Hi everyone! I sincerely hope you all enjoyed this more in depth video. If there's any chance you liked it consider supporting on Patreon, it would mean a lot! Would love to do more of these but holy balls this took awhile to do. As always you don't have to, but it would help justify the time more for me. Also there's cool stuff on Patreon too. Either way, this video was bittersweet to do. The Vita was basically what started my channel back in 2012. It's how many of you found me and continue to watch today. Thank you for all the years of overwhelming kindness and support!
Very informative man! I really enjoyed it. Incredibly insightful and very well edited. I never knew much about psvita, just that I didn't want one... Thanks for this!
I'd say memory cards killed the vita. SONY shot itself with those prices, essentially punishing consumers who buy a game to then need to spend more for the space
@@zacharymogel9087 and the card they made is garbage and over price as shit, LMAO 64 gb for 90 bucks. I can get a 64 gb micro sd right now for 12 bucks
3ds struggled mightily at 1st...and the 3ds sold half of what the DS did in its lifetime...also people prefered to buy a 3DS over a Wii U...on the other hand people preferred to buy a PS4 than a Vita
Well the 3DS had the dual screen system, no eye do flooded it with all of there big name titles, and never struggled when it came to what can run on the handheld. Nothing about market issues more just studying and doing there homework correctly to make sure there was little flaws with the system.
That doesn’t prove anything. The market for handhelds was way smaller in the 3DS/PSV generation than it was in the DS/PSP and GB/GBC generations. That was because of phones and tablets. Eventually handhelds as we used to know them went away to be replaced by the Switch, a genius move by Nintendo because having downgraded home console games gives them a much bigger 3rd party library than they otherwise would have, and their own first party library provides the tailored-to-Switch experiences.
@@arseface2k934 Vita is way more powerful, but in my opinion they aren't comparable. One has dual screens and 3D, the other has an great looking OLED screen and is more premium feeling.
keesin well, in Europe and America. In Japan, it was supported till last year and a lot of Japanese Games got released there or are still releasing. Just absolutely nothing here in the west.
The phrase "ahead of its time" couldn't apply more to the PS Vita. We have now achieved in terms of mobile technology, what Sony WANTED back in 2012 with the PS Vita. With Sony releasing the Sony Xperia XZ soon, a smartphone with 4k resolution, the existence of phones with 120hz refresh rates and the success of Nintendo's Switch, I think Sony should try again, this is how *Long Comment Below:* Make a Playstation PHONE, not a Sony smartphone, a PLAYSTATION SMARTPHONE, with its own OS (as opposed to just using ChromeOS or AndroidOS or AppleOS) with a sleek futuristic design (like the PS5 controller), attachable buttons and joysticks, and INSANE POWER, the most powerful phone on the market built specifically for gaming. Now to be fair, those already exist (the Razer Phone for example), but the only thing you can do with them is play shitty GooglePlay Store apps. Imagine if Sony made a Playstation App (which again, already exists) but specifically for Playstation Phone *Exclusives.* Now, all of the basic things that apply to getting an expensive phone would apply to the Playstation Phone, so that means 2-5 year contracts, trade-in discounts etc. This frees Sony up to investing a lot of money into it, without risking people not buying it because of the price (which to be fair could go up to more than $1000), the iPhone X is absolute proof of this. Look, I will mention again that the success of the Nintendo Switch PROVES that it can work, and Sony can make a far superior Switch that could last decades, with new models in-between, and insane graphics and gameplay. Maybe call it the PSP+[the year it comes out] so like PSP2020 or just PSP20 or something like that, and instead of PSP meaning PSPortable, it means PSPhone.
Owen Terzic "El taller de yakara" explains it well, but it's in spanish, Im sure there must be people that explains the same. You can always go to the official Henkaku page.
The PS Vita could've EASILY surpassed 30 Million systems sold if Sony weren't so stupid with the way they handled it. No market change has damaged the PS Vita like how Sony damaged its own product.
@@AArco-vc1jj The memory cards did hurt it a lot. But it's a combination of things. Lack of games (there is a sizeable library now, but it's full of jrpgs.) And the fact that Sony did not push the system.
>Makes an expensive machine that is so powerful for its time, it makes development of games expensive for handheld standarts; >Forces consumers to pay for expensive proprietary Memory Card to save and install anything; >always associated to other devices, its never its own thing; >Never cared to make a system seller game/IP for the Vita, designed for handheld gaming, like Nintendo having Pokémon for they portable consoles since the original Game Boy; >Abandons everything and leave it to Indie devs. You can play many of those Indie games on other systems; >Blames Mobile Gaming for Vita's failure. If Mobile Gaming its so harmful to handheld consoles, then how the 3DS did so well and the Switch is doing great?
What alot of people don't realize is, Nintendo has a monopoly on their IPs. It's the main reason their systems sell. I'd like to see sales figures for any nintendo system if some of their big IPs were multi platform. Added fact is their target audience plus fanbase for games that passed through generations. Plus the big window between their games. Infact I believe someone even did a video about this.
Because even 3DS has been much less successful than the original DS. Also Switch is not only a portable console. Vita probably launched at the worst possible time, when Switch launched the "smartphones are going to take over everything" hype had already died down somewhat. C'mon, smartphones had a massive impact on Vita's popularity...
@@mynthon0 Well yeah, but that can be attributed to the casual bubble. 3ds sales roughly equal GBA sales after all. The main problem was games: they didn't secure fucking monster Hunter, THE system seller in Japan for the psp, and let it slip to Nintendo.
But then what are you adopting? A console that's no longer supported by the manufacturer or any game development studios? It's not late adopting. That's just a yard sale.
@-*KGB*- Notice how you put that qualifier in there? "Great" consoles. It's one thing to collect an NES or a Commodore 64 or a PSOne, either out of nostalgic sentiment or monetary value among collectors and antiquarians. Those respective consoles didn't fail to be profitable in their day, and only became obsolete as technology progressed. It's another thing entirely to collect a failed product not even a decade old, and failed due to a botched unit design and marketing strategy. Perhaps you don't notice the difference. Perhaps you don't care, as you've already said. Either way, Vita's are only being sold on cheap not because they're a bargain per se, but because the seller just wants rid, or perhaps a retailer flogging old stock. That's only my observation.
Bought one used with homebrew, a PSP emulator (Adrenaline) and 64GB of internal space. It's the first model, Wi-fi only, has some minor scratches but was definitely worth it's price. Converting the amount to dollars, I paid something around U$150.00 in late 2019. Initially I just wanted to play Child of Light on the go (got all the trophies avaliable, piece of cake), but the Hotline Miami games and the Persona series really hooked me to this little beast. Sadly, I can't use the Remote Play function due to the fact that I'm an Xbox ONE day one adopter (the PS4 is really expensive in Brazil), but both are pretty amazing systems
It may have failed from a business perspective, but as a owner of the console itself, the hacking community gave its full potential. Shout out to all the communities who are still working hard on providing ports and homebrews hence keeping the console alive!!🔥
Vegito Charmara Exactly. That's why fans that are also modders/hackers should take advantage of it. Sony didn't know what to do with it (or the Vita at ALL for that matter). I remember seeing fan made concept art of a UMD player (to play physical PSP games) that connected via the accessory port.
Vegito Charmara Another great use for it would be to connect an external battery, similar to those special phone cases. The 1000 model's battery suffered due to the OLED screen.
rob d how did it suffer from oled each pixel in the screene could be turned on individualy meaning that black on the screen was using no power for those pixels it was actualy more efficient than other screens
@@robd9921 dude, I honestly don't know what you're talking about. My 1st gen vita gets more battery life than my DS, phone, and laptop combined (while gaming). The only thing that comes close is my nexus 7 tablet,and that's physically too large to fit in a pocket.
If only Sony stuck with the SDCard. The very high prices of the Vita Mem Cards and the fact that you required one to even use the device at lauch scared many away.
@@thebravegallade731 - The problem is, Sony's Memory Stick Pro Duo was still too slow. Not sure how good it's read/write speeds would be for Vita. The fastest it got I think was about 50 to 60 MB/second, but that was usually the theoretical max speed. In reality, it probably didn't always hit those speeds. Hell, MicroSD cards should get around 100 MB/second or just over and don't always hit their max speeds.
@@JediMastr80 memori stick micro has similar specs to modern sdhc. Not that many people know it exists as the psp was the life support the memory stick format was on...
RedVGFox That's an awesome buy. I wish I had a deal like that when I bought mine. I got a decent deal on my 64 gig memory card though so I guess it's not all bad lol
good deal. giddy up. I just finished, Uncharted, Limbo, and Tearaway. I also got a Vita late in the game, and I'm scavenging for as many games as I can
What I find amazing is that this represents Nintendo's final victory in the handheld market after a THIRTY-YEAR war of fighting off competition and winning every single time. It took huge balls to enter their domain from everyone who tried. I liked the NGPC and the Wonderswan, I loved the GG, and I had fun with the PSP and Vita. A very sad end, all the moreso because the Vita was almost a prototype for all the things that made the Switch such a runaway success. So near and yet so far. EDIT: Nevermind, the steamdeck is out now
Nintendo is unique company. After difficult eras has unique reflexes to outsold everything in handheld fields. If Sony and especially financial beast like Microsoft can not defeat Nintendo like Sega, then Who?
