A New Sony Handheld Console Could Be in the Works

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https://www.gamerevolution.com/news/462165-a-new-sony-handheld-console-could-be-in-the-works

[Flojomojo]

Source link updated. Nothing to see here. NOT a new handheld. Maybe an amiibo-type add-on for PS5.

 

https://www.engadget.com/2018/11/27/sony-patents-a-new-kind-of-game-cartridge/

[godslabrat]

Not gonna happen. File this away with "Dreamcast 2"

[Tanooki]

Toio, can't say I'm not surprised by that. If they're going more into the realm of copying what a cheap little amiibo can do for DLC to add to a game, that's fine. Sony got burned so hard on the Vita and before that, the piracy tools killing the PSP off effectively they wanted nothing more to do with handheld.

 

The thing is I can't see them going into handheld dedicated media again, but I can see them aping Nintendo again and doing their own kind of dockable system eventually. I think the writing is on the wall for that on consoles. NOt that people are tiring of things looking, sounding, and thinking (AI routines) pretty, but less people want to have their butt tethered to the TV to play their games. Nintendo being Japanese, and them still caring about home first saw that as obvious and couldn't do it quite with the stinky WiiU, but given how many of them don't play at home, do play on the mass transit systems, they made sure the Switch was an on the go experience with little to no sacrifices and there they succeeded. The Vita was quite capable, and it was card based too, so perhaps in time you will see a dockable Playstation 6 or something, but in the immediate future the PS5 will be another TV toy closed PC media box again I'm sure.

[Mockduck]

Both the Vita and PSP were excellent devices, so I'll buy if they do. There aren't enough of me though.

[JeremyR]

Sony wouldn't support the PSP, much less the Vita? So what would the point be? No one would make games for it

 

Nintendo's handhelds always had solid support from Nintendo themselves, though arguably to the detriment of supporting their consoles. They solved with with the Switch, which is both basically.

[Tanooki]

I don't think there's much of an argument there, at least from after the SNES period where their handhelds were a detriment to the console given the hardcore support they got compared. So many more third parties flocked to it, loved it, well supported it, and even gave it franchises they wouldn't put on a console. Hell even the two faced types at rockstar called the Gameboy more mature than the Gamecube and put an overhead version of basically GTA3 (2D/3D mixed) GTA Advance on there. The consoles have been profitable on their own outside WiiU, but realistically floundered to a painful enough level, yet from Pokemon forward into GBC as it almost arrived into GBA then the DS/3DS line they kept them a well run machine of mostly excellence (outside the period the WiiU sucked so hard 3DS couldn't cover the hemorrhaging.)

 

You're right, Switch solved it, they talked years ago about killing the console division as a separate entity and merging that and the handheld one into one larger better off R&D house. LIttle did we know they'd get to cooking on kicking ATI to the curb (GC family of consoles) and picking up Nvidia and basically borrowing with customization their Shield tablet design and look how well that worked out -- a dockable handheld for TV play if you like. They gambled yet again, yet this time, won big time (so far.) They went for strong performance, ease to code, ease to port, capable of using modern 3D engines in design, yet saw the writing is on the wall for anchoring a console to the TV so they gave choice and choice is winning.

[TheCoolDave]

Both the Vita and PSP were excellent devices, so I'll buy if they do. There aren't enough of me though.

 

Agreed, and there was some great games for the systems but, after a while they seemed to die off... 5 games for the main console and one for the portable. It got old.

 

If you had a 3DS, you got tons of options and there was always new games.

 

The PSP and Vita were awesome systems, just wish it had better support...

[Tanooki]

The problem was Sony only tried hard enough to make a good enough system to really show up Nintendo in how games looked and sounded, but once that was done and retailed, they gave up. Their real attitude and this isn't my just saying it was classic 80s NIntendo known arrogance really. Playstation the name would sell the system (for PSP) so since they called it Playstation Portable, people would just flock to it to make quality games. When reality was, quite a few didn't and eventually they started having to court people to bother, and by that point pandora screwed them harder and harder on the losses. When Konami cut and run complaining tha tlike 10 copies pirate to 1 sold or whatever they guesstimated it at, that really push most people away from bothering. Vita they didn't bother at all with which was kind of weird, a few decent launch games, then trickle support for the coming years, eventually even just making weaker ports of PS3 games to cross play.

