As part of their Tokyo Game Show press conference, Sony have issued a press release detailing PlayStation Vita, the launch line-up, technical specs and – yes – pricing. We know that the unit itself has already been locked down in terms of costs, but that initially cheap unit price has some hidden extras…
“As the next generation portable entertainment system, PS Vita enables a revolutionary combination of rich gaming and social connectivity within a real world context, transforming every aspect of a user’s daily life into an entertainment experience,” says the PR blurb.
First up – the games. There are 26 “exciting” software titles at launch, with more than 74 games currently in development. Here’s the list of day-one (or at least, launch window) games for Japan:
- Blazblue Continuum Shift Extend
- 3gokushi touchbattle (working title)
- Project NOELS (working title)
- Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3
- Nature of Night of Kamaitachi – 11th visitor, A Suspect (tentative)
- F1 2011
- Dream C Club Zero Portable
- Niconico
- Fish On
- Katamari Damacy (working title)
- Ridge Racer (working title)
- Disgaea3 Return
- Virtua Tennis 4 – World Tour Edition
- @field
- Uncharted: Golden Abyss
- Little Deviants
- Minnato Issho
- Hot Shots Golf Next
- Yuusha no kiroku (TBD)
- Monster Radar
- Shinobido 2: Tales of the Ninja
- Army Corps of Hell
- Lord of Apocalypse
- Dynasty Warriors Next
- Dark Quest
- Michael Jackson the Experience HD
But here’s the tricky bit – you’ll be needing a memory card for Vita, and they don’t come cheap. The smallest, 4GB, is ¥2,200 with the largest, 32GB, a staggering ¥9,500. That’s about £80, and with games reportedly running between 2 and 4GB you’ll be wanting that biggest one, for sure.
[drop2]”Some PS Vita software titles may require the use of separately sold memory card for saving game’s saved data while some software titles are capable of saving it on to the PS Vita card itself,” confirms the PDF. Don’t go buying a PS Vita without a memory card, basically, or chances are you’ll not be able to save your game.Other accessories include an AC adaptor (¥1,800), protective film (¥800) and a travel pouch (¥2,300), although it’s worth noting that although Vita doesn’t come with a memory card (boo) it does come with a charger. As you’d expect.
Along with confirming the innards of the system (512MB RAM, 128MB VRAM and an ARM A9 CPU) the press release mentions battery life: a very 3DS-like 3 to 5 hours (with default screen brightness, bluetooth off and headphones on) and the Vita takes just over 2 and a half hours to charge from zero power.
I’m disappointed in the battery life – it seems a little short to me even though it’s roughly on par with 3DS and PSP, and it’s not replaceable either. I guess I’d just hoped Sony would go all out and give us something that would last a long haul flight without needing to break into First Class to borrow a power point. I’m not put off, just disappointed.
But the price of the memory cards is shocking, and clearly a way for the manufacturer to offset the relatively cheap price point of the Vita itself.
You can read our hands on with PS Vita here.
Zephyre
Damn, I was hoping there was finally some info on the data plan for the 3G version.
Does seem odd that some games are going to insist on saving to memory sticks while others are happy to use the system memory. 1st party games being used to flog peripherals?
anthro
I’d imagine that the data plan for 3G will be dependent on the carrier that you use; current 3G-enabled devices just have a slot for a SIM or microSIM that you can purchase from your carrier. They’ll be the ones setting the prices, not Sony.
Zephyre
Pretty sure it’s an AT&T exclusive in the USA so I’m not convinced you’ll be able to stick any old service in.
The Lone Steven
I’ll carry a generator around with me and a plug socket so that i can charge it up when i need to.
You can get Memory cards very cheap nowadays. So i’m going to bet that Sony will lock out all unoffical ones just to be annoying.
The launch line up is decent although, i will only buy Uncharted and try playing that at the same time as UC3. :op
plutoniumdragon
So the specs are no better than the Moto Titan (which also has more Ram) and it needs very expensive proprietary memory cards.
Not sure about this now…
anthro
It is a device dedicated to a Sony-designed OS though, which will be used mainly for playing games designed exclusively for it.
The Moto Titan has to run Android 3.0, which requires a minimum of a dual-core processor, and has to compete with existing Android-enabled devices. Smartphones and tablets have to do a lot more than just play games.
plutoniumdragon
That’s the thing, Android phones can do far more than just play games… As far as I can tell they both have the same quad core CPU, the same PowerVR GPU and identical screen resolution – so it comes down to OS load and quality/price of games and whether or not I want hard controls versus touch.
Not forgetting the PSN integration of course.
Maybe I’m being cynical, but I can see those “special” cards being used like cartridges to sell individual games at stupid prices, maybe even locking saves to stop pre-owned like the 3DS. I still don’t know – but I think my money is on the phone upgrade first then maybe Vita when we see how it pans out.
anthro
Don’t forget though that Android 3.0-capable devices are going for around the £400-500 mark. If Sony thought people would buy a handheld gaming device for more than the PS3 cost on launch, they’d probably chuck a quad-core processor and a huge GPU in it and make it twice as powerful as the PS3.
skibadee
it has a quad core?
plutoniumdragon
Widely reported as a Cortex A9 quad core speculation is that Vita will use one core for the OS and 3 available for games.