I actually think sony sold the schematics if I’m saying that right to Nintendo if you really think about it the vita was a hand held and can hook up to the TV. The vita also started out with the Oled screen then the led screen and the Nintendo Switch started out with the led screen and now has the Oled screen and can do basically the same thing handheld or TV
glad to see that after 3 years of this comment being out, you updated it lol, yeah Smaller companies are making handhelds, like ayn, ayaneo, etc Valve shows that there is STILL demand for a handheld that can do it all.
An incredible system with so much promise, ruined by proprietary memory cards, all in the name of combating piracy. Wonder how much money they lost vs. how much they may have lost had it used SD cards. Excellent work, BTW. You earned a new sub :)
It was also ruined by lack of backwards compatibility. So many games to play but, the system wouldn't play them, making it a waste of money to many. The PSP should have used a cartridge from the start. Then, backwards compatibility would have been easier and the system would have had more value.
@@TheDeathmail how did it have a lack of backwards compatibility? There was a ton of ps1 and psp games that could be played on it. And UMD’s were used so they could store much more dats. Take this into comparison with the ds. A ds cartridge could only hold 64 mb, while a umd could hold 1.8 gb.
@@astralmaster It isn't backwards compability if the games are either re-released on cartridges or downloadable from the Ps Store. And yes it was a good choice to use UMD in the seventh generation but the Vita should have not gotten rid of the UMD reader even if they chose to use carts(they could've at least make a revision to add UMD compability). Also UMD only has a maximum of around 1.8 GBs of storage while the game carts had a known maximum of 4GB. It was either Sony make a new disc of the same size as the UMD or use a cartridge for the Ps Vita and we know what they chose.
@@jerrossclarito6119 Price, Using Game cards which store less data and cost more to make despite it's predecesor using UMD and not making an improved UMD which can store more data and let backwards compability exist, lack of exclusives/First Party Games and lack of care for the Vita by abandoning the console after just two years. Also this video exists. Watch it and no memory cards weren't the only thing that fucked it.
Not entirely. The Memory Cards were just one nail (a big one to be sure, but not the main one). The VITA's bigger issue were the economics behind developing for it. It is expensive making AAA level games. The 3DS got away with weaker specs since that meant it didn't the best graphics to succeed so developers could afford to make cheaper games for that. The VITA's biggest selling point was being able to play console quality games on the go, but it was too weak to run most PS3/PS4 games well but making games for the level the VITA could run was too expensive and risky given the few sales and limit the scope of the game even if it was released on PS3/PS4 as well. That meant there wasn't many games for the system which started killing it. Of course, Indie games and Sony's Cross Buy system was arguably the thing the VITA needed but that happened years too late. Hindsight is 2020. If Sony wanted to save the VITA, it still would have been an uphill task but their better options would have been: -1- from Day -1- get Indie creators on board. Make the VITA the destination for Indie Games and integrate them with Cross Buy from Day 1 with both PS3 and PS4 versions. -2- Make the system cheaper. Remove the camera and touch pads if you need to. Use standard MicroSDs for memory. -3- Go all out with ports of popular games that would work. Get Rockstar to re-release the GTA trilogy for VITA for example. The start with AC3 Liberation, Killzone Mercenary and COD BOD3 wasn't enough. With this, I don't the VITA would sell amazing, but it likely would thrive.
I don't see anyone listing the reason why me or one of my friends never got one which is weird because I guarantee it was probably one of the biggest (bigger than any other) reasons why it sold terribly, simply because the netplay wasn't there. You couldn't play online with the 3g model and if you tried with wifi it was dogshit that was poorly optimized with little to no consideration for data so if you used it over a mobile hotspot without an unlimited (and it'd better be high speed with high end devices that can support hotspots well) plan you'd be paying an insane amount of money (which even when it worked with optimal speeds it was terrible). This seemed kinda silly because there were high demanding games on mobile platforms that took better consideration on data use and properly utilized netplay code that made playing online in a real time game actually feasible which no game on the vita at all was able to do. It seemed like the perfect time to play mobile games online and they completely missed that mark which is the sole reason I and literally everyone I know never got one
Literally could have been one of the greatest consoles of all time. Got my first vita about a month ago and let me tell you, I wish I had known about this a lot longer ago. The vita will be always respected by the true gaming community. Long live the VITA!
The Nintendo Switch proves that handheld gaming is far from dead. If anything, it got a fresh breath of life thanks to the Switch's success and Nintendo knowing how to properly sell the system. Smartphones have nothing to do with this. It's all about marketing and good support. Nintendo even released a survey questioning people which way they prefer to play their Switch, and it was 50% handheld and 50% docked. So there is definitely a demand for handheld systems. Whatever Sony said was obviously to shift the blame on the market climate rather than on their incompetence.
To be fair, the Vita was released during a time when people were still getting smartphones and it was strongly believed that Smartphones could replace it at the time. It's just that... nobody expect that smartphone manufacturers (or google) wouldn't do something about it (I mean, if they themselves made easy to attach controllers that would work, then many of the higher end phones would work as handhelds with only the lower end phones maybe having issues). But instead, it was developers who we mostly never heard of before that tried to develop it of varying quality or we didn't even hear about it. So it wasn't that smartphones couldn't kill handhelds, just that they didn't, because enough wasn't invested in it when it came to gaming. But, it probably wouldn't make them too much money in the long run. And to be fair, the Switch has a lot of the games people wanted, and it came out when people were less wowed about Smart Phones and it had a bigger screen and just so many games that people wanted came out. Remember, it was originally called by many a Zelda machine...
@@TheDeathmail The Vita's price worked against it; the originally announced $250 seemed like a deal, especially as that was the 3ds's original launch price. Nintendo cut it's portables price to $180 and compensated early adopters with free games, while Sony revealed that the proprietary cards were mandatory and expensive. They pulled the Vita entry price in the realm of the Xbox 360 and PS3 which both had established libraries of games by that time. If Sony had made a few crucial decisions the Vita would still be alive and well: - with the PSP Go Sony had the brilliant idea to include 16GB of internal storage; this would have made the initial purchase easier for many -another Go feature was the availability of a TV Dock/charger; Sony had the Switch formula ingredients years earlier -when the PS4 was selling like crazy, Sony should have released a PS4/Vita bundle; the PS4 has sold around 95 million + to date, I'm not saying a bundle would have magically produced the same numbers for the Vita but you would have had a larger user base than the 16 million+ it ended up with.
Switch really is more a console than a handheld. The handheld feature is more useful around the house such as playing in your bed or taking it to a friend and things like that. However true handheld gaming like in the buss or something is completely conquered by mobile gaming.
@@MrMarinus18 You can't compare smartphone gaming to Switch mobile gaming though. I mean what can you play on your phone? Solitaire, or some mundane flappy bird like game you can play for 5 minutes. You can play some AAA games on your Switch. But then I can see your point. One won't invest much time in handheld gaming as much as a console/PC stationary gaming, so that's why the smartphone mobile gaming has a bigger "impact" on people lol
First thing to remember is that handhelds can be a hard sell, even Nintendo knows this. The 3ds struggled in the beginning but they continued to push it and the 3ds ended up saving Nintendo during it's Wii U era. You need to educate the public, you have to sell your product, you can't assume people are just going to run to your product because you think your awesome and then just give up when it's not working out. Also when the Vita came out the price of memory was dropping very sharply, people expect cheap memory. Not only are there memory cards to expensive but their to small for the massive size of the games. I know they were scared of piracy and it may have been expensive to create proprietary memory cards but they backed them selves into the dumbest of dumb corners, especially since piracy on the Vita was avoided in the most part due to firmware updates and a system that was locked up tight other then the PSP side of things. In my opinion the memory cards being that expensive was a way to make the Vita look cheap while helping the company avoid taking a loss on the Vita. The Vita could have and should have done very well but a lack of advertising, expensive memory cards, a lack of AAA first party and 3rd party games past a certain point and yeah to a degree the smartphone boom hurt the Vita. But if they would have just released a revision of the Vita that used micro SD and pushed it hard I do believe that the Vita would have been extremely successful. Sony might not love their little red headed step child but the modding community does. The Vita is a little power house and can do some amazing things. You can even use a micro SD card with an adapter invented by a member of the modding community. There honestly has never been a better time to buy a vita. I will never part with my modded Vita. Great video.
Very well worded comment! If you had spoken this to me I would have understood immediately. Just a few grammar errors. There, a place. They're, they are. their, possessive. Your, possessive. You're, you are. Too, a lot. I don't mean to be preachy or anything, it's just that you have really good ideas and I'd hate for anyone to dismiss what you're saying because of a few grammar issues.
*sell, and even *its Wii U era (possessive) it's = contraction of "it is/has" *their memory cards (possessive) *too expensive *they're too small (contraction of "THEY aRE") *themselves *for the most part I'm not sure what you meant by "locked up tight other then the PSP side of things." First off, it should be "than" not "then" (because it's a comparison), but secondly that's not a correct use of "other than," so I have no idea what you were trying to say there. *powerhouse
The price really just killed it. The 3DS was only around half the price of the Vita all things considered and while the Vita was a superior system it wasn't good enough to warrant double the price.
