or university or local bookshop or whatever. Make competition more 'local', intimate, and give more satisfaction to more players by letting them be rule their own local roosts, so to speak.

That would be a interesting foundation to build the online/community side of things on, and you could layer all sorts of other things on top of that, like the treasure hunt idea, AR, etc. And it would be a very different spin on things than's possible on PS3, would be welcome differentiation that makes sense of why you'd want certain games on a portable that you might not otherwise want to play there.

/digresson

That all sounds great, unfortunately Sony has never been able to deliver on the software end, always years behind their competitors.

 

[Plinko]

That is a shockingly brilliant idea. Wow.

If Sony maintained the service well enough, that could make Vita a success with people who otherwise wouldn't consider getting one. It makes serious portable gaming seem fresh, accessible, fashionable even.

Alas, probably too good to be true.

It's a decent idea but has the same problems Nintendo has with "Streetpass." How likely are you to find a bunch of people playing Wipeout on their Vita at the same Starbucks? What about those who live in rural areas? I could see it being successful at universities but that's about it.

 

[gofreak]

It's a decent idea but has the same problems Nintendo has with "Streetpass." How likely are you to find a bunch of people playing Wipeout on their Vita at the same Starbucks? What about those who live in rural areas? I could see it being successful at universities but that's about it.

The resolution could be dynamic depending on the density of NGP players.

It might go down to the level of a starbucks in one area or the level of a block or town or even county in another (although, granted, the less granular the resolution the less compelling it might be).

The big advantage over streetpass here is that you don't have to be in places at the same time as other people. It can connect you asynchronously over time, so if people check into places over weeks and months - whether someone else with a NGP is present or not - they can discover and engage with the community 'there'.

In terms of implementation - ideal case would be if Sony sewed it into the OS, integrated it with LiveArea etc. etc. BUT, even if they don't, as long as devs have access to the location data, they could roll their own stuff for their own game.

'near' is on the right track though, but community formation and discovery based on location should be the next step.

 

[Krev]

It's a decent idea but has the same problems Nintendo has with "Streetpass." How likely are you to find a bunch of people playing Wipeout on their Vita at the same Starbucks? What about those who live in rural areas? I could see it being successful at universities but that's about it.

As a university student who lives very close to the city, it seems perfect for me, but I can see how it could be problematic for many locations.
It would certainly take off in Japan though.
It's a much more compelling idea than StreetPass.

EDIT: gofreak has it worked out pretty well.

 

[butter_stick]

The name doesn't matter. Kinect is a stupid name. Wii is. What matters is creating a brand, and that's where I'm not totally convinced by Vita. It doesn't really sound unique or make me think of a portable games console. It'll depend on how well they market it.

 

[Agent X]

Like, Vita should basically have a foursquare style foundation that transparently discovers communities of people playing the same games as you in the places you go to, and let you join them if you want. This should be a service exposed by the near application to all games.

So if, say, a few people go to the same Starbucks and they all play Wipeout on their Vita, it would invite them to join what would basically be a Wipeout club for that Starbucks.

Global competition is intimidating for most people - most will never touch the top of global leaderboards - but here you could constrain competition and engagement to scopes related to places that are actually to some degree meaningful for you - like your office or university or local bookshop or whatever. Make competition more 'local', intimate, and give more satisfaction to more players by letting them be rule their own local roosts, so to speak.

That would be a interesting foundation to build the online/community side of things on, and you could layer all sorts of other things on top of that, like the treasure hunt idea, AR, etc. And it would be a very different spin on things than's possible on PS3, would be welcome differentiation that makes sense of why you'd want certain games on a portable that you might not otherwise want to play there.

I really dig the ideas you've described here. Having "local" scoreboards and the possibility of impromptu "local" competitions would bring an entirely fresh sense of community to the table.

 

[Himself]

So is it "vite-uh" as in vitamin, or "vee-tuh" as in Rita?

 

[Dead Prince]

please don't plaster name all over it and i'll be fine. just going to place a sticker over it.

 

[C.Dark.DN]

Even tho I don't like them, Nintendo's version at least, Mii is the perfect name for an avatar. Wii goes along with that well. NGP and Vita do nothing for me. I want ps4,ps5,psp2,psp3.

 

[Lijik]

I really don't like the name for a console/handheld. I am curious what their marketing spin will be with this name...

A revival of the "This Is Living" campaign.