Interesting that the A9 has “TrustZone” security and DRM management integrated OnDie looks like piracy should be somewhat difficult….:)
anthro
Yeah, sorry – should have clarified. I know it has a quad-core processor, but Sony probably could have designed a new quad-core in-house with much higher processing power if they thought they could sell the unit for £400 or more. They could also have put in a higher-specced GPU, internal memory, and made the resolution higher than currently specced. However they are limited by the price that people are prepared to pay out for a handheld console.
People frequently state that smartphones are the way forward, but I disagree primarily because people who purely want to game will be unwilling to fork out £400-500 on a smartphone when they only want it for its gaming features.
plutoniumdragon
@anthro I agree with your point about pricing entirely.
I doubt the Vita will be compared in isolation though and the smartphone comparison is inevitable for most people, a fair percentage of which will have the option of a “free” upgrade to their cellphone.
anthro
Yeah, it’s those quotes around “free” that people will always ignore; if we were able to adopt the same plan with the Vita that one does with contract phones, we’d be paying about £23 a month on a 12-month contract or £11.50 on a 24-month. That’s incredibly cheap for such a powerful device. Compare that to an iPhone, with lower specs, at £40 a month on a two year contract…
sparkyscrum
I think what people forget when comparing memory card prices is your looking at the cheapest. Do we know the speed of the card? As if your looking at the cheapest card vs a high speed card your going to see a massive difference.
Also the while game play experience will be affected by this speed. By creating a standard Sony ensure all players experiences re the same.
To give you an idea I’ve just looked on a site and found these prices for an 8GB SD card
£7 class 4 PNY card
£16 class 10 Lexar
After all we don’t want to experience a slow load game compared to your mates? Would be a bad advert for the Vita if your card is seen to be very slow loading games.
As for battery life, I’m much more worried. After all 3-5hrs isn’t that long. I wonder if the Vita will still be as comfortable with the charger plugged in. Same can’t be said when playing games on my iPad or HTC phone.
Im not sure plugs are so far developed yet that we can charge anywhere yet but then again would you really commute or be away from a plug for 3hrs? Maybe if by coach. (Haven’t been on a coach in years so not so sure if they have plugs, long distances trains slowly are as are newer commuter trains).
plutoniumdragon
Sony are saying these cards are more secure, I strongly suspect that is the overriding reason for using them.
Of course it won’t hurt the bottom line to be the sole supplier of them as well will it?
sparkyscrum
True I’m sure it will bring in some extra memory. Considering that the game cards are SD like and memory car are Micro SD like I bet Sandisk have developed the format for Sony and will bring put their own memory cards before too long.
Smallville2106
I was going to gat one on day one but I think I will wait a bit before I get one now. All the games will eventually be available on PS3 anyway so there’s no rush imo.
tantalus_blank
Hmm, I imagine LBP is absent due to mm being British…hopefully we’ll get it at launch
MuggleMind
From memory, wasn’t there a PSP hack using the replaceable battery? Maybe Sony are trying to do everything they can to reduce the risk of piracy. Personally, as a photographer used to paying high prices for CF cards, the Vita memory cards aren’t that bad, although I’d prefer them to e a lot cheaper, obviously. Maybe as more are produced they will drop in price, or we will get 3rd party versions.
Still a day 1 purchase for me, assuming I can find the cash.
TheDeathAvenger
I think your talking about that Pandora’s Battery thing.
colmshan1990
£80 for a 32gb memory card?
Considering back when the PSP launched I paid €55 for a Sandisk 512mb card, I’m gonna consider that good launch value.
MrTwP
I know what you mean, when the Original PSP launched the memory cards were like £50 for 4GB.
Sony needs to make there money somewhere, they are selling the Vita at a loss
TheDeathAvenger
Exactly, third party cards like Sandisk were similarly priced to the Sony cards (which were the same format). Now it seems like Sony are going to be charging much higher prices with some other new format, rather than just using an existing popular format like microSD.
As for Sony’s need to make money on the possible loss they may make on the PS Vita, they can make that money from the license fee they take for every game.
TheDeathAvenger
Got a 3DS at launch and I barely play it. So far I’ve found it really disappointing. I loved playing about with the AR stuff (with the dragon), but nothing more has come of it, and I’ve heard nowt about free updates (or even paid updates/games). So this, a lack of games that interest me, and the whole price drop scenario has made me reluctant to buy anymore consoles until I know that it is very unlikely that I’ll be disappointed. It’s not that I’ve not felt like this before, and despite feeling like this now, I know how likely it is I’ll start to feel like caving when the PS Vita launch draws near.
I’m quite disappointed that the PS Vita won’t have built-in storage. I was hoping for 32GB built-in, with expansion available with a microSD card (small in size and 32GB can cost only 35 quid).
Is the memory card in the picture a game card or the stupidly expensive memory card?
I wonder what the charging port is like, as I’d like to be able to charge it with my portable pebble charger.
sparkyscrum
That’s the game card. The memory card is about same size as a Micro SD and even looks like one.
TheDeathAvenger
I’ve had a look around a few other gaming website and seen pictures of the game card (apparently called NVG) and the proprietary (microSD like) memory card.
sparkyscrum
Charging port is flat long connector, bit like the PSPgo’s, wish they’d use a standard USB card as even the phone companies use that now.
Fed up of having to remember my PSP, phone and iPad chargers. Just want the one!
TheDeathAvenger
I’ve seen a picture of the bottom of the PS Vita, looked like a USB port. I’m guessing that’s the charging (and data) port.
gazzagb
80 quid just for the 32Gb Memory Card?! Sony’s having a laugh.