Marketshare anecdote:
I was in Rome last week (yay!) and I saw equal number of PSPs and DSs played. Also, in the shops they seemed to occupy the same shelf space.
Marketshare anecdote:
I was in Rome last week (yay!) and I saw equal number of PSPs and DSs played. Also, in the shops they seemed to occupy the same shelf space.
Pretty curious if AR will take off with the next gen portables. Certainly seems to have some big advantages in handhelds being portable. This is pretty amusing:
http://tinycartridge.com/post/3988659519/three-story-tall-mii-created-with-a-giant-ar-card
and it makes me want to see the Dinosaur version that was demoed on NGP.
For instance, this test helped decide whether or not the NGP would be pure DD or whether a UMD replacement should be provided, and the obvious result is in the shape of the 2 or 4GB flash cards that the NGP software can be distributed on. Another lesson learnt is the requirement of any game published on NGP on flash to also always be available as DD. .
So the PSP Go has officially halted production, marking it as a failure as a product pretty much officially, as if that were necessary. Various obvious reasons for why it failed, but I think it should definitely not be overlooked that it was also an important testcase for them anyway to help the NGP succeed in the future.
For instance, this test helped decide whether or not the NGP would be pure DD or whether a UMD replacement should be provided, and the obvious result is in the shape of the 2 or 4GB flash cards that the NGP software can be distributed on. Another lesson learnt is the requirement of any game published on NGP on flash to also always be available as DD.
In that sense, the PSPgo's utter failure was good news for Sony: here were two major questions about what to do with NGP answered without any discussion necessary or possible, which was also important for communicating this message to publishers.
So you're claiming SONY needed to spends tens of millions of dollars to develop PSPGo in order to find out if DD would work better than carts?
I think the REAL answer is that DD works just fine if you have the right pieces in place....just look at Apple's App and iTunes store....no carts needed there. It's fairly obvious SONY didn't have all the right pieces in place.
...
We went with a large screen for NGP because - looking at how people are adapting to smartphones - in a couple of years everybody will have one, and everybody will have the opportunity to play downloaded application games. So we have to create enough strong reasons for people to look at NGP in addition to the smartphone they already have."
"We are not trying to compete with smartphones, we can't," he continues. "So the question is, considering people have phones anyway, why would they want another device? Looking at the adoption of iPad and other tablets, if there are enough reasons, people do want another device.
...
What lessons were learned from the PSP? What didn’t PSP achieve that NGP can?
Throughout the development process of NGP, obviously we looked at what worked with PSP and what didn’t. We were almost too happy with PSP’s core capabilities; CPU, GPU and the 4-inch display. At that time it was the largest display you could find on a portable [gaming] device, with very beautiful graphics capabilities. We were too happy having PS2 quality-games on the Go, and we didn’t go much further. We had Wi-Fi capabilities with PSP which was very fast, and some experiences like Monster Hunter were created using Wi-Fi, but other than that it was very hard for developers to create a unique experience on PSP that you couldn’t get on a console like PS2.
After PS3 came out, people got used to looking at PS3-quality graphics. So just having nice graphics is not enough; people prefer playing on a large screen at home. That was the biggest lesson we learned in designing NGP – of course we advanced the CPU and GPU again, and developed the 5-inch OLED, but I’m sure in a couple of years people will get used to seeing it, so if we stop there we’ll make the same mistake we did on PSP. So what we made sure was to bring enough new hooks on NGP so that we can continue to create unique gaming experiences that you cannot get on consoless. Touch capability on both front and back, AR, sensors, social connectivity: these features will challenge NGP developers’ ability to create longer than PSP [did].
My friend bought a PSP early on, and has used it faithfully as a portable media player. Well, he's just ordered himself and ASUS EeePad Transformer after seeing a friends, and that'll be his device of choice now. With direct HDMI out it's ideal for portable media both in a small device and for output on a TV. NGP hasn't even go that, and I expect my mate to be very representative. I don't think the added gaming features are going to be worth enough to most of PSP's owners.
Sony Ericsson announced another 20+ games optimized for the Xperia PLAY today, ahead of their demonstration at next week's annual E3 conference...
New Android Games Exclusive on Xperia™ PLAY:
Minecraft™ by Mojang
Battlefield Bad Company 2 by Electronic Arts
Tom Clancy's Rainbow 6 Shadow Vanguard by Gameloft
Desert Winds by Southend Interactive
Ruined by Bigpoint
Icebreaker™ by NaturalMotion
Sleepy Jack by SilverTree Media
Cracking Sands by Polarbit
Armageddon Squadron 2 by Polarbit
An unnamed fighting game from Khaeon Gamestudio
New Games coming soon on Xperia PLAY:
Pocket Legends by Spacetime Studios
Star Legends: The Black Star Chronicles by Spacetime Studios
Eternal Legacy by Gameloft
Guns 'n'Glory 2 by HandyGames
Dungeon Hunter 2 by Gameloft
Pocket RPG by Crescent Moon Games
D.A.R.K. developed by Gamelab
Samurai II: Vengeance by MADFINGER Games
Vendetta Online by Guild Software
Order & Chaos - Gameloft
Happy Vikings by Handy Games
A Ball Game by Trendy Entertainment
Lumines by Connect2Media