That ending almost had me in tears. "The playstation vita might have failed, but it failed gracefully" I knew people who had them and I would always be amazed when playing them on how futuristic it was for being a handheld. Playstation really did miss the mark by giving up on it and overpricing the memory cards, but the games and community for the vita to this day are still going strong. One of the best handheld gaming and entertainment device ever made. Would have been cool to see it compete with the switch.
Honestly it is a sad waste of a console. UNLESS you mod it, if you mod it then you turn it into something worth the money lol at that point you can do a lot with it including playing psp games and n64, ps1, etc
Sony: "Is it that I'm so out of touch that I made proprietary memory that costed 3 times that average price that caused the Vita to fail?" ........... Sony: "No, no.. its the consumers that don't want portable gaming."
The Vita was such a neat device. What annoyed me however was the price of memory cards, the ugly user interface and the forced inclusion of the touchpad/touchscreen/gyroscope, etc. Great Video, Ryan!
pixelwatch I have to disagree with you on the interface. The interface is beautiful. In my opinion it's way better than the Nintendo Switch interface by a long shot. I have both and the Vita is definitely better and not ugly at all to me.
I guess that depends a lot on personal taste. It's good that you enjoy it - I want to like it, but to me it feels too colorful, too playful. I sort of like the bubbles though. Those icons were really unique. The switch is a little bland and very "Un-Nintendo", I agree with you there.
@@tacoengineer6660 dont lie to yourself. Its super tacky while the nintendo switch interface is modern and minimalistic. It should've been like the psp and ps3 interface.
@@CristianMartinez-rg9sz I don't find it tacky at all. It's a good user interface for a handheld. Not on PSTV though. I like the Switch interface but if anything it is too minimalistic for Nintendo. The Vita seems somewhat similar to the 3DS in this way which is not a bad thing.
This was so great to watch. Has a PS Vita owner myself, I still love the platform regardless. I still toss it in my bag whenever I head out to work and in some cases I prefer to bring it with me over my Switch. It sucks that Sony didn't support it well in the west. If only they could bring some of those Asian exclusives over to the west.
The Legend of Heroes Evolution games need to come to the West either by Vita download or PS4. Still waiting on Trails of Cold Steel 3 and 4. Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 were excellent games. Since 1 and 2 are coming out for PS4, I'm thinking they are waiting to see how well those will sell before releasing 3 and 4 in English. It's like waiting for Rebuild of Evangelion 4.
Hahah same. I loves my PS Vita for what it was but I didn't love the game selection and the very expensive mem card. I'm from South Africa and VAT and import tax is so much more than overseas. I love my PSP and ds and 3ds though. Still go back and play them all when I am in the mood. My 3ds is getting less love cause of my switch now though =P
This video genuinely gave me goosebumps. When I first saw the vita I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread and I still stand by that though as it is one of my favorite consoles of all time. But the sheer untapped potential it had makes me really sad.
I was still in high school when the Vita came out. So I didn’t have one. I would like having another option for handhelds, but I don’t Sony will ever make another portable PlayStation. With the Switch doing well it would be almost impossible to beat. Especially as Nintendo is putting all their faith in the switch, where a new PSP would still only be an after thought. The switch might end up failing as well if google Stadia and streaming games do well enough also.
@@coltonpiper6156 if switch get really good success im pretty sure sony rise up again meet fan expectation. they probably taking few step back rethink how they continue on portable.. waiting for right time maybe... STADIA lol that might be future but not all have stable internet specially for 3rd world country. to many technical problem in user side...
Colton Piper Well even if streaming becomes amazing Nintendo will still have their reputation and IPs that no other company will have. I doubt Stadia and XCloud are gonna be good until at least the next console generation, so I think the Switch will be fine.
I know i am a bit late but can you recommend me some story focused games (ps vita/psp)? My friend gave me his vita, and i have muramasa rebirth and persona 4. I already played gravity rush and odin sphere/dragons crown on my ps4.
faruk doğan story focuses games? Um, I can’t really think of many there are more on the switch I would say I own a switch and a vita but find myself playing the switch a lot more, also little nightmares 2 and disaster report 4 come out next year for the switch
LudiXP lucy commenting on another youtuber that I like O.o whoa... what an interesting turn of events, though im not surprised but im thrilled that you support him :)
PSP succeeded because, for the first time EVER, you could play console quality games ANYWHERE! Vita did not change that, but now Sony was trying to do the "developing 2 versions of the game at once" thing. That hurt both profits, and games themselves (most notable, Sly Cooper 4). And now, it seems Nintendo did what Sony could not.
I think it worked at first since PS3 games weren't all that demanding at first,but the problem layed with late 2012 where the problem showed that Sony's top tier devs (Naughy Dog,Santa Monica,Polyphony Digital,Sucker Punch,Guerilla Games) were all so damn busy with their last PS3 titles or their biggest projects yet transitioning to the PS4 and that just made Sony realize they had to choose either compromise games to be on both or be the super dominate leader in the gaming industry. They chose the ladder of course.
I also think that while playing console games on the go is exciting it actually isn't ideal. So when the novelty was used up by the PSP it became more a liability to the Vita than an asset. Nintendo had the same issue. The gimmicks and motion controls of the Wii made it very successful but when that novelty wore out it really was a liability to the Wii U. Console games just are not ideal for play in less than ideal situations which you usually play handhelds in. The 3ds just had more big games that were better suited to handheld play.
@@flyingninja1234 The Switch is not a dedicated portable though. You know the market is tough when even Nintendo wasn't confident enough and had to combine it's portable and console markets
I LOVED my Vita... until my incredibly overpriced 64GB memory card randomly died. Turns out to be a common problem with the 64GB cards. Someday I will hack it and use it again, but I still have some residual bitterness about how badly Sony handled things.
i'm still an avid user of vita, and it saddens me to see that the console didn't see the same light of day like it's predecessor. but it's eventual downfall was due to sony's bad marketing tactics and, like jack trenton said, it was a great machine, but it was too late, seeing how the world has shifted to smartphones for their portable gaming needs, amongst other issues
I play Java games during the psp era, and that didn't affect the PSP at all. Memory card price was the major reason, which made smartphones to take advantage of the cost values. Even though i don't play games on smartphones myself.
I hate the games on smartphones... id rather use joysticks and touch actaul buttons than to touch an all touch screen.. portable consoles are way better than mobile games on phones
I don't get this whole "People have cellphones and can play games on them so handheld devices are not worth it." Mentality. Yes phones having games are a thing, and some are pretty good. But most of the time they're time wasters. Not at the same level of a AAA handheld game that I'm willing to drop 40 to 60 bucks on.
Yea, that argument only holds true to most people who aren't gamers but want to play some casual game on their phone as a way to pass time while their bored. Despite the fact that there are ports of console games on phone app stores, it can't at all compare or measure up to dedicated gaming handheld consoles.
It has been 10 now that the PSVita was released. Playing it still today... the games on this handheld are some of the best gaming experiences I have had on a handheld system. Happy 10 Years PSVita!
Using proprietary tech for the PS3 and Vita nearly ruined the PS brand. Everyone applauded when Kaz announced the price, while Kaz knew there was a catch, you could literally spend over $400 to get a Vita with Storage and a game. The deception, greed, and anti-consumerism under his watch will always be a lesson for Sony and the industry as a whole. Thankfully they realized this, but while PS4 benefited from it, the Vita never got a second chance.
i didn't even know what a vita was let alone it existed until around november 2015. my 3DS(had since lauch) was collecting dust and i was missing my psp (go) which got lost around 2010 or 11 so i was doing some web surfing to buy a new one when i stumbled accross the vita. i was so unsure if i should get it cause of so many negative reviews saying it sucked and had no games. I caved in because it was newer and still being "supported" and i dont regret it one bit. All in all great video it felt like a real documentary. I've recently hacked my vita with H ENCORE and it has a vast library of all ps1 and psp with a little ps2 games. Also emulates one of my fav handhelds the GBA as well as N64. In time im sure the Hacking community will be able to do more to/for the vita than sony ever bothered to do. I do still hope they make a successor with all the "vita" issues fixed!
As far as consoles go, I am deeply saddened in my “gamer” heart.... 😔 This system was amazing in all areas and so many of the games on this platform were AWESOME & portable to boot. I haven’t met one person who has given this system a decent chance, not be blown away by one or more things the Vita had to display. Most were amazed by the graphics alone...., especially pre Switch. All that is simply to say that I personally love gaming on this system and will probably never let it go. Not only for nostalgic reasons but also cuz I still play this regularly and is one of the most fun systems I have ever owned. Thanks Sony and long live PSVita!!!!
I was an early adopter of the Vita but was let down by Sony's lackluster support of it. Aside from the main VIta games drying up leaving little to no incentive to hold onto it, I wanted to play PSP and PS1 games on the go but found the PSN store severely lacking in the classics department. I'm sure the modding scene picked up the slack but at the time I just felt ripped off and wanted to get rid of the thing. I also hated the back touch screen, it always seemed to get in the way and was an unnecessary addition.
Great video! Much more professional than a lot of gaming documentaries I see on YT. New sub, hoping to see more like it. It’s crazy to think what would have happened if the Vita was successful and where the portable market would be. ATM I have the amazing GPD Win 2 (portable gaming pc) but it’s from a independent developer, but maybe there’d be a lot more powerful portable devices or even Microsoft official portable gaming PCs if the vita created a market for hardcore portable gaming.