[Mord]

Sony wouldn't support the PSP, much less the Vita? So what would the point be? No one would make games for it

 

Nintendo's handhelds always had solid support from Nintendo themselves, though arguably to the detriment of supporting their consoles. They solved with with the Switch, which is both basically.

 

You do realize there's a LOT of games for both the PSP and Vita right? Even long after Sony stopped pushing the PSP there were some devs releasing games for it until just recently. Same with the Vita.

 

The problems with the PSP and Vita had a lot more due to Sony's poor marketing and even poorer handling of them than actually having too few games. Pricey low sized proprietary memory sticks for starters kept coming back to bite Sony in the ass on both consoles - especially when Sony tried to do a digital-only PSP Go.

 

If they do release a new handheld, I'll at least take a look and see what they have to offer but if they try repeating the same mistaken decisions as they did with the PSP and Vita I doubt they'll get me on board.

 

Regarding the memory sticks for the Vita and how it hinders the platform - I have a 16gig card in my Vita. It was the largest size commonly available around where I was and that cost 40+tax. Once that filled up with games bought on PSN, I simply stopped buying vita games digitally. Didn't matter how cheap they would end up in a flash sale. I had no room to add them to my Vita and I wasn't about to be bothered with swapping out those microscopic easily lost and/or broken cards. I'd say "Well, ok I'll just keep buying games physically!" Except Sony really tried their hardest to push digital at the expense of physical distribution so here we are.

 

My Switch has a 128gig card in it. Standard micro-sd card. I'll likewise probably never remove it from the Switch but there's still over 110 gigs left on it if not more waiting to be filled from the nintendo eshop before I stop buying games digitally for it.

[Tanooki]

^^ You sound like me both with respect to the PSP/Vita as I had and liked them a lot, but the shortcomings and then most developers ditching the thing were a double turn off and I own neither now. In a more perfect moment had I the time and resources I've thought of owning a PSP again but I know it would get like weeks of love from me scooping up stuff and playing it a bit and i'd lose interest (time) so I don't. And on the other thing, the Switch, you seem to have the same card size I do and relatively the same room left too and I don't intend to (like with Sony) end up swapping them out either as it sucks and being so tiny they're easily lost. The way I figure it with the 32 on board (partly consumed) and 128 on the memory card 164GB is more than I'll ever bother to use in patches, fluff updates, and the occasional e-shop title I'll snap up so it's fine.

[TheObscureGamer]

 

You do realize there's a LOT of games for both the PSP and Vita right? Even long after Sony stopped pushing the PSP there were some devs releasing games for it until just recently. Same with the Vita.

 

The problems with the PSP and Vita had a lot more due to Sony's poor marketing and even poorer handling of them than actually having too few games. Pricey low sized proprietary memory sticks for starters kept coming back to bite Sony in the ass on both consoles - especially when Sony tried to do a digital-only PSP Go.

 

If they do release a new handheld, I'll at least take a look and see what they have to offer but if they try repeating the same mistaken decisions as they did with the PSP and Vita I doubt they'll get me on board.

 

Regarding the memory sticks for the Vita and how it hinders the platform - I have a 16gig card in my Vita. It was the largest size commonly available around where I was and that cost 40+tax. Once that filled up with games bought on PSN, I simply stopped buying vita games digitally. Didn't matter how cheap they would end up in a flash sale. I had no room to add them to my Vita and I wasn't about to be bothered with swapping out those microscopic easily lost and/or broken cards. I'd say "Well, ok I'll just keep buying games physically!" Except Sony really tried their hardest to push digital at the expense of physical distribution so here we are.

 

My Switch has a 128gig card in it. Standard micro-sd card. I'll likewise probably never remove it from the Switch but there's still over 110 gigs left on it if not more waiting to be filled from the nintendo eshop before I stop buying games digitally for it.

What in the hell do you mean? The original PSP sold like 90 Million

[Mord]

What in the hell do you mean? The original PSP sold like 90 Million

 

With a lot of them being sold because the thing was easily cracked open for piracy I'd say. That 90 million, which wiki seems to point at being closer to 82 million, was still half of what it's competition sold, and it was a worldwide total. Of those about 17 million were the sales in North America. It took 5 years to sell that many, and I'm sure that total includes all the ones sold during the liquidation phase where you could pick up a system for 40 bucks. That's less than 4 million sold per year on average and in fact that would favor the launch years where it did sell better initially. If any other system sold that slowly it would have also been considered a failure.

 

Again, the PSP and Vita did as well as they did DESPITE Sony. Not BECAUSE of Sony. That's my point.