-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
The PSP was ahead of its time. The Vita was behind the times.
- Thread starter jackissocool
- Start date
OP has a pretty weird opinion.. I think you are treating correlations as causation and all that..
Making the vita a phone might have expanded their possibilities, but I really doubt it would be the silver arrow you kinda are saying it would be.
Personally, I think the biggest issue was: games. There just weren't alot, what was there wasn't super impressive. Uncharted, Killzone, and Gravity Rush are still kinda the big mass appeal exclusives on there and it took well over a year to get all those.
Nowadays, its a different issue.. There are LOADS of games. But they aren't exactly mass appeal titles.. Personally I buy just about every damn game that comes out for the thing.. But I understand why people wouldn't be woo'ed by ports of Ninja Gaidens, pretty good fighting game ports ( that usually come out late and might be better elsewhere ), JRPGs ( my fav! and I think if people love JRPGs, it might sway their entire opinion of the vita ), and other obscure-ish Japanese Rhythm, Visual Novel, and Hunter type games.
I think the games are ultimately the most polarizing. A large subset of people just can't find interest in that many vita games, while people like myself get a boner for everything I just listed above..
Making the vita a phone might have expanded their possibilities, but I really doubt it would be the silver arrow you kinda are saying it would be.
Personally, I think the biggest issue was: games. There just weren't alot, what was there wasn't super impressive. Uncharted, Killzone, and Gravity Rush are still kinda the big mass appeal exclusives on there and it took well over a year to get all those.
Nowadays, its a different issue.. There are LOADS of games. But they aren't exactly mass appeal titles.. Personally I buy just about every damn game that comes out for the thing.. But I understand why people wouldn't be woo'ed by ports of Ninja Gaidens, pretty good fighting game ports ( that usually come out late and might be better elsewhere ), JRPGs ( my fav! and I think if people love JRPGs, it might sway their entire opinion of the vita ), and other obscure-ish Japanese Rhythm, Visual Novel, and Hunter type games.
I think the games are ultimately the most polarizing. A large subset of people just can't find interest in that many vita games, while people like myself get a boner for everything I just listed above..
When the PSP originally came out, or when I decided to get one around 2007 or so, I was impressed at its ability to run digital content. It was one of the first gaming devices and probably the first dedicated handheld that would just run music or videos you put on it. Even back then it had the capacity for going all-digital even though Sony didn't really take advantage of that until much later. It was one of the first gaming systems that felt more like a computer system.
Media-wise the PSP's mistake was Sony thinking it needed to introduce another disc format when it had a console that clearly proved digital was the future. Maybe internet connections and the market weren't ready for digital when the PSP launched, but I think Sony should have at least gone with game cards for its physical media like the Vita.
The other problem of course is that the PSP never really got any killer apps. It eventually got a lot of good games, but they're mostly niche games. The only reason it lived on (and why Vita was even a possibility) is because Monster Hunter saved its ass in Japan which brought the PSP a lot of Japanese developer support later on.
The Vita is very much the same: Great hardware, great capabilities, almost no notable unique software. If you own almost any other current game platform you can get most of the important Vita games.
Market-wise, the OP is on the right track with the phone comparison, but without the phone part. The Vita could have maybe been made as Sony's general-purpose pocket media/computing device that also plays games. Maybe have multiple versions, one that's a phone, like the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad. I think with a lot more general usability software the Vita might have made an interesting tablet alternative for its current price.
But that's one of Sony's biggest problems -- all its different divisions don't talk to each other. There was a thread recently about Sony Xperia tweeting about portable gaming as if the Vita didn't exist. I think the problem is that Sony even has different portable device divisions in the first place. Xperia, Handheld PlayStations, Walkman, and whatever else should all just be one thing, or at least all under one brand. Sony should have one all-purpose line of portable devices that also plays full PlayStation games.
Media-wise the PSP's mistake was Sony thinking it needed to introduce another disc format when it had a console that clearly proved digital was the future. Maybe internet connections and the market weren't ready for digital when the PSP launched, but I think Sony should have at least gone with game cards for its physical media like the Vita.
