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Sony: climate "not healthy" for PlayStation Vita successor

NX will do fine in Japan, but it will need all the help in the West. Nintendo are the next in line after Sony to abandon one of their primary platform (Wii U) if they plan to make the NX any success. Sony atleast managed to find major success with PS4, but we can't say the same for Nintendo's next console/handheld.

There was a time when the DS used to sell more than a million in a month and now the 3DS barely manages a fraction of these sales.

The upside to Japan is that there's been a recent move to basic phones over smartphones. Nintendo should be able to carve out a decent market there, but yeah, good luck in the west.
 

Talonz

Member
There really isn't any need for a Vita 2 for the games that are put out on the Vita now(Indy games) the current hardware is more than adequate.
 

Traffcore

Member
True. They should focus on their primary products which make them profitable. Vita is a lovely machine and an excellent accessory to the PS4.
 
What screwed the Vita over the most was actually Sony themsleves.

They made so many stupid decisions with the system from the start they positioned it as both a competitor to mobile and the 3DS and it ended up being spread to thinly to really compete with either.

Then you have the needless and outright useless 3G support (which was not cheap and only through AT&T, they literally got booed when they announced this lol)

Then you have the starting price tag of 250$ which sounded great at the time (the 3DS was still 250$ at this point) but the 3DSes lackluster sales pretty much already proved that price point was simply too high for a handheld.

Then you have the memory cards, which were proprietary (unlike the 3DS) and expensive as all hell (seriously at launch the prices of these cards were insane 20$ for the smallest one and these were REQUIRED to do anything with the system and non-bundles did not come with one)

Then you had the games, launch had a few decent games but third party support was (like the Wii U) pretty much lackluster from the beginning, Sony even had a bundle for both Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed liberation, Call of Duty is still one of the worst games of the system (if not THE worst) and Liberation was... decent at least? Instead of highlighting some of the better titles the system would receive with bundles (like Persona 4 Golden or Teraway or Killzone) they went for mass market appeal which ended up dropping flat shortly after those bundles were released, and despite the rather good sales of both of those bundles neither game ever got a sequel on the Vita so any of the people who Sony tried to bring in have been left in the dark without games to play.

The Vita itself is an amazing piece of tech but the way it was ultimately designed and the decisions they made at the top were what ultimately killed it.

If Sony had been as smart with the Vita as they have been so far with the PS4 it might be a very different story, but the way Sony approached the Vita was very similar how the first approached the PS3, and that's what largely screwed them over.
 

Elios83

Member
Pretty obvious, it would be crazy to release an other dedicated gaming handheld with the same business plan of the original PSP, that is targeting 18-35 male core gamers.
That market has evaporated and it's not coming back.
An other handheld from them would only make sense if it was primarly an Android-based device with full compatibility to the Playstore Apps, on top of that it should add specific Playstation support with traditional controls.
But I woulnd't risk failure on that either, they should work on bringing their backcatalogue on mobile devices through Playstation Now first. Right now PSNow is also available on a few TV models. They need to expand to other devices and improve the catalogue pf games available on that service.
 
Yup, Nintendo have released the "NEW" 3DS worldwide this year which is the equivalent of the DS to DSi launch yet total 3DS sales will most likely remain flat YOY (around 7.5 million) whilst DS/DSi sales were 29 million for 2009.

It's going to be very interesting to see what happens to Nintendo in next few years .
Sony has already given up on handhelds .
They going console only and that should last them until there streaming service pick up the slack .
But nintendo best market is getting eat away from mobile and the don't have a console to fall back on .
If the NX not successful they are going to be in a very bad place.
 

BroBot

Member
Sony really should have named it "Psp 2". 80% of people that questioned me while I was playing a vita thought it was a psp. Maybe they can make a Vita 3000 with slightly better specs, triggers, and rebrand it as "PlayStation 4 Portable"?
 