I got a Vita for my 12th birthday back when it first came out. I’m 21 now, and my Vita still works great. I think it’s an underrated handheld. It’s got good games that are fun to play.
Just bought two Vita’s, two memory cards, and some games before the digital store closes in four months. The PSP and Vita were such important pieces of my childhood - felt like something I wanted to hold on to now that I’m older.
I love my Vita. Got the week early bundle. Then the slim and Playstation TV. Great systems that had the potential to have an even better library. However, I'm still happy we got some great games on it.
Even as a Nintendo/Microsoft fan, I find it sad how the Vita flopped. It didn't deserve to get this fate. In terms of handheld gaming it was revolutionairy. I never got to own one, I did own a PSP back in the day alongside my DS and loved it to bits. I saw how cool and how much potential the Vita had over at friends' houses. The graphics were amazing, the (hope I say this right) cross play function with PS3/PS4, it had some great games as well. Did like the PSP design more. There was something about the sharp edges and the transparent shoulder buttons on the PSP that made it super sexy together with the glossy finish, the Vita was a bit too round. I kept thinking for many times I wanted to buy one myself, just to find out the ridiculous memory card prices. Currently thinking of picking one up since you can use SD cards and a lot of awesome homebrew being available for it. Interesting to conclude that the homebrew community has been on point when it comes to the Vita, but Sony hasn't.
I like to think that Nintendo took on the legacy of the Vita with the Switch, they saw the potential in console quality-games on a portable that Sony didn't quite grasp.
“Console level’ games on a portable were were always Nintendo’s thing since the gameboy.lol just the standard of what that is has advanced. Nintendo has and will always be the king of video games.
How I would’ve handled the Vita: *Physical Design* • No rear touchpad. Front touchscreen and cameras optional/debatable • Focus primarily on making the Vita as much like a portable console experience as possible by having L1/R1 L2/R2 triggers and clickable joysticks for L3/R3, making it exactly like a DualShock controller. Gyroscope and microphone can stay. • Not necessary but maybe make buttons more like ones on controller in terms of design, color. *Functionality* • Don’t bother with Remote Play for PS3 since it hardly even worked. Have the Vita focus on being its own console. • When the PS4 would come around though, experimenting with Remote Play would be fine. • No expensive memory cards - just use the old ones for the sake of costs. • Console itself would start off at its slashed $200 price. *Games* • Give developers plenty of time, money, etc to develop quality games (if Resistance, CoD, ACIII, Uncharted, etc were given the same care as console counterparts with maximum replayability in mind, I think the Vita would’ve done really well.) • Besides AAA games we got, add more to the roster such as the Bioshock that was teased, inFAMOUS, God of War, Metal Gear, Gran Turismo, maybe even a Far Cry title, etc.
This video made me whip out my ol' Vita 2000 and I booted World of Final Fantasy again. I own a Switch and love the console, but the Vita is incredible in its own way, always had been, but playing with it again after 2 years in the vault feels so nostalgic and almost magical how this console even existed. I use my Switch everyday, but the Vita is still my favorite handheld console to this day.
The PSVita was my introduction to indie games. I remember vividly playing Hotline Miami for days on it. I couldn't put it down. It had its flaws and I would have loved to have more significant AAA games on it (like a GTA for instance), but I loved how it got recycled into an indie beast. I have many good memories of this console despite the failure. Awesome video, I loved the documentary! Thank you.
This is the one thing I'll agree with the Vita fans on. Vita was a cool idea poorly managed. If it wasn't for the memory cards and other b.s I would've bought one.
Man, I love this system. I’ve got the black and white OLED systems along with a PSVTV that I love to play on. For the most part they are good for RPGs and VNs, but there are so many genres that just shine on this thing. NFS: Most Wanted on the go? Yes please!
If it has more games and a cheaper memory card. It would've. I love my 3ds... But I knew the vita was so much better and stronger. I wanted it to be better. But it wasnt
The back TouchPad and lack of PS4 game versions is what really killed it. If they dropped the TouchPad it could've been $50+ cheaper, and PS4 games being on it, even if it was worse looking wouldve worked if maybe they just did a $5-10 uncharged if you own the ps4 version. Obviously storage was an issue too, but I wouldn't be too concerned about that when there were so few games to buy. Sure, around 10 killer games by the first 2 years, but a lot of mobile type games. They really should've put PS2 games on the Vita. Would've been more than enough to have me buy it.
I never got to experience the PS Vita, and I'm honestly kinda bitter that I never got to. It's a wonderful looking platform with tons of neat little bits. Bits the switch still hasn't really gotten into. I still wanna experience the console, but I fear I won't be able to before it's death in 2020-2021 due to financial reasons...man, just like the DS's wifi days.
100% storage card prices and space size were to blame for its demise. I was a huge day one fan, and even slim model and PSTV. Years later I’m glad I busted it all back out and got a custom firmware installed and used micro sd storage now through the game card slot with an adapter. Such an amazing 🤩 system with mass storage space! I even sold my slim and bought back the OLED model I missed so much!
Great video! I bought a Vita for the first time a few weeks ago. I loved my PSP back in the day but never got into Vita until recently. I gotta say, it felt a little gimmicky. The touch screen/touchpad, microphone, and cameras weren't really used in the games I tried and enjoyed. The proprietary cards are also a drawback. One thing that I simply could not stand was the user interface. The XMB on the PSP was perfect. Hence why they're still using the XMB design 15 years later. The Vita's interface felt awkward to use and the "bubbles" made it seem almost "cute". In the end, it was an innovative device and it's unfortunate it didn't do as well as its predecessor. This video ended saying the device was a failure, but throughout the video I got a sense that it really wasn't all that big of a failure. Millions of units sold. Lots of great games. Years of support. I mean, it had its run and it's coming to a close, but overall it wasn't all that bad.
From what I've heard, even now the PS Vita community is one of the most dedicated in gaming. Even the Vita homebrew community seems to focused less on piracy and more about native vita ports for games (such as the GTA games), emulation of older consoles, and experimenting with the hardware. (I don't actually know though, it just seems like this from my perspective as an 'outsider' who's never even owned a vita).
I’m a Nintendo fanboy and was never really interested in Playstation games but i’m also a lover for great design and damn, the PSP (any Version) and PS Vita are design masterpieces! They are soo beautiful! I like the design better than the designs of 95% of smartphones today. Sony products almost always have a timeless design. I personally think Sony is even better than Apple at designing their products.
For me it wasn’t just the memory cards that killed it, it was the markets in general. Smartphones and tablets were getting a lot better which instantly killed any kind of handheld game markets considering the type of games you can get off the App snd google play Store. Not to mention all smartphones have 3G/4g so you can play multiplayer anywhere whereas I think a lot of people probably bought the WiFi only ps vita model so you were restricted where you could play multiplayer. The weight and size of most smartphones were a bit more portable too even back then. Another thing that killed it was the type of games that were coming out. Initially there had a lot of GREAT games with high graphics for a handheld with uncharted, virtua tennis, even fifa was good for it’s time on the vita! And then all of a sudden more games were coming out that were just SO visually unappealing with these types of pixelated mini RPG style games with cartoony/anime looking characters I mean they look like games you could get on a game boy Advance or a Nintendo system and that’s just NOT PlayStation. It’s no wonder when you factor in all these reasons it died a death.
amazing how everyone who has owned a vita speaks highly and fondly about it. i still play mine and it opened my eyes to a world of games i would never have bothered looking into if it hadnt come out.
The music that starts playing at 21:00 makes me cry every time. It makes me think of the year 2012 to 2013 when i was excited for gaming. Great little 🎶
Incredible video! it genuinely breaks my heart the Vita failed. I absolutely LOVE my Vita til this day and have owned one since launch. Sigh..... Dammit Sony!!!!
If we ever get a follow-up to the PSVITA, maybe they should include a 32GB Memory Card to go with the console then people won’t have to spend extra cash on the Memory Cards upon Purchase/Pre-order. Not only that, include the Rear touch pad, PS5 Remote play, Wi-Fi/cloud connection, Backwards Compatibility with PSVITA, being able to play PSP games by downloading them (Since we don’t have UMDs anymore) on the console, Face ID for easy log in and certain games (Like the Rear Touch Pad was for Tearaway), special headphones for games like Minecraft and Fortnite, camera on the back for photo taking, inclusion of PSVR2, and Airplane mode like on your phone. Not only will these features help the next PlayStation Portable console, but also combat whatever Microsoft is planning for their Portable XBOX. (If we ever get a Portable XBOX)
Realistically speaking, the next PS handheld (assuming there is one) will likely just be a PS4 Portable. Rather than have its own exclusive games, a concept that’s kinda redundant nowadays, you’d be able to log into your PSN account and natively download all PS4 games you digitally own, and also have access to PS Plus cloud streaming. It would have crossbuy and crossplay enabled both ways, basically allowing you to take a PS4 wherever you go. I’d imagine it’d also have Remote Play capabilities with PS5. As for design, imagine the Vita, but replace the rear touchpad with DualShock 4-style L2/R2 triggers, and also with DS4-style clickable analog sticks, as well as replacing the Start/Select buttons with Options/Share. Touchscreen that would double as both the DS4 touchpad and also an alternative way to navigate the UI, which I imagine would be like either the PS4 or 5. Probably no cameras though.