The other problem of course is that the PSP never really got any killer apps. It eventually got a lot of good games, but they're mostly niche games. The only reason it lived on (and why Vita was even a possibility) is because Monster Hunter saved its ass in Japan which brought the PSP a lot of Japanese developer support later on.
The Vita is very much the same: Great hardware, great capabilities, almost no notable unique software. If you own almost any other current game platform you can get most of the important Vita games.
Market-wise, the OP is on the right track with the phone comparison, but without the phone part. The Vita could have maybe been made as Sony's general-purpose pocket media/computing device that also plays games. Maybe have multiple versions, one that's a phone, like the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad. I think with a lot more general usability software the Vita might have made an interesting tablet alternative for its current price.
But that's one of Sony's biggest problems -- all its different divisions don't talk to each other. There was a thread recently about Sony Xperia tweeting about portable gaming as if the Vita didn't exist. I think the problem is that Sony even has different portable device divisions in the first place. Xperia, Handheld PlayStations, Walkman, and whatever else should all just be one thing, or at least all under one brand. Sony should have one all-purpose line of portable devices that also plays full PlayStation games.
KojiKnight
Member
This has been covered before in other PSP/Vita threads... The UMD disc could hold 1.5GB of data and costed, at most, 1-2 dollars to produce.
The DS at the time of the PSP launch could hold "up to 1 gigabit" or 128MB with the majority of games being 1/10th that (128mbit, or 16MB). These cards cost between $5-15 to make (depending on the size). Yes, later on the size of DS carts increased and the price went down (I think 256MB was the largest DS cart, though I could be mistaken), but they were still never on par with the cost of UMDs.
Sintoid
Member
When PSP launched had 64 megabyte memory cards where you could not store even a single MP3 album and movies were available only on UMD format and no Youtube support. PSP was described by the internet as a multimedia useless mess until memory cards were price slashed and capacity came to 2GB. In that time PSP was hacked and became modder's heaven. That's why PSP became so popular but it was not a precursor device at all. The normal PSP was a portable device with some bugged multimedia features that everyone blamed, nothing more nothing less.
Vita is a device more aligned to the market. Audio and Video, Youtube and Netfix, many other multimedia apps and Video Store. I actually use a lot more Vita's multimedia features, I admit that I never imagined myself using a single PSP multimedia feature exactly because they were crap (unless you have a modded PSP)
outunderthestars
Banned
So much this. I never understood how someone could use a PSP for media. It was terribly clunky, and memory card prices were absurd.
DR2K
Banned
I think that does I the context of tech advancements over time.
Zuhzuhzombie!!
Member
VITA phone.
I kinda hope that their split with Ericsson means that this will eventually happen.
outunderthestars
Banned
I see this from people all the time. Do you really think there is a market for a phone with physical controls?
Because the market appears to have rejected pretty much any phone that isn't a slate design.
OldKingDoran
Banned
when you have incompetent/inexperienced engineers, thats what happens
BLACK AMERICAN PSYCHO
Junior Member
They have and failed, many many many times. And Vita is doing bad in the west becuase of marketing/awareness imo.
moltonasty
Member
Gonna have to disagree OP. Vita still feels very fresh and modern to me, definitely not outdated in any way at all. Then again, I also have a 3DS, so compared to that it looks like it comes from the future lol.
I think Vita's problem is essentially that the dedicated handheld space is dying all around. I'm not really sure what Sony could have done differently, since I think it's an incredible piece of hardware.
I think Vita's problem is essentially that the dedicated handheld space is dying all around. I'm not really sure what Sony could have done differently, since I think it's an incredible piece of hardware.
Not much more I ought to say than what you said really.
Maybe they had a chance with the PSP GO. Vita is just too big and doesn't have the battery for that. Maybe in the future.
