Future of PS Vita is Streaming and Indie

[orangpelupa]

Sony has stated that they change the focus of PS Vita. They wont be making lots of big budget first party games for Vita.

PS Vita is now targeted for Streaming (videos and game) and playing Indie games.
But Sony also have BRAVIA TVs that support streaming (videos and games)

Sony also think that graphic fidelity is a problem if they making games for PS Vita.

http://www.polygon.com/2014/6/18/5820824/indies-third-party-games-are-vitas-focus-moving-forward

it will be even weirder when Sony sudently release Vita Firmware update with Android to get more indie games... Click vita games, boot to vita mode. click android game, boot to android.

-

on the other hand, 3DS is completely seperate with Wii U, have low-spec hardware, and very successfull in portable gaming.

 

[Brad Grenz]

No sense throwing good money after bad. I love the Vita but people obstinately ignore brilliant games like Tearaway so it is not a shock that Sony can't keep losing money like that. Indie games sell incredibly well, though, so that's a natural focus.

Hell, for the first half of Vita' life Sony got yelled at for trying to force console quality games onto the system instead of smaller, more bite sized experiences. But now that they've shifted to what people said they wanted people are whining that they've stopped making the AAA games no one bought!

Bottom line: if people wanted those big games they should have bought them instead of waiting for them to hit PS Plus.

 

[Wynix]

So the Vita will be the first Playstation to not have it's own Gran Turismo game? Great support Sony.

 

[Graham]

Well. Costs a lot of money to develop a console equivalent game on a handheld. Arguable costs more than said console game as you are beset by massive challenges from all directions. And sadly the market doesn't always respond as you'd hope (see tearaway ).

Then you get a certain review calling your game a glorified tech demo...

 

[Shifty Geezer]

it will be even weirder when Sony sudently release Vita Firmware update with Android to get more indie games... Click vita games, boot to vita mode. click android game, boot to android.

That's not announced, is it?

So the Vita will be the first Playstation to not have it's own Gran Turismo game? Great support Sony.

There just isn't a large enough install base to justify the expense. Vita's too niche to be a viable business proposition for a lot of genres/styles.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

PS Vita is now targeted for Streaming (videos and game) and playing Indie games.

The majority of my time on Vita is spent on indies, particularly Spelunky and Terraria. Once Minecraft releases, sheesh!

As much as I like the idea the AAA titles on Vita, when I'm plating games like Uncharted I can't shake the feeling that I'd much rather be paling this on a big TV

 

[Wynix]

Once Minecraft releases, sheesh!

When is the release date? I think it's about time I see what all the fuss is about.

It better be a good port!

 

[Arwin]

So the Vita will be the first Playstation to not have it's own Gran Turismo game? Great support Sony.

I also think this shows that they still lack some business sense. I would have taken the PSP game, and make that run on Vita with 16 cars on track and making use of all the available control inputs, add some better shaders here and there, maybe try to make it run at 60, and a career mode and some licences/missions. From there I would wait and see how that hits the market, and then build/invest more.

 

[tuna]

I also think this shows that they still lack some business sense. I would have taken the PSP game, and make that run on Vita with 16 cars on track and making use of all the available control inputs, add some better shaders here and there, maybe try to make it run at 60, and a career mode and some licences/missions. From there I would wait and see how that hits the market, and then build/invest more.

Why not just port gt4?

 

[Wynix]

Why not just port gt4?

I had the same idea, it is a much better game; GT PSP was rubbish.

 

[orangpelupa]

the reason of "graphic fidelity" is weird. because compared to 3DS, games on VITA should have better fidelity.

i want more AAA game on VITA that is bite sized. More like Prof. Layton, Ace Attorney...
if making a shooter, make it bite sized like Kid Icarus Uprising.

my PS vita has not arrived so i cant realy play, but from youtube gameplay videos, it seems PS Vita have AAA console-quality games (i.e. Uncharted GA), and almost no bite sized game with nice singleplayer storyline.

That's not announced, is it?

There just isn't a large enough install base to justify the expense. Vita's too niche to be a viable business proposition for a lot of genres/styles.

they dont announce that.

 

[tuna]

I had the same idea, it is a much better game; GT PSP was rubbish.

GT PSP was awesome!

 

[Deleted member 13524]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUj7glhBa3Y

Freedom Wars looks great. Doesn't strike as Indie at all.

There are 3rd parties investing a lot in the Vita, which means there must be a reasonable amount of software sales to justify that.
In the end, it looks like Sony is holding back the Vita as a stand-alone success on purpose.. for some obscure reason.

 

[tuna]

Maybe because they haven't sold any?

 

[Sigfried1977]

i want more AAA game on VITA that is bite sized. More like Prof. Layton, Ace Attorney...
if making a shooter, make it bite sized like Kid Icarus Uprising.

Pretty much this. Having a crappy port of Borderlands 2 a year later, a budget Assassin's Creed, or other half measure "console quality" games isn't really what the hardware was made for methinks. Unfortunately the sort of games that do exactly what I was hoping from the hardware all along (like Tearaway) seem like they cannot translate overwhelmingly positive critical reception into reasonable sales figures, so what's Sony gonna do?