@18:09 i was surprised to see he was honest and open about the reality of smartphones. instead of just going on a profit driven illusion and saying something like "yes smartphones as portable gaming platforms are good but the PSVita does it better" or something of that nature. clearly a smart person that understands the current situation at the time and makes decisions based on that.
PS Vita still is my favorite handheld console even then I have a Nintendo SWITCH also. Persona 4 Golden, Soul Sacrifice, Gravity Rush, Muramas Rebirth, Killzone Mercenary, Hatsune Miku Project Diva F 2nd, MGS HD Collection, Summon Night 6, Ys and The Legend of Heroes series gave me a lot of great feelings and memories, that not any home console can give. I still play in my PS Vita (now I almost beat a Trails of Cold Steel II) and I still have around 15 unfinished games (I have 47 catridges in total) and after I finished them all, maybe a SWITCH will be my main handheld console.
I still have my Vita, and I admit I don't use it much, mostly because of its proprietary memory card. With all these cheap high capacity microSD cards one can buy at local retailers and online, it would have been easier for me to buy more titles and carry them with me, and continue getting more miles out of my Vita. Also, I really had hopes Polyphony had made a Gran Turismo game for the Vita, which I'd put a lot of hours to.
I had the PSP as a kid and was so excited when the Vita came out but the memory cards killed it for me. With the money I had saved up I chose the 3DS and honestly I’m glad that happened. IMO it was the best Nintendo handheld since the GBA, which I loved. And on top of that it made me rekindle my appreciation for Nintendo after being with the PlayStation for my adolescence.
The Vita will always be a success in my eyes...it came at a perfect time in my life...disposable income and a 1st time father in 2011...this portable console was a life saver
Omg yes. 128gb sd card with PKG. This means you have the entire PSVita psp and ps1 libraries at your fingertips just waiting to be played. Not to mention the numerous different emulators for the system.
I see a lot of people saying the system mainly failed because of those memory cards. I don’t think you can ignore the broader market effects in the handheld gaming space. The market for handheld games consoles was way smaller in the 3DS/PSV generation than it was in the DS/PSP and GB/GBC generations. That was because of phones and tablets. Nintendo had spent several generations carving out a niche on handhelds, designing new games and even some IPs like Pokémon specifically for handhelds first, rather than designing games as spin-offs of home console games. Nintendo had forged an identity in consumers’ minds as a company that had good handheld games. Sony had not, so they were the ones that had to go. Eventually handhelds as we used to know them went away to be replaced by the Switch, a genius move by Nintendo because having downgraded home console/PC games gives the console a much bigger 3rd party library than it otherwise would have, and their own first party library provides the tailored-to-Switch experiences. Nintendo essentially fused their home console and handheld lines and have abandoned the DS size of handheld console because it can no longer provide a viable ecosystem. The people that really wanted AAA handheld gaming experiences are largely happy with the Switch and Switch Lite, and the casuals have moved to mobile and tablets. So yes, if Sony had simply used standard SD cards for the Vita, the system would have probably sold about twice as many units, but we would have still ended up where we are today.
I’ve watched this along with your PS3 and PS4 documentaries over the last few days, really great series. I love my Vita. It helps a lot if you like Japanese games but I can see why people were disappointed with the library if you were expecting AAA action games and shooters.
oh man I remember buying it for my nephew that wanted it badly... memory cards killed it. Otherwise a phenomenal portable. I on the other hand had a blast with the 3DS and n3DS with many fantastic games for it. It is still to this day the best portable ...Switch doesnt even come close imo.
It was a fantastic console that just didn't have the games to support it. The PSP had exclusive games in the GTA, God of War, Metal Gear, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Jak and Daxter, Ratchet and Clank, Dragon Ball, Resistance etc series. More than one in some cases. The Vita had none of those. It had a exclusive Uncharted, Assassin's Creed, Killzone and Call of Duty but not all that much more.
I picked mine up again recently, and given it had a menu with pages of icons on it, a black top bar with various icons including battery and a top bar, a notifications menu, SIM card support, and a web browser that feels surprisingly really good to use with a digital keyboard that the form factor feels really nice to use, I wonder what it would have been like if they went all the way and made it a hybrid smartphone/handheld console. Not sure how it would have went but it woulda been nuts for sure
Hi everyone! I sincerely hope you all enjoyed this more in depth video. If there's any chance you liked it consider supporting on Patreon, it would mean a lot! Would love to do more of these but holy balls this took awhile to do. As always you don't have to, but it would help justify the time more for me. Also there's cool stuff on Patreon too. Either way, this video was bittersweet to do. The Vita was basically what started my channel back in 2012. It's how many of you found me and continue to watch today. Thank you for all the years of overwhelming kindness and support!
Very informative man! I really enjoyed it. Incredibly insightful and very well edited. I never knew much about psvita, just that I didn't want one... Thanks for this!
Mystic perfect video
I wish this video was longer, just so I could see where the Vita will go from here. Great vid as always
Thank You I do not how you it. 💯🔥💯🔥
Mystic bro this was so fucking good , 10/10
I'd say memory cards killed the vita. SONY shot itself with those prices, essentially punishing consumers who buy a game to then need to spend more for the space
Psp proved the memory cards can be overlooked long as the games we want are there and vita is missing some key titles like GTA psp highest seller
kapil busawah they could have used an SD card which was universal but nooooo they made their own card
@@zacharymogel9087 and the card they made is garbage and over price as shit, LMAO 64 gb for 90 bucks. I can get a 64 gb micro sd right now for 12 bucks
Jack I know it was a mistake for sony
kapil busawah Granted you’re correct still Nintendo gets away with charging an arm n a leg for older games yet has massive success so WTF??!!!!
Smartphones didn't kill it because 3DS sold really well despite smartphones. Memory cards killed it.
3ds is wayyy diff than psp and wayy diff than a cell phone. Latter 2 are more similar
3ds struggled mightily at 1st...and the 3ds sold half of what the DS did in its lifetime...also people prefered to buy a 3DS over a Wii U...on the other hand people preferred to buy a PS4 than a Vita
and the switch
Well the 3DS had the dual screen system, no eye do flooded it with all of there big name titles, and never struggled when it came to what can run on the handheld. Nothing about market issues more just studying and doing there homework correctly to make sure there was little flaws with the system.
That doesn’t prove anything. The market for handhelds was way smaller in the 3DS/PSV generation than it was in the DS/PSP and GB/GBC generations. That was because of phones and tablets.
Eventually handhelds as we used to know them went away to be replaced by the Switch, a genius move by Nintendo because having downgraded home console games gives them a much bigger 3rd party library than they otherwise would have, and their own first party library provides the tailored-to-Switch experiences.
I really thought the vita was going to be a success back in 2011, but Sony destroyed it with the scam memory cards.
Davie The Space - Same here. Memory cards, and Sony’s general care for the system made it destined for failure.
How is it a failure with new games still coming out 7 years later🤔
toppdogg2k17 Because most of its games have been shovelware and anime trash for the past 3 years
Henkaku (h.encore) has just changed that. Try for yourself and you'll love vita more than any handheld
Mohit Gupta 5 years Too late
I still remember when it was known as the NGP people were saying it stood for "Nintendo Got Pwnd"....that aged badly.
both the 3ds and vita are stellar devices, shame people have to get caught up in console wars bs
Wow, I completely forgot about that, time flies
@@arseface2k934 Vita is way more powerful, but in my opinion they aren't comparable. One has dual screens and 3D, the other has an great looking OLED screen and is more premium feeling.
"we dont want our consoles going to the way side in only two years."
literally abandons it in two years
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Painfully true.
keesin well, in Europe and America.
In Japan, it was supported till last year and a lot of Japanese Games got released there or are still releasing.
Just absolutely nothing here in the west.
@@NeoReibert Is that supposed to make us feel better? Because that's kinda worse...
The phrase "ahead of its time" couldn't apply more to the PS Vita. We have now achieved in terms of mobile technology, what Sony WANTED back in 2012 with the PS Vita.
With Sony releasing the Sony Xperia XZ soon, a smartphone with 4k resolution, the existence of phones with 120hz refresh rates and the success of Nintendo's Switch, I think Sony should try again, this is how *Long Comment Below:*
Make a Playstation PHONE, not a Sony smartphone, a PLAYSTATION SMARTPHONE, with its own OS (as opposed to just using ChromeOS or AndroidOS or AppleOS) with a sleek futuristic design (like the PS5 controller), attachable buttons and joysticks, and INSANE POWER, the most powerful phone on the market built specifically for gaming. Now to be fair, those already exist (the Razer Phone for example), but the only thing you can do with them is play shitty GooglePlay Store apps.
Imagine if Sony made a Playstation App (which again, already exists) but specifically for Playstation Phone *Exclusives.* Now, all of the basic things that apply to getting an expensive phone would apply to the Playstation Phone, so that means 2-5 year contracts, trade-in discounts etc. This frees Sony up to investing a lot of money into it, without risking people not buying it because of the price (which to be fair could go up to more than $1000), the iPhone X is absolute proof of this.
Look, I will mention again that the success of the Nintendo Switch PROVES that it can work, and Sony can make a far superior Switch that could last decades, with new models in-between, and insane graphics and gameplay.