ArkhamFantasy
Member
I love my vita but if someone had told them that it wouldn't get monster hunter/final fantasy/dragonquest/kingdom hearts/bioshock...I don't think they would have made it.
Activision also kind of screwed them on the cod game.
Activision also kind of screwed them on the cod game.
512MB actually.
UMDs problem is that a mechanical drive on a portable device (in a era of flash memory) is simply a stupid idea.
Slower, bigger in size, prone to fault and energy inefficient.
LiquidMetal14
hide your water-based mammals
Agree all the way.
This. Plus, it created a big problem once the Vita came out concerning physical backwards compatibility.
Zuhzuhzombie!!
Member
I see this from people all the time. Do you really think there is a market for a phone with physical controls?
Because the market appears to have rejected pretty much any phone that isn't a slate design.
I think there is a market for a well supported handheld that has phone features and abilities.
I wouldn't buy either a 3DS or a Vita but I would buy a Vita phone.
The PSP was a good piece of hardware, aside from UMDs. It didn't have good game support in the west at all which was a huge problem. I think we could have seen some really impressive games on that hardware if more were developed. God of War comes to mind, I remember that being pretty damn impressive at the time. But I think dedicated handhelds are on the way out, they just won't be able to compete with smart phones/tablets in the long run, even if they have 'better' games.
OldKingDoran
Banned
No doubt the handheld market has shrunk considerably, but the 3DS shows that there is still a place for dedicated handhelds. The Vita could have done 3DS levels of success, but Sony messed up many times with Vita.
Proprietary memory cards, useless (imo) and needlessly expensive back touch, having a bad handheld game philosophy where they're trying to make console style games on a handheld, that simply doesn't work well.
Also the major lack of advertisement and marketing.
KojiKnight
Member
PSP wasn't born in the era of flash memory, it was born BEFORE the era of flash memory. As many have noted, the initial memory sticks on offer were quite expensive, and whether DS carts got to 512MB in size is kind of a non-issue since it doesn't change the fact that 16MB carts were costing Nintendo $5-10 to produce at the start of the system... So many of those early PSP games games would have either had to have been severely gimped, or cost $20+ putting them on par with console prices for games that were not console sized experiences.
Too many people are looking back through modern glasses and going "Why didn't Sony do THIS with PSP?" because A: The technology wasn't there in time for launch and B: There was no guarantee that certain technologies would have caught on.
To put it into perspective, at the time I had a pocket PC that had 32MB of internal storage... I spent quite a bit to get (what seemed to me) a HUGE SD card... it was 256MB.
(edit) Fixed that, meant before.
Freeman
Banned
The funny thing about PSP and piracy is that it was mostly piracy of emulated games from other platforms.
The Vita is fine, but Sony accepted defeat to early, why not release release a Vita smartphone, that are many options of how they could do it. The expansive Memory Card is also unfortunate, but at the end of the day all it needs is a compelling game that have broad appeal but those are hard to predict.
The Vita is fine, but Sony accepted defeat to early, why not release release a Vita smartphone, that are many options of how they could do it. The expansive Memory Card is also unfortunate, but at the end of the day all it needs is a compelling game that have broad appeal but those are hard to predict.
Kai Dracon
Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
The dedicated handheld game market has always been powered by the kids to a large degree. Nintendo did their research right when they made the Gameboy and several handheld devices following it.
It seems every handheld that's ever tried to trump Nintendo in wow factor, with better graphics/hardware relative to Nintendo at the time, has failed. They've all been expensive, had short battery life, and no Nintendo games.
Nintendo kinda fucked up with the 3DS because they were looking for a unique hook that wasn't technically elegant yet (glasses free 3D) and bet the farm on it. But they swerved fast enough to recover much of their traditional handheld momentum. (I consider the 3DS a success in today's mobile market, which all pundits swore had obsoleted dedicated portable hardware in an absolute sense.)
It seems every handheld that's ever tried to trump Nintendo in wow factor, with better graphics/hardware relative to Nintendo at the time, has failed. They've all been expensive, had short battery life, and no Nintendo games.