The 3DS was a failure before it even launched? Because that's when Capcom started developing Revelations, Street Fighter and Monster Hunter. Two of the three were announced prelaunch and all of them came out in the first year.

They weren't paid to either.

I'm talking about MH, which has been announced in september 2011: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=444609

And yes they were, famousmortimer confirmed it
 
It's going to be very interesting to see what happens to Nintendo in next few years .
Sony has already given up on handhelds .
They going console only and that should last them until there streaming service pick up the slack .
But nintendo best market is getting eat away from mobile and the don't have a console to fall back on .
If the NX not successful they are going to be in a very bad place.

Everything you said is true. Hence why Nintendo is putting so much emphasis into toys-to-life (Amiibo figures/ cards) and ground-up mobile games using their IP.

It seems to me that Nintendo is going to get away with not having to significantly increase development staff or software output by combining handheld/ console software into one line of product, and the other 30% that used to do handheld software can do mobile games.
 

Oregano

Member
I'm talking about MH, which has been announced in september 2011: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=444609

And yes they were, famousmortimer confirmed it

Monster Hunter came out three months later. You think they slapped the game together in a few months? Capcom even said they started planning it right after Portable 3rd released.

Famousmortimer is mostly famous for being full of shit. Nintendo didn't have to bribe publishers to get support to the successor to the DS.

EDIT: Oh wait you mean 4? They didn't do MH3U to then not release more MH on the same system.
 

EGM1966

Member
Makes sense. Even if they called it PS4P I would expect a handheld to struggle more year on year now. That markets being swallowed up by smart phones and tablets.
 
Famousmortimer was confirmed to have made stuff up while pretending to be an insider. His whole sordid "career" was one long episode of Tales From My Ass.

And yet he knew about the PSTV a year before it got announced, he also knew about Infamous Vita which has been canceled well before it was revealed to the public. There's other things I might be forgetting but the only thing I remember him being wrong was for why Driveclub was being delayed.

Monster Hunter came out three months later. You think they slapped the game together in a few months? Capcom even said they started planning it right after Portable 3rd released.

Famousmortimer is mostly famous for being full of shit. Nintendo didn't have to bribe publishers to get support to the successor to the DS.

I never said that, the deal might have been in place several months before when Nintendo release that it wouldn't be as easy as they thought it would. And Portable 3rd released in December 2010, August 2011 for the PS3 version. They could've easily switch platform.
 

RPGam3r

Member
Not very shocking or "sad" as some people put it. I would rather Sony focus all its resources on PS4. Same reason I hope Nintendo does a hybrid console + handheld so they can focus on one market with all their resources.
 

OmegaDL50

Member
I think it'll be a very long time, maybe never.

Thing is the Vita is actually a well designed system. I feel the reasons it hasn't done well aren't related to how good a handheld it actually is, which is a shame.

Agreed.

If a platform gets half hearted support, in turn I think the consumer interest also reflects in the amount the platform receives in return.

I mean look at the PSTV and how that was handled. The whitelist is something that should have never needed to happen. Sony effectively sent it out to die in a crippled state. Only a extremely limited few (like myself) would be interested in picking it up to play Vita games on an HDTV. If the support was there then maybe the interest as well as demand would be there as well.
 

sörine

Banned
Haha, lord :D Tu put it simply, it's like you even wonder how and why the PS Vita dare to exist in the first place.

It's generous of you to worry about the studios who touched the PS Vita, but I'm sure the lost lambs are going to be fine by moving to the Nintendo ecosystem. It's the only one we need after all ;-)
It's not really corncern so much as simply pointing out a missed opportunity. I doubt I'd shed any tears if NIS, Compile Heart and company closed up shop tomorrow. Maybe Falcom but even that's more about what they were than what they are.