Maybe call it the PSP+[the year it comes out] so like PSP2020 or just PSP20 or something like that, and instead of PSP meaning PSPortable, it means PSPhone.
The memory cards killed it.
Yes but now you can mod it and use SD Cards. That's no longer a problem anymore
Less games
Owen Terzic "El taller de yakara" explains it well, but it's in spanish, Im sure there must be people that explains the same. You can always go to the official Henkaku page.
@@tacoengineer6660 not everyone mods, especially the normal consumer
@@SeamanGod Yes but there's a lot of people modding their Vitas now because it makes the Vita so good
The PS Vita could've EASILY surpassed 30 Million systems sold if Sony weren't so stupid with the way they handled it.
No market change has damaged the PS Vita like how Sony damaged its own product.
Royal Knight Sony assumed that since "its Sony" that the Vita will sell like hotcakes and didnt bother with marketing
and the worst thing is by this failure, maybe... Sony will never make a new portable console :(
How did they mess it up? I don't own a Vita so I don't know the details. Was it the price on the Memory Cards ?
@@AArco-vc1jj The memory cards did hurt it a lot. But it's a combination of things. Lack of games (there is a sizeable library now, but it's full of jrpgs.) And the fact that Sony did not push the system.
Naaaa, the customers are tidy
>Makes an expensive machine that is so powerful for its time, it makes development of games expensive for handheld standarts;
>Forces consumers to pay for expensive proprietary Memory Card to save and install anything;
>always associated to other devices, its never its own thing;
>Never cared to make a system seller game/IP for the Vita, designed for handheld gaming, like Nintendo having Pokémon for they portable consoles since the original Game Boy;
>Abandons everything and leave it to Indie devs. You can play many of those Indie games on other systems;
>Blames Mobile Gaming for Vita's failure.
If Mobile Gaming its so harmful to handheld consoles, then how the 3DS did so well and the Switch is doing great?
Mobile gaming is garbage tho
What alot of people don't realize is, Nintendo has a monopoly on their IPs. It's the main reason their systems sell. I'd like to see sales figures for any nintendo system if some of their big IPs were multi platform. Added fact is their target audience plus fanbase for games that passed through generations. Plus the big window between their games. Infact I believe someone even did a video about this.
Because even 3DS has been much less successful than the original DS. Also Switch is not only a portable console. Vita probably launched at the worst possible time, when Switch launched the "smartphones are going to take over everything" hype had already died down somewhat. C'mon, smartphones had a massive impact on Vita's popularity...
@@mynthon0
Well yeah, but that can be attributed to the casual bubble. 3ds sales roughly equal GBA sales after all.
The main problem was games: they didn't secure fucking monster Hunter, THE system seller in Japan for the psp, and let it slip to Nintendo.
Take my vote, buddy! xD
It pays off to be a late adopter... I just got the Vita this year, used, off of eBay. And a ton of games from $5-$20. I love it!
Me too! Have fun.
But then what are you adopting? A console that's no longer supported by the manufacturer or any game development studios?
It's not late adopting. That's just a yard sale.
@-*KGB*-
Notice how you put that qualifier in there? "Great" consoles.
It's one thing to collect an NES or a Commodore 64 or a PSOne, either out of nostalgic sentiment or monetary value among collectors and antiquarians. Those respective consoles didn't fail to be profitable in their day, and only became obsolete as technology progressed.
It's another thing entirely to collect a failed product not even a decade old, and failed due to a botched unit design and marketing strategy.
Perhaps you don't notice the difference. Perhaps you don't care, as you've already said. Either way, Vita's are only being sold on cheap not because they're a bargain per se, but because the seller just wants rid, or perhaps a retailer flogging old stock. That's only my observation.
Bought one used with homebrew, a PSP emulator (Adrenaline) and 64GB of internal space. It's the first model, Wi-fi only, has some minor scratches but was definitely worth it's price. Converting the amount to dollars, I paid something around U$150.00 in late 2019. Initially I just wanted to play Child of Light on the go (got all the trophies avaliable, piece of cake), but the Hotline Miami games and the Persona series really hooked me to this little beast. Sadly, I can't use the Remote Play function due to the fact that I'm an Xbox ONE day one adopter (the PS4 is really expensive in Brazil), but both are pretty amazing systems
I've never played a vita. Might pick it up
"The PlayStation Vita may have failed, but it failed gracefully."
Well said!
No, it failed untidely.
It may have failed from a business perspective, but as a owner of the console itself, the hacking community gave its full potential. Shout out to all the communities who are still working hard on providing ports and homebrews hence keeping the console alive!!🔥
@@carldrogo9492 Nope it failed gracefully, nuff said
Vita was the Dreamcast of handhelds...
Bob Tom Definitely. The accessory port that Sony never did anything with on the 1000 model needs to be utilized by fans someday.
Vegito Charmara Exactly. That's why fans that are also modders/hackers should take advantage of it. Sony didn't know what to do with it (or the Vita at ALL for that matter). I remember seeing fan made concept art of a UMD player (to play physical PSP games) that connected via the accessory port.
Vegito Charmara Another great use for it would be to connect an external battery, similar to those special phone cases. The 1000 model's battery suffered due to the OLED screen.
rob d how did it suffer from oled each pixel in the screene could be turned on individualy meaning that black on the screen was using no power for those pixels it was actualy more efficient than other screens
@@robd9921 dude, I honestly don't know what you're talking about. My 1st gen vita gets more battery life than my DS, phone, and laptop combined (while gaming). The only thing that comes close is my nexus 7 tablet,and that's physically too large to fit in a pocket.
If only Sony stuck with the SDCard. The very high prices of the Vita Mem Cards and the fact that you required one to even use the device at lauch scared many away.
*launch
or just, you know. thier own memsticks, that they have patents for, meaning they would recieve money for every memstick sold.
Greed !
@@thebravegallade731 - The problem is, Sony's Memory Stick Pro Duo was still too slow. Not sure how good it's read/write speeds would be for Vita.
The fastest it got I think was about 50 to 60 MB/second, but that was usually the theoretical max speed.
In reality, it probably didn't always hit those speeds. Hell, MicroSD cards should get around 100 MB/second or just over and don't always hit their max speeds.
@@JediMastr80 memori stick micro has similar specs to modern sdhc.
Not that many people know it exists as the psp was the life support the memory stick format was on...
Bought a PSVita two weeks ago for 50 bucks, not regretting about it at all.
RedVGFox That's an awesome buy. I wish I had a deal like that when I bought mine. I got a decent deal on my 64 gig memory card though so I guess it's not all bad lol
good deal. giddy up. I just finished, Uncharted, Limbo, and Tearaway. I also got a Vita late in the game, and I'm scavenging for as many games as I can
Bought 1 yesterday for 35U$ :-) only thing i have to change the right analog stick :-(
Don't know where you guys are getting these, the one I bought a couple weeks ago was $200. It's in perfect condition though so maybe that's why
got mine for 75, put sd2vita in it and henkaku
actually an amazing handheld, the poor thing
also sad that no one makes games for it outside of the east now
What I find amazing is that this represents Nintendo's final victory in the handheld market after a THIRTY-YEAR war of fighting off competition and winning every single time. It took huge balls to enter their domain from everyone who tried. I liked the NGPC and the Wonderswan, I loved the GG, and I had fun with the PSP and Vita. A very sad end, all the moreso because the Vita was almost a prototype for all the things that made the Switch such a runaway success. So near and yet so far.
EDIT: Nevermind, the steamdeck is out now
Nintendo is unique company. After difficult eras has unique reflexes to outsold everything in handheld fields. If Sony and especially financial beast like Microsoft can not defeat Nintendo like Sega, then Who?
What's the Steam Deck doing besides living in the Switch's shadow? Lmfao
I actually think sony sold the schematics if I’m saying that right to Nintendo if you really think about it the vita was a hand held and can hook up to the TV. The vita also started out with the Oled screen then the led screen and the Nintendo Switch started out with the led screen and now has the Oled screen and can do basically the same thing handheld or TV
glad to see that after 3 years of this comment being out, you updated it lol, yeah Smaller companies are making handhelds, like ayn, ayaneo, etc Valve shows that there is STILL demand for a handheld that can do it all.
@@iamCifu maybe in terms of sales but otherwise it's better in every way
An incredible system with so much promise, ruined by proprietary memory cards, all in the name of combating piracy. Wonder how much money they lost vs. how much they may have lost had it used SD cards. Excellent work, BTW. You earned a new sub :)
It was also ruined by lack of backwards compatibility. So many games to play but, the system wouldn't play them, making it a waste of money to many. The PSP should have used a cartridge from the start. Then, backwards compatibility would have been easier and the system would have had more value.
TheDeathmail UMDs were a bad idea from the start so I don’t blame Sony for ditching it on the vita.
@@TheDeathmail how did it have a lack of backwards compatibility? There was a ton of ps1 and psp games that could be played on it. And UMD’s were used so they could store much more dats. Take this into comparison with the ds. A ds cartridge could only hold 64 mb, while a umd could hold 1.8 gb.
