No Posts About The New "psp Go" ?

[ashdjones]

I'm an existing PSP owner and this doesn't appeal to me much.

...what's the batterylife like I wonder? Always the first question people should be asking.

 

[iprice]

 

[fiveseven]

Meh, already got a PSP1000, don't need anything flashier.
I'm kind of curious to see how the downloadable games are handled. It's probably not going to be amazing, but you might see a few good games there.

 

[Mithrildor]

Cartman wasnt last on The List, but indeed the PSP Go is ugly.

 

[WizardStan]

I'll be one of the last people to defend Sony and it's marketing decisions, but some of the responses that you people have made are exactly in the same vein (some near word for word) of criticism made against the Pandora. Most notable are that the buttons are too small and hands are "getting cramped just looking at it".
Seriously, you're forcing my hand here. How can I defend the Pandora's design against ignorant posts and ignore the near same posts against a competing product? Hypocrisy doesn't sit well in my tummy.

 

[Nova]

How about we all reserve judgement on the ergonomics of the thing till it's actually being mass produced and is in our hands?

 

[x68000]

Not so sure on the design of this, but i do like the idea of digital downloads only - should open up lots of original gaming the psp has lacked since inception.

Can't believe that they are touting GT PSP for this like it has just been announced. Many people bought the PSP back in 2004 purely on the strength of GT being one of the early titles for it...........5 years later!

 

[Goity]

Depending on the size of this thing, the analog there could work well.

No 2nd analog is a real shame though.

Still, it does look interesting, and I'll be watching it closely.

 

[Nintendo]

Kind of hideous. Same hardware as the regular PSP I presume? If so, I wouldn't see any reason to get this over a hacked PSP. But whatever, I'm sure SONY already has 10 on preorder.

Believe it or not, I'm just going to get one for now (hopefully this is the final/last(4th) PSP hardware revision), unless a limited edition PSP go is released (which no doubt there will be) in the near future.

To be honest, I've changed quite a bit in the 4 years I've been on these boards.

I'm more interested in PANDORA, Wiz and Dingoo, iPod Touch/iPhone portable systems.

 

[Goity]

I still have no idea why we have to get rid of UMD though. It's not like they're expensive to make, and apart from the slow reading speed and battery life sucking they have many advantages, such as resellability, large storage space and durability.

 

[johncross85]

I still have no idea why we have to get rid of UMD though. It's not like they're expensive to make, and apart from the slow reading speed and battery life sucking they have many advantages, such as resellability, large storage space and durability.

If they left the UMD in they it'd just be a PSP with a worse form factor. Plus, the size of the UMD drive would prevent the change to shape... so the Go would just be a PSP with exactly the same form factor. Hardly a compelling improvement!

Sony want to move to digital distribution because it is cheaper and they have more control and less reliance on publishers. Small developer A want to produce a budget PSP game but large publisher B won't distribute it because it costs too much and they are only interested in big budget licensed titles. Currently small developer A can go to Sony who can publish it at a much reduced cost on PSN but no-one will buy it because everyone is too stuck on buying boxed product for the PSP. The PSP Go has no UMD so owners HAVE to buy from PSN... everyone gets used to buying PSP games via PSN... Sony gets more profit, has more control, and a wider range of titles on the PSP to attract some of the casual gamership away from the DS.

If Sony had actually got PSN working properly in time for the PSP launch then the platform would have had a better range of titles at a better range of prices available from the get go and people would be used to the idea of digital distribution for PSP. Instead they leave it until AFTER the PS3 launches to sort it all out and then it's simply too late for the PSP. The Go is a low cost attempt by Sony to get developers interested in developing for PSP and gamers interested in buying digital content prior to them launching the PSP2. Had the PS3 been a run away success from the outset they probably would have ditched the PSP altogether but bad sales of PS3 and continued strong interest in PSP in Japan means it gets another (attempted) lease of life.