Nintendo kinda fucked up with the 3DS because they were looking for a unique hook that wasn't technically elegant yet (glasses free 3D) and bet the farm on it. But they swerved fast enough to recover much of their traditional handheld momentum. (I consider the 3DS a success in today's mobile market, which all pundits swore had obsoleted dedicated portable hardware in an absolute sense.)
Why on earth do people keep trying to cling to the phone idea? Why would you want a gaming device on a contract? Not to mention contracts for phones typically run 2 years and you wouldn't be able to even buy one if you just renewed. They've already tried it and it doesn't work.
Zuhzuhzombie!!
Member
The Playstation Phone sucked and people keep the same phone and handheld for 2+ years.
figadapaura
Member
The only thing behind the times is those ridiculous SD card prices.
OldKingDoran
Banned
really man. Not to mention it would be an absolute drain on the battery, with what the phone OS, multitasking, constant LTE/Wifi connection, it would be too much
Immaculate
Banned
I agree completely and once cfw came around it was bliss
The PSP was a success in Japan because of Monster Hunter (and that success then turned into plenty of good games even late in the cycle). In the west it was success in the beginning because of Multimedia but also because there was really a good push behind it by Sony and 3rd parties. Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories were great games and brought the GTA console experience onto a console. Something which hasn't been replicated since then (even though you can get GTA now on your iPhone the controls are garbage). Due to piracy sales were never as high as executives hoped and in the second half of its life cycle practically no more games were developed in the West.
The Vita had two issues when it was designed. Some manager though that by locking down piracy they could increase the sales numbers of games, assuming that the Vita would obviously sell as much as the PSP. This assumption took also into account that it would sell by itself without games, and Capcom would of course release MH on the Vita. Not locking down MH on the Vita was almost catastrophic for Japan.
So Sony successfully killed the market in the West and East from the start. Pirates would not buy the Vita and most consumers in the west had already a smartphone which could play games (even GTA), so why get a Vita with very few games? Photo cameras are dying out because people just want to carry one device, so dedicated handheld devices would have the same issue. It didn't help the the Vita is very expensive. The attach ratio for the few people who bought a Vita is very high though, so the managers got something right (though my guess is that those people also had plenty of original PSP games and were not pirating, at least that is true for me). In Japan it found a market once a steady flow of niche games was released. The PSP sold 20 million units in Japan though, the Vita will be lucky if it reaches half the amount.
Adding phone capability to the Vita would have killed it even more though. I cannot see anyone replacing their smartphone with a Vita.
The Vita had two issues when it was designed. Some manager though that by locking down piracy they could increase the sales numbers of games, assuming that the Vita would obviously sell as much as the PSP. This assumption took also into account that it would sell by itself without games, and Capcom would of course release MH on the Vita. Not locking down MH on the Vita was almost catastrophic for Japan.
So Sony successfully killed the market in the West and East from the start. Pirates would not buy the Vita and most consumers in the west had already a smartphone which could play games (even GTA), so why get a Vita with very few games? Photo cameras are dying out because people just want to carry one device, so dedicated handheld devices would have the same issue. It didn't help the the Vita is very expensive. The attach ratio for the few people who bought a Vita is very high though, so the managers got something right (though my guess is that those people also had plenty of original PSP games and were not pirating, at least that is true for me). In Japan it found a market once a steady flow of niche games was released. The PSP sold 20 million units in Japan though, the Vita will be lucky if it reaches half the amount.
Adding phone capability to the Vita would have killed it even more though. I cannot see anyone replacing their smartphone with a Vita.
KimonoNoNo
Member
It seems at the moment SCE's strategy in the West is sell Vitas with the minimum outlay as possible to basically make whatever money they can off their niche audience.
Sony will not replace the Vita and it will continue to have a long zombie existence fed on Japanese imports and smaller Indie games.
I'm not sure what you could add to the Vita to not make it seem like tacked on shit (I already feel this way about backtouch). I don't think you can always add more to new devices; sometimes you can only do what others are doing, but as good as possible.
