People don’t read manuals – especially the lengthy tomes that accompany games consoles – so it’s generally left up to chance, luck and a little bit of imagination. Or, more appropriately, Twitter, where PlayStation evangelist MusterBuster and some other users are collating some top tips.
Look, you might know some of these, but I didn’t know at least two of them until they were highlighted to me, and some of them are pretty groovy.
10: Slide and Hold. Want to scroll quickly on the Vita? Just slide up or down and hold your finger there. It works on LiveTweet, the browser, even the core UI, and it’s surprisingly effective. Takes a tiny bit of practice but it’s a cool one.
9: Take a photo. You’d be shocked at how many don’t know you can hold down the PS button and tap Start to take a screengrab of most games in action, the image automatically saving to the Photos application for you to copy over to a PC or even Tweet from LiveTweet.
[drop2]8: Sort out your profile. You can add a nice little background to your profile that others can see on their Friend lists – just go to Settings, then PlayStation Network, then Account Settings, and it’s in there. There’s loads of backgrounds to pick from.7: Get some tunes. The Vita, unlike the PlayStation 3, supports custom soundtracks for every game by default – just hold down the PS button for a couple of seconds in any game to open up a menu where you can pick your tracks and even change the brightness – the darker the screen the better the battery life.
6: Change your lock screen. Easy peasy this one, but it’s a bit hidden away. Open up the Photo app, browse to the image you want and then in the bottom right corner there’s a settings icon – tap it and you’ll find the option there to add the image to your lock screen.
5: Delete your unwanted games. Hold any icon on the Vita’s main menu and you’ll find a little icon that’ll let you delete that app (and its save, so be careful) from the menu (assuming it’s not a default app or Welcome Park) as well as see information about the game or see past updates. You can also move your icons around when in this state, and change the background effects by tapping the ‘wave’ icon bottom right.
4: Keep your games updated. When you click on a game and it opens the LiveArea for it, if there’s an update there’ll be a little orange icon in the top row on the left. Tap it to download the patch, then tap it again to install it once it’s downloaded.
3: Quick mute. Hold the – and + volume buttons for a second and the Vita will mute. A rarely known tip and one that’s particularly useful – give it a try the next time you need to quickly dial down WipEout 2048.
2: Near and far. Near’s great, but the UI is a bit confusing and it goes deeper than it first appears. For example, did you know that you can tap on a profile icon once you get to a Nearby Vita owner and see more information about them, like Play History?
1: Do it right. Get the most from your PSP games by using the Vita’s right analog stick, just hold a finger on the screen when playing a PSP game and a menu will pop-up in which you can select what you want the right stick to do.
Hopefully some of them are new to you – let us know if you have any more!
TSBonyman
Thanks, although i knew most of those i did not know that when you delete a game you are also deleting the save file.
I would like to see what near is all about but sadly i’m in the “could not obtain location data” category.
Sympozium
oh god… I actully never noticed with Ridge Racer really gutted and I just wanted to free space for a demo.
SpikeyMikey23
I’m in that ‘near’ category also. Shame! Is it a known issue or am i just the only one in the vicinity with a vita?…..
TSBonyman
We’re not alone, i saw some other’s on the official PS forum, no official word from Sony yet though.
Bladesteel
You either have to have a 3G vita, or be within range of one or more wifi access points that are in the location database (googles?)
(unfortunately the access points take precedence so I’m placed at my old apertment since apparently it’s been mapped to that location)
matthangzhou
1. You can adjust the graphics for psp games to make them a bit smoother by adjusting the settings in game.
2. You can turn off the vita music in the settings . You cant turn off the stores unfortunately.
3. Buy tales from space: mutant blobs attack. A fantastic game that has a fantastic art style and plays well but hasn’t had much coverage here on TSA.
4. Buy a screen protector now! Wouldn’t want that beautiful screen with a scratch on it now would we? They also have packs tht include a cover for the back touch pad too.
5. You can add screens to the menu by holding down a bubble and then clicking the arrow in the bottom right. You can then add photos taken with the camera or screenshots to them and drag the bubbles around.
6. If you’re looking for the facebook app its had problems and has been taken off the shop for now.
Sympozium
I haven’t figured out how to like back up saves, how can you do that?
matthangzhou
Connect into a pc or ps3 via the USB cable and then go to the system management option and it is there.
JigsawPieces
Like matthangzhou says … if you connect it up to your ps3 (or PC) by usb, then use the ‘Content Manager’ app, you can copy individual games (including saves and patches) to/from the Vita, as well as back the whole thing up.
matthangzhou
That’s the one, content manager not system management!
uncharted86
Is there no way to write text in a friend request on Vita to let the person know why I want to add him/her?
bully1990
Does anyone know if you can use Media Go to manage the content on your Vita? I had music and videos on my PSP with playlists set up so I’d like to move these to my Vita but when I tried it would only let me use the content manager app.
Krisaim
Please help.
I have looked everywhere for this answer. When I connect my PS3 bluetooth headset to the Vita I can here the game. I just can’t here my friend in party chat and it makes the whole thing pointless. Is this a bug? I’m sure a option should be somewhere so I can have the voice out of the headset and game sound out of the speakers.
Thanks in advance.
ps I have ticked the vice option, a little better but not much.
Pitcher-T
Does anyone know why I can’t download ghost of sparta again for my ps vita? Its the same account etc, but when I go to download it from my ps vita it says ‘this content cannot be downloaded on ps vita’. And yes it is the psp version, not the ps3 hd one.
hazelam
maybe that game’s not been made compatible with the Vita yet.
hazelam
but i’ve read that even games that aren’t downloadable that way can work if you download them on ps3 and transfer them to your Vita from there.
DirtyHabit
Been having this problem too. Tried to copy GOS over last night. It said I wasn’t signed into the correct account, (I was) Spoke to Sony this morning. They said it’s not compatible with Vita yet.
Slightly annoying as its on the blog as compatible. But worryingly, the other option on the PS3 was to re-download it. But it doesn’t show in my history and when I go to the store it’s asking me to pay for it again!? So ‘George’ at SCEE is ‘looking into it’….
DirtyHabit
Oh wait.. I sussed it out. It IS compatible with the Vita after all. :)
toto93
I found out that you can get on thr internet while a game is open if you follow a link from the twitter app, I’m doing it right now
lotrek
Everyday im learning something new about the Vita, like i knew all these apart from no6
gaffers101
Has anyone got any advice on Near? I’ve just keep getting
‘could not obtain data for your location’ message.
Any help would be appreciated.