Heck, if most of the indies would be more Guacamelee than cliched pixely platfromers plagiarizing bygone eras I wouldn't mind so much either.

Really sucks how the situation seems to be playing out. The launch of the system was so promising too.

 

[SlimJim]

I saw the new PSVita yesterday and on the box is a big "you can stream your PS4 games!!" emphasis, which is a shame because there are some great games available.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Maybe because they haven't sold any?

The Vita sold as much as the PS3, PS4 or PSP would have sold if these consoles were as marginalized by Sony as the Vita was. Perhaps even more.

I think Sony is the one who's been screwing the Vita the most, at least in the Western countries. There's never been any meaningful marketing, 1st-party dedication or a substantial amount of time dedicated to it in E3.
The Vita was launched in the West in Februrary 2012. Here's Sony's E3 2012 presentation (four months later):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzYIFEjuEc4

Do you know how many games were presented for the Vita in the E3 2012? One (really, just one, 1). Assassin's Creed Liberation, a single 3rd party game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=vzYIFEjuEc4#t=2505

Before that, they showed a single slide with the CoD logo (another 3rd party) and another slide with a scene from Uncharted Golden Abyss (which had already launched).

And the PS3 which had been selling for 6 years already? For the PS3, they showed (very) extended trailers and presentations for Beyond: Two Souls (first party), Assassin's Creed 3, Far Cry 3, Book of Spells (first party), God of War 3 (first party) and Last of Us (first party).

This was 2012. The Vita had just started to sell and there was no way to know if the console was going to be a success or not (even less when we look at the 3DS' slow start).
And E3 2013? The Vita didn't get a single trailer of its own in E3 2013. There was a ~2 minute talk about how they got a hundred titles for the platform (thanks to japanese 3rd parties, not thanks to Sony).


So we have to make a different question:
- How could the Vita not fail, given Sony's blatant disregard over the platform?!

If last month's E3 had been presented with a single 3rd party game for the PS4 and then 4 first party games for the PS3, what message wouldSony be sending to its customers? Who would be buying a PS4 after that E3?

It wasn't the tablets, the 3DS or smartphones who killed the Vita as an independent mobile platform. It was Sony.

 

[SlimJim]

It wasn't the tablets, the 3DS or smartphones who killed the Vita as an independent mobile platform. It was Sony.

I still think it can be resurrected: I mean get a decent monster hunter out and Japan will accept the Vita, but you kind of hit the nail on the head; Sony is mainly to blame for the current state of the Vita..

I kind of saw the Vita as unnecessary as well; I thought Sony understood that people were not going to pay 40+ Euro for console- like games. So I was really hoping for creative, simple efforts produced by great Sony studios. Uncharted was really good.. but it took me about 15-20 hours to complete (on hard)! it was too big for it's own good.

Square produced some great Nintendo DS games, even those at native Vita res, priced at 9.99 -14.99 could sell like hotcakes: bravely default, the world ends with you, etc. these games are ported to iPhone for crying out loud (which is harder I think).

Sony really needs to rethink their strategy. Unless their current path is final, in which case..

 

[Wynix]

I have to agree; Sony dropped the Vita in record time, also allowing most of their first party studios to ignore it was incredibly stupid.
Nintendo has success on handhelds because they commit to the platform; Sony needed to improve upon what they achieved with the PSP, instead they regress and treat it like a second class citizen compared to the ageing PS3.

 

[Sigfried1977]

I kind of saw the Vita as unnecessary as well; I thought Sony understood that people were not going to pay 40+ Euro for console- like games. So I was really hoping for creative, simple efforts produced by great Sony studios. Uncharted was really good.. but it took me about 15-20 hours to complete (on hard)! it was too big for it's own good.

Considering how 3ds games, especially the first party ones, tend to be even more expensive (and barely drop in price ov er the years) than most Vita games, I don't think games pricing was even the biggest issue here. There simply wasn't anything really worth buying the system for. Nintendo is smart enough to modify their handheld offerings to a big enough degree where they become worthwhile additions to your software library regardless of whether you own a similarly titled game on a Nintendo home console or not. Skyward Sword doesn't render A Link between Worlds obsolete.

Now compare that to Uncharted Golden Abyss. It's a nice game for sure. An impressive technical achievement. But compared to its home console brethren it was still a rather paired down experience. It didn't do anything the other versions didn't do. It just did all the same things slightly worse. Whenever you talk about one of the bigger Vita games you always hear people talking about how it 's great ... for a handgeld game. When people talk about a quality Nintendo offerings, the "for a handheld game" part is hardly ever mentioned because the games can stand on their own perfectly well.
Tearaway was such a game, but I'm afraid at that point it was simply a case of too-little-too-late. Even big Vita supporters had probably abandoned the system at that time, and a drop in the ocean wasn't enough to bring them back. (and as cool as that game was, it was also very slight compared to your typical Nintendo offering)