The only thing I'd really want improved on the Vita is full sized sticks, like the Shield, and I want clamshell. The OLED is already one of the best screens out there. It's a little uncomfortable to hold without a grip, but that's Sony choosing portability over ergonomics. It does pretty much everything you'd want it to do. It got rid of the battery guzzling optical drive. It's powerful and the software features are great. It's a pretty A+ followup.
The only thing I'd really want improved on the Vita is full sized sticks, like the Shield, and I want clamshell. The OLED is already one of the best screens out there. It's a little uncomfortable to hold without a grip, but that's Sony choosing portability over ergonomics. It does pretty much everything you'd want it to do. It got rid of the battery guzzling optical drive. It's powerful and the software features are great. It's a pretty A+ followup.
Indie's pretty much for THE most hardcore, or at least the most dedicated to following gaming IE the crowd that'd come to sites like these. So yeah, that kind of makes sense, along with a huge chunk of Japanese gaming that can operate on a similarly small base. A lot of major American publishers/developers either aim too big or are completely apathetic to handhelds, even before phones hit it big it was mainly for kids licensed games, shovelware, and the odd smaller game a publisher actually took on.
While I agree that the Vita is lacking in the multimedia department (browser, app support, video/audio format support, etc.), I disagree with your assertion that the Vita should have been a phone.
A Vita phone would have been full of compromises which would have led to a mediocre product in every aspect. The battery life is the first limitating factor which should be considered. Some people are already unhappy with the battery life of the current handhelds, adding the phone capabilities would have only made it worse. Looking from the phone perspective, having a big gaming focus would make the battery life horrible for the rest of the usage. The only way to mitigate this problem would have been weaker hardware, resulting in a weaker gaming proposition.
The same can be said for the controls. Either they would have been gimped or we would have gotten an ugly and clunky phone nobody would want to buy.
Furthermore, the phone market is already very competitive with Apple and Samsung dominating. I don't think Sony could have used the Playstation branding to gain market share, especially when the described phone would be bad.
Looking back, at that time, Sony had no other choice than to go with the 'console on the go' strategy. The casual handheld market is owned by Nintendo and the smartphones already fed into it. The core market was the only niche where Sony could seriously compete. Unfortunately for them, they overestimated the market. The only alternative would have been to abstain the market and not release the Vita.
A Vita phone would have been full of compromises which would have led to a mediocre product in every aspect. The battery life is the first limitating factor which should be considered. Some people are already unhappy with the battery life of the current handhelds, adding the phone capabilities would have only made it worse. Looking from the phone perspective, having a big gaming focus would make the battery life horrible for the rest of the usage. The only way to mitigate this problem would have been weaker hardware, resulting in a weaker gaming proposition.
The same can be said for the controls. Either they would have been gimped or we would have gotten an ugly and clunky phone nobody would want to buy.
Furthermore, the phone market is already very competitive with Apple and Samsung dominating. I don't think Sony could have used the Playstation branding to gain market share, especially when the described phone would be bad.
Looking back, at that time, Sony had no other choice than to go with the 'console on the go' strategy. The casual handheld market is owned by Nintendo and the smartphones already fed into it. The core market was the only niche where Sony could seriously compete. Unfortunately for them, they overestimated the market. The only alternative would have been to abstain the market and not release the Vita.
ArtHands
Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
How about reading the OP? It is behind the time, because it brings nothing new to the table except back touch pad and 3G which nobody wants. The psp is ahead of time because it brings those multimedia features before the smartphones.
We ain't talking about the specs here.
CamHostage
Member
Crazy thing is, cheapskates like me were doing both things very regularly at the time. I always had my eye on one of those handy, dandy Creative Zen PMDs (the mostly-poor-man's iPod,) but in the meantime, my PSP and its awesome Podcast tool were all I needed for audio and video over half-hour train rides every day of the week...
And stranger still, I know I wasn't alone in that behavior at the time.
Me too.
you're nasty