And I'm repeating myself here but this is an issue in retrospect. At the time it was a more than fair assumption Vita was going to do significantly better than it has and not crazy to think PS handhelds would continue past it. And even then, again repeating myself, the smaller publishers still did okay on the system anyway so it's more about missed opportunity in terms of building for the future. I do think the likes of Bandai Namco, Koei Tecmo, Square Enix and Sega would've been better served switching some of their Vita games to 3DS at the time too though (ie: anything hunting for example).

What nonsense. Why are you assuming the Vita base won't upgrade to PS4 once supports stops? Day and date releases of PS4 ports from Vita or PS3 now make up 40-50% of total sales in Japan, even more if you count Western sales. To say they're gonna sell 4-5x less because the year old ports did is ridiculous.

They keep coming back to Vita, make profit and more games, yet you still claim they made a mistake. I think you don't understand their business. When the Vita falls, they'll go to PS4, the ports to that platform is already easing that transition.

If Capcom made MH on Vita it would've sold as much as it did on 3DS, and Japan handheld market could've used a strong Vita.
The ridiculous nonsense here is your claim PS4 will fully supplant their handheld heritage in the Japanese market. I think you're in for a very rude awakening over the next several years.

MH4 sold significantly more than Vita itself had at the time. Monster Hunter very clearly benefitted by going for the big pond rather than trying to grow the tiny one. God Eater, Toukiden and Phantasy Star all would've done better had they followed the king too. Now they get to perish with PS4.
 

Delio

Member
It's going to be very interesting to see what happens to Nintendo in next few years .
Sony has already given up on handhelds .
They going console only and that should last them until there streaming service pick up the slack .
But nintendo best market is getting eat away from mobile and the don't have a console to fall back on .
If the NX not successful they are going to be in a very bad place.

That honestly makes me wonder if there is even a space for Nintendo. But I'm pulling for NX to tough it out.
 
It's going to be very interesting to see what happens to Nintendo in next few years .
Sony has already given up on handhelds .
They going console only and that should last them until there streaming service pick up the slack .
But nintendo best market is getting eat away from mobile and the don't have a console to fall back on .
If the NX not successful they are going to be in a very bad place.

I'd say the US government and ISPs need to get their shit together before streaming services pick up the slack. It's literally impossible to use PS now and similar services in my home town.
 

Oregano

Member
I never said that, the deal might have been in place several months before when Nintendo release that it wouldn't be as easy as they thought it would. And Portable 3rd released in December 2010, August 2011 for the PS3 version. They could've easily switch platform.

The 3DS only released in February 2011. You think the 3DS came out, and then struggled, then Nintendo moneyhatted Capcom, they switched from a Vita/PS3 game to a 3DS game and managed to ship the game in the space of less than 10 months? EDIT: Keeping in mind that MH3U was clearly made to prep for MH4.

It's much more likely that Capcom thought putting one of the biggest franchises in Japan on the successor to the most successful platform in Japan(by far) was a pretty damn good idea.

Especially when they already had Revelaitons in the pipeline.
 
What nonsense. Why are you assuming the Vita base won't upgrade to PS4 once supports stops? Day and date releases of PS4 ports from Vita or PS3 now make up 40-50% of total sales in Japan, even more if you count Western sales. To say they're gonna sell 4-5x less because the year old ports did is ridiculous.



They keep coming back to Vita, make profit and more games, yet you still claim they made a mistake. I think you don't understand their business. When the Vita falls, they'll go to PS4, the ports to that platform is already easing that transition.

If Capcom made MH on Vita it would've sold as much as it did on 3DS, and Japan handheld market could've used a strong Vita.



For MH to sold as much as it did in 3DS, Vita would either need an insane attach rate or double sales.
 

ArtHands

Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
They're lucky that Vita showed up in time to act as the guinea pig and lost.

In truth, Nintendo too could have almost been a victim of this. Even Iwata admitted that 3DS games were going to cost a lot more than DS, and that it could negatively affect how they actually sell.


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=409278

Combine this with the 3DS failing at launch, they were just one gen early from feeling the full brunt of it.