@@astralmaster It isn't backwards compability if the games are either re-released on cartridges or downloadable from the Ps Store. And yes it was a good choice to use UMD in the seventh generation but the Vita should have not gotten rid of the UMD reader even if they chose to use carts(they could've at least make a revision to add UMD compability). Also UMD only has a maximum of around 1.8 GBs of storage while the game carts had a known maximum of 4GB. It was either Sony make a new disc of the same size as the UMD or use a cartridge for the Ps Vita and we know what they chose.
They had piracy on psp . Maybe that's why they were paranoid
"It had failed gracefully"
Such an epic statement.
Miserably is a more appropriate adverb to describe that clusterfuck of a system.
Vita is a great *_handheld_* ,
Which wasn't well *_handled_* !
#LongLiveVita
#Vitaislife
#Vitaislandisstillwet
Shubham Bora that was good
Shubham Bora nice and relatable
Shubham Bora awesome lines !!!! you are a genius !!!
it isn't windows vista
@@idk-sy3iu yeah vista was laggy while vita was awesome
This video almost made me cry, man. I love this thing to bits as a gamer. Why did it suffer such an innocent fate???
Corporate greed (overpriced proprietary SD cards) and a substantial lack of marketing.
@@jerrossclarito6119 Price, Using Game cards which store less data and cost more to make despite it's predecesor using UMD and not making an improved UMD which can store more data and let backwards compability exist, lack of exclusives/First Party Games and lack of care for the Vita by abandoning the console after just two years. Also this video exists. Watch it and no memory cards weren't the only thing that fucked it.
Smartphones
Not entirely. The Memory Cards were just one nail (a big one to be sure, but not the main one).
The VITA's bigger issue were the economics behind developing for it. It is expensive making AAA level games. The 3DS got away with weaker specs since that meant it didn't the best graphics to succeed so developers could afford to make cheaper games for that. The VITA's biggest selling point was being able to play console quality games on the go, but it was too weak to run most PS3/PS4 games well but making games for the level the VITA could run was too expensive and risky given the few sales and limit the scope of the game even if it was released on PS3/PS4 as well. That meant there wasn't many games for the system which started killing it. Of course, Indie games and Sony's Cross Buy system was arguably the thing the VITA needed but that happened years too late.
Hindsight is 2020. If Sony wanted to save the VITA, it still would have been an uphill task but their better options would have been:
-1- from Day -1- get Indie creators on board. Make the VITA the destination for Indie Games and integrate them with Cross Buy from Day 1 with both PS3 and PS4 versions.
-2- Make the system cheaper. Remove the camera and touch pads if you need to. Use standard MicroSDs for memory.
-3- Go all out with ports of popular games that would work. Get Rockstar to re-release the GTA trilogy for VITA for example. The start with AC3 Liberation, Killzone Mercenary and COD BOD3 wasn't enough.
With this, I don't the VITA would sell amazing, but it likely would thrive.
I don't see anyone listing the reason why me or one of my friends never got one which is weird because I guarantee it was probably one of the biggest (bigger than any other) reasons why it sold terribly, simply because the netplay wasn't there. You couldn't play online with the 3g model and if you tried with wifi it was dogshit that was poorly optimized with little to no consideration for data so if you used it over a mobile hotspot without an unlimited (and it'd better be high speed with high end devices that can support hotspots well) plan you'd be paying an insane amount of money (which even when it worked with optimal speeds it was terrible). This seemed kinda silly because there were high demanding games on mobile platforms that took better consideration on data use and properly utilized netplay code that made playing online in a real time game actually feasible which no game on the vita at all was able to do. It seemed like the perfect time to play mobile games online and they completely missed that mark which is the sole reason I and literally everyone I know never got one
Literally could have been one of the greatest consoles of all time. Got my first vita about a month ago and let me tell you, I wish I had known about this a lot longer ago. The vita will be always respected by the true gaming community. Long live the VITA!
why dont you buy nintendo switch
The Nintendo Switch proves that handheld gaming is far from dead. If anything, it got a fresh breath of life thanks to the Switch's success and Nintendo knowing how to properly sell the system. Smartphones have nothing to do with this. It's all about marketing and good support.
Nintendo even released a survey questioning people which way they prefer to play their Switch, and it was 50% handheld and 50% docked. So there is definitely a demand for handheld systems. Whatever Sony said was obviously to shift the blame on the market climate rather than on their incompetence.
To be fair, the Vita was released during a time when people were still getting smartphones and it was strongly believed that Smartphones could replace it at the time. It's just that... nobody expect that smartphone manufacturers (or google) wouldn't do something about it (I mean, if they themselves made easy to attach controllers that would work, then many of the higher end phones would work as handhelds with only the lower end phones maybe having issues).
But instead, it was developers who we mostly never heard of before that tried to develop it of varying quality or we didn't even hear about it.
So it wasn't that smartphones couldn't kill handhelds, just that they didn't, because enough wasn't invested in it when it came to gaming. But, it probably wouldn't make them too much money in the long run.
And to be fair, the Switch has a lot of the games people wanted, and it came out when people were less wowed about Smart Phones and it had a bigger screen and just so many games that people wanted came out.
Remember, it was originally called by many a Zelda machine...
@@TheDeathmail The Vita's price worked against it; the originally announced $250 seemed like a deal, especially as that was the 3ds's original launch price. Nintendo cut it's portables price to $180 and compensated early adopters with free games, while Sony revealed that the proprietary cards were mandatory and expensive. They pulled the Vita entry price in the realm of the Xbox 360 and PS3 which both had established libraries of games by that time.
If Sony had made a few crucial decisions the Vita would still be alive and well:
- with the PSP Go Sony had the brilliant idea to include 16GB of internal storage; this would have made the initial purchase easier for many
-another Go feature was the availability of a TV Dock/charger; Sony had the Switch formula ingredients years earlier
-when the PS4 was selling like crazy, Sony should have released a PS4/Vita bundle; the PS4 has sold around 95 million + to date, I'm not saying a bundle would have magically produced the same numbers for the Vita but you would have had a larger user base than the 16 million+ it ended up with.
Switch really is more a console than a handheld. The handheld feature is more useful around the house such as playing in your bed or taking it to a friend and things like that. However true handheld gaming like in the buss or something is completely conquered by mobile gaming.
KirinFire yeah I love my switch great console and little nightmares 2 and disaster report 4 are coming out next year for it!
@@MrMarinus18 You can't compare smartphone gaming to Switch mobile gaming though. I mean what can you play on your phone? Solitaire, or some mundane flappy bird like game you can play for 5 minutes.
You can play some AAA games on your Switch. But then I can see your point. One won't invest much time in handheld gaming as much as a console/PC stationary gaming, so that's why the smartphone mobile gaming has a bigger "impact" on people lol
First thing to remember is that handhelds can be a hard sell, even Nintendo knows this. The 3ds struggled in the beginning but they continued to push it and the 3ds ended up saving Nintendo during it's Wii U era. You need to educate the public, you have to sell your product, you can't assume people are just going to run to your product because you think your awesome and then just give up when it's not working out.
Also when the Vita came out the price of memory was dropping very sharply, people expect cheap memory. Not only are there memory cards to expensive but their to small for the massive size of the games. I know they were scared of piracy and it may have been expensive to create proprietary memory cards but they backed them selves into the dumbest of dumb corners, especially since piracy on the Vita was avoided in the most part due to firmware updates and a system that was locked up tight other then the PSP side of things. In my opinion the memory cards being that expensive was a way to make the Vita look cheap while helping the company avoid taking a loss on the Vita.
The Vita could have and should have done very well but a lack of advertising, expensive memory cards, a lack of AAA first party and 3rd party games past a certain point and yeah to a degree the smartphone boom hurt the Vita. But if they would have just released a revision of the Vita that used micro SD and pushed it hard I do believe that the Vita would have been extremely successful.
Sony might not love their little red headed step child but the modding community does. The Vita is a little power house and can do some amazing things. You can even use a micro SD card with an adapter invented by a member of the modding community. There honestly has never been a better time to buy a vita. I will never part with my modded Vita.
Great video.
Very well worded comment! If you had spoken this to me I would have understood immediately. Just a few grammar errors.
There, a place. They're, they are. their, possessive.
Your, possessive. You're, you are.
Too, a lot.
I don't mean to be preachy or anything, it's just that you have really good ideas and I'd hate for anyone to dismiss what you're saying because of a few grammar issues.
*sell, and even
*its Wii U era (possessive)
it's = contraction of "it is/has"
*their memory cards (possessive)
*too expensive
*they're too small (contraction of "THEY aRE")
*themselves
*for the most part
I'm not sure what you meant by "locked up tight other then the PSP side of things." First off, it should be "than" not "then" (because it's a comparison), but secondly that's not a correct use of "other than," so I have no idea what you were trying to say there.
*powerhouse
The price really just killed it. The 3DS was only around half the price of the Vita all things considered and while the Vita was a superior system it wasn't good enough to warrant double the price.
That ending almost had me in tears. "The playstation vita might have failed, but it failed gracefully" I knew people who had them and I would always be amazed when playing them on how futuristic it was for being a handheld. Playstation really did miss the mark by giving up on it and overpricing the memory cards, but the games and community for the vita to this day are still going strong. One of the best handheld gaming and entertainment device ever made. Would have been cool to see it compete with the switch.