John

 

[WizardStan]

I still have no idea why we have to get rid of UMD though. *snip* resellability *snip*
DING DING DING! We have a winner!
*dons his official tin foil conspiracy hat*
See, resale of used games is a huge market. I don't have the numbers handy and don't want to make stuff up, so for the time being lets just say that used games constitute a significant percentage of gross sales. Ie, if you questioned everyone who played a legitimate copy of a game whether they bought new or used, you'd see a fairly large number of people say they got it used.
Exactly $0 from that used sale goes to the developer. Developers don't like when people play their game without paying them for it. Go figure, eh? The sales department sees every one of those second hand purchases as a lost sale, and will seek to convert them to new purchasers at every opportunity.
By going pure digital, it is impossible to buy used, unless it's coming part and parcel with the console. Problem solved for the sales team!
Personally I think that such a tactic will ultimately cost them in the long run, but we shall see.

There's also the cost of producing a UMD, which is not insignificant. If a company can take the money they would have spent producing something physical, including storage space, and wrap it into profits, they will.

Then there's QA time. By going with digital distribution, you open the door to patchability. Minor tweaks can be done after the game is released. You can save 2 to 4 weeks on the delivery date by producing an almost perfect game and patching it up if there are any problems, something you simply couldn't afford to do with physical medium.

Finally is access. In order to buy a physical game, you go to a store where you are presented with a wall of titles. It can be daunting selecting something unless you know exactly what you're looking for. Even if you do know what you're looking for, there are a lot of alternatives surrounding you. Out of the corner of your eye you notice another game and wonder if maybe that one is better, perhaps. Maybe the title you're looking for isn't even there! You stop to think, and even after you've decided, you have to carry it up to the counter, and physically pay for it, all of which are producing more thoughts, giving you time to question your purchase. Marketers don't want you to think; they want you to buy! If you're on a digital download model, there's no physical transaction required. You go in, see the game you want, click a button, and it's yours; no time to second guess the decision. If there's another game that catches your eye at the same time, you can buy that too. You don't need to worry about having enough money, they have your credit card on file and just charge you. The marketing department likes it when you stop thinking and just buy, it makes their job a lot easier.

 

[johncross85]

I still have no idea why we have to get rid of UMD though. *snip* resellability *snip*
DING DING DING! We have a winner!

Yup, Sony want to kill the resale market as does the entire games industry. Gamestop/Game make substantially more money per sale from second-hand games than new ones because zero cut goes to the publisher. There's no conspiracy theory there - publishers calling for regulation & restriction on game resales is a regular news story in industry publications like MCV.

John

 

[Exophase]

Or Sony wants to get rid of UMD because they add a lot of weight, power draw, and mechanical complexity to the unit. That and people don't like the load times.

At the time of PSP's launch Sony may have thought that 1.8GB games were not realistic to digitally distribute and store and that typical buyers wouldn't go for it. It might help that it turned out a lot of PSP games really don't need to be nearly that large.

 

[quote]

An exploit will be found soon enough, and the 16gb will give plenty of room for 'backups' I'm sure.


Edit: Haha, just realised, the warez community now has nothing to hide behind - 'backups' can be made without any custom firmware rubbish, the game itself is a file.

 

[Goity]

I wonder how Video Game stores will react to the PSP Go - who will want to sell a console they can't sell games for?

 

[Nintendo]

It'll have to, somewhat be marketed like the portable game system...iPod Touch/iPhone.

 

[danielliu88888]

An exploit will be found soon enough, and the 16gb will give plenty of room for 'backups' I'm sure.

Edit: Haha, just realised, the warez community now has nothing to hide behind - 'backups' can be made without any custom firmware rubbish, the game itself is a file.

hooray! more pirates! unless sony tries really hard to prevent loading games through some stupid proprietary memory stick/card.

 

[psj3809]

Its funny reading some of the biased negative comments from people !

I think the PSP Go looks superb, would like to give one of these a try before slating the buttons etc.

I was one of the people who initially bought a GP2X, was a usesless brick for about 5 months until the firmware was finally sorted out, after that a great device but i'll never buy another gadget like this again until a few months later when the main problems have been sorted out.

I really like the look of it the PSP, hope it does well.

 

[BackAssward]

Its funny reading some of the biased negative comments from people !

It's funny that you think negative comments are necessarily biased... makes you sound biased.