To say the truth, I think the PSP is enough of a guinea pig to the world as well. Vita just enforced that belief.
 

Man God

Non-Canon Member
It's not like they just slapped Portable 3rd on 3DS, added 3D and went here you go, launch year MH. It's practically a whole new game bringing bits from Tri and Portable 3rd together.
 

kewlmyc

Member
With the way Smartphones and tablets are going, I don't think we'll be seeing dedicated gaming handhelds outside of Nintendo anymore.
 
I'd say the US government and ISPs need to get their shit together before streaming services pick up the slack. It's literally impossible to use PS now and similar services in my home town.

When i say streaming services going to pick up the slack i am talking about more than 10 plus years from now.
 

Orayn

Member
And yet he knew about the PSTV a year before it got announced, he also knew about Infamous Vita which has been canceled well before it was revealed to the public. There's other things I might be forgetting but the only thing I remember him being wrong was for why Driveclub was being delayed.

No it wasn't.

What he said about Driveclub was a pretty critical ass-pull presented in the same breathless insider style as everything else he said. I think it's enough not to use him as a source and to take any unconfirmed info he "leaked" with a huge grain of salt. (To say nothing of the "please give me money and I'll use it to hire some writers and figure things out afterwards" shitshow of Dodd Scientifics.)
 

sörine

Banned
The 3DS only released in February 2011. You think the 3DS came out, and then struggled, then Nintendo moneyhatted Capcom, they switched from a Vita/PS3 game to a 3DS game and managed to ship the game in the space of less than 10 months? EDIT: Keeping in mind that MH3U was clearly made to prep for MH4.

It's much more likely that Capcom thought putting one of the biggest franchises in Japan on the successor to the most successful platform in Japan(by far) was a pretty damn good idea.

Especially when they already had Revelaitons in the pipeline.
We've had confirmation in interviews that the MH move was decided in 2010 and that it was Capcom who came to Nintendo with the deal. It was the obvious thing to do for a series like that even though it shocked everyone at the time.
 
It's really interesting to think about how different the gaming landscape was when the Vita was launched, or heck when it started development. If it took two years to go to market after entering production then it would have started life in 2009. When Smartphones were still in their infancy. Anyone wondering why the Vita was made to begin with needs to realize smartphones caught the industry off guard and it couldn't ajust fast enough to put out a decent alternative.
 

Josh7289

Member
I'm somewhat surprised he answered the question so directly, but it's been clear for a few years that there would not be a Vita successor, so I appreciate Shuhei Yoshida's candor, in this case and in general.
 

L.O.R.D

Member
Do you know what is more not healthy?
Not releasing major games on Vita
Also, patching up exploits that in fact good for them
 

Jigorath

Banned
Of course. The handheld market is fucked outside Japan. Kids don't need a 3DS or a Vita when they can play Minecraft on their parents' tablet.
 

eksy

Banned
Shuhei is just a likable guy, without even trying. Watch the Q&A in the article. Someone asks about his opinion on Pachter's recent theory on the console death in the future. His answer to that and other questions are pretty humorous (Playstation+Nintendo merger, contest winner "controller only?", etc)
 

sörine

Banned
Of course. The handheld market is fucked outside Japan. Kids don't need a 3DS or a Vita when they can play Minecraft on their parents' tablet.
They also don't need a console when they can play Minecraft on the parents' tablet. The knockdown effect is just more delayed there but it's already started.
 

Jigorath

Banned
sörine;180007367 said:
They also don't need a console when they can play Minecraft on the parents' tablet. The knockdown effect is just more delayed there but it's already started.

Difference is, people are still buying consoles.

They're just not buying Nintendo consoles.
 

Jigorath

Banned
They're not buying as many consoles as they did last gen regardless.

I'm fully aware of that. But trying to say that consoles are in the same position as handhelds because there's been a decline gen on gen is rather silly. Consoles are still pretty successful all things considered. The decline has hit the handheld market much much much harder than the console market.
 
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