Honestly it is a sad waste of a console. UNLESS you mod it, if you mod it then you turn it into something worth the money lol at that point you can do a lot with it including playing psp games and n64, ps1, etc
More like crashing and burning with no games
Sony: "Is it that I'm so out of touch that I made proprietary memory that costed 3 times that average price that caused the Vita to fail?"
...........
Sony: "No, no.. its the consumers that don't want portable gaming."
Lolz they blamed it on mobile gaming which is obviously an excuse.
Meanwhile Nintendo are laughing all the way to the bank just on portable gaming
@@InhabitantOfOddworld laughing to the bank like hahaha
Vita lives on through Switch. Nintendo proved that console quality games on the go CAN work.
Psp almost proved that in 2004. Early in his life the psp had many games that were avaible on pc or ps2 or versions of that games.
@@polboss99 GTA liberty city stories and vice city stories.... Midnight Club, Star Wars Battlefront.
The PSP was a true gem.
The Switch fulfills the promise that the Vita made. Nintendo took Sony's failures with the Vita and fixed all of them.
The Vita was such a neat device. What annoyed me however was the price of memory cards, the ugly user interface and the forced inclusion of the touchpad/touchscreen/gyroscope, etc.
Great Video, Ryan!
pixelwatch I have to disagree with you on the interface. The interface is beautiful. In my opinion it's way better than the Nintendo Switch interface by a long shot. I have both and the Vita is definitely better and not ugly at all to me.
I guess that depends a lot on personal taste. It's good that you enjoy it - I want to like it, but to me it feels too colorful, too playful. I sort of like the bubbles though. Those icons were really unique.
The switch is a little bland and very "Un-Nintendo", I agree with you there.
@@tacoengineer6660 dont lie to yourself. Its super tacky while the nintendo switch interface is modern and minimalistic. It should've been like the psp and ps3 interface.
@@CristianMartinez-rg9sz I don't find it tacky at all. It's a good user interface for a handheld. Not on PSTV though. I like the Switch interface but if anything it is too minimalistic for Nintendo. The Vita seems somewhat similar to the 3DS in this way which is not a bad thing.
Same i don't like so much the vita interface, but I think it's more because of all those useless filler applications.
This was so great to watch. Has a PS Vita owner myself, I still love the platform regardless. I still toss it in my bag whenever I head out to work and in some cases I prefer to bring it with me over my Switch. It sucks that Sony didn't support it well in the west. If only they could bring some of those Asian exclusives over to the west.
Mod it, and download pkgi.
The Legend of Heroes Evolution games need to come to the West either by Vita download or PS4. Still waiting on Trails of Cold Steel 3 and 4. Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 were excellent games. Since 1 and 2 are coming out for PS4, I'm thinking they are waiting to see how well those will sell before releasing 3 and 4 in English.
It's like waiting for Rebuild of Evangelion 4.
*As a
20:00 it's kinda wholesome to hear he's a fan of his own company's products, truly believes in it.
wholesome line to end the video on. very good
I sold my PS Vita 2 years ago, but I still have 2 PSPs. PS Vita was amazing. My favourite games on it were Wipout 2048 and NFS Most Wanted
Hahah same. I loves my PS Vita for what it was but I didn't love the game selection and the very expensive mem card. I'm from South Africa and VAT and import tax is so much more than overseas. I love my PSP and ds and 3ds though. Still go back and play them all when I am in the mood. My 3ds is getting less love cause of my switch now though =P
Everyday's great at
Y O U R J U N E S ! ! !
leonthesleepy You’re not Nanako!
NANI?!
Im still stuck at that damn minecraft dungeon dude today!
JimoAiJustsunkyourship ohhh u have SOO much more to look foward to
NANAKO CHAN!!!
This video genuinely gave me goosebumps. When I first saw the vita I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread and I still stand by that though as it is one of my favorite consoles of all time. But the sheer untapped potential it had makes me really sad.
7 years later still enjoying my first vita... Hope sony will create a new handheld in the future
Me too! Got mine in 2018 December xD
I was still in high school when the Vita came out. So I didn’t have one. I would like having another option for handhelds, but I don’t Sony will ever make another portable PlayStation. With the Switch doing well it would be almost impossible to beat. Especially as Nintendo is putting all their faith in the switch, where a new PSP would still only be an after thought. The switch might end up failing as well if google Stadia and streaming games do well enough also.
@@coltonpiper6156 if switch get really good success im pretty sure sony rise up again meet fan expectation. they probably taking few step back rethink how they continue on portable.. waiting for right time maybe... STADIA lol that might be future but not all have stable internet specially for 3rd world country. to many technical problem in user side...
Colton Piper
Well even if streaming becomes amazing Nintendo will still have their reputation and IPs that no other company will have. I doubt Stadia and XCloud are gonna be good until at least the next console generation, so I think the Switch will be fine.
Sony stated they won't ever touch portable gaming anymore
Still playing my PS Vita almost daily in 2019.
I know i am a bit late but can you recommend me some story focused games (ps vita/psp)? My friend gave me his vita, and i have muramasa rebirth and persona 4. I already played gravity rush and odin sphere/dragons crown on my ps4.
That’s my man (no homo)
That's nice hehe
faruk doğan story focuses games? Um, I can’t really think of many there are more on the switch I would say I own a switch and a vita but find myself playing the switch a lot more, also little nightmares 2 and disaster report 4 come out next year for the switch
The Runaway Kid nigga why did you reply to him if you were just gonna talk about the switch
looks like its been a few years since you made this. the homebrew scene has really exploded since then
I feel like I just watched a documentary, great work Ryan!
LudiXP lucy commenting on another youtuber that I like O.o whoa... what an interesting turn of events, though im not surprised but im thrilled that you support him :)
Yeah
A documen-terry.
Clearly says ‘Documentary’ in the title.
Js..
@@pppwhat *interesting
*turn of events
*I'm
PSP succeeded because, for the first time EVER, you could play console quality games ANYWHERE! Vita did not change that, but now Sony was trying to do the "developing 2 versions of the game at once" thing. That hurt both profits, and games themselves (most notable, Sly Cooper 4). And now, it seems Nintendo did what Sony could not.
I think it worked at first since PS3 games weren't all that demanding at first,but the problem layed with late 2012 where the problem showed that Sony's top tier devs (Naughy Dog,Santa Monica,Polyphony Digital,Sucker Punch,Guerilla Games) were all so damn busy with their last PS3 titles or their biggest projects yet transitioning to the PS4 and that just made Sony realize they had to choose either compromise games to be on both or be the super dominate leader in the gaming industry. They chose the ladder of course.
Nintendo had much better marketing.
I also think that while playing console games on the go is exciting it actually isn't ideal. So when the novelty was used up by the PSP it became more a liability to the Vita than an asset. Nintendo had the same issue. The gimmicks and motion controls of the Wii made it very successful but when that novelty wore out it really was a liability to the Wii U.
Console games just are not ideal for play in less than ideal situations which you usually play handhelds in.
The 3ds just had more big games that were better suited to handheld play.
Mobile phones killed the Vita and the marketplace can't accept dedicated portables...
Nintendo: Hold my beer.
Leave it to Nintendo to make a successful portable system, regardless of the market.
@@flyingninja1234 pokepower to the rescue
@@flyingninja1234 The Switch is not a dedicated portable though. You know the market is tough when even Nintendo wasn't confident enough and had to combine it's portable and console markets
Darkhg The 3DS begs to differ, the only reason Sony said that is because they weren’t successful
@@nitinanku more like Sony didn't realize that 7th gen was a spike in console gaming in general. 3ds=GBA
I LOVED my Vita... until my incredibly overpriced 64GB memory card randomly died. Turns out to be a common problem with the 64GB cards. Someday I will hack it and use it again, but I still have some residual bitterness about how badly Sony handled things.
Hack it will give It some life
these days you can hack even without a memory card if I'm not mistaken. just do it my man, you won't regret it
I play my Vita almost every day. What a great system.
i'm still an avid user of vita, and it saddens me to see that the console didn't see the same light of day like it's predecessor. but it's eventual downfall was due to sony's bad marketing tactics and, like jack trenton said, it was a great machine, but it was too late, seeing how the world has shifted to smartphones for their portable gaming needs, amongst other issues
I play Java games during the psp era, and that didn't affect the PSP at all. Memory card price was the major reason, which made smartphones to take advantage of the cost values. Even though i don't play games on smartphones myself.
I hate the games on smartphones... id rather use joysticks and touch actaul buttons than to touch an all touch screen.. portable consoles are way better than mobile games on phones
*its predecessor (possessive)
*its eventual downfall (also possessive)
it's = contraction of "it is/has"
"PS Vita may have failed, but it failed gracefully." Kudos on that last sentence.
I don't get this whole "People have cellphones and can play games on them so handheld devices are not worth it." Mentality.
Yes phones having games are a thing, and some are pretty good. But most of the time they're time wasters. Not at the same level of a AAA handheld game that I'm willing to drop 40 to 60 bucks on.
Yea, that argument only holds true to most people who aren't gamers but want to play some casual game on their phone as a way to pass time while their bored. Despite the fact that there are ports of console games on phone app stores, it can't at all compare or measure up to dedicated gaming handheld consoles.
Yeah, freaking Switch is selling like water
That's what developers thought when the smart phones broke trought. Big name games on phone. It didn't work that well.
It has been 10 now that the PSVita was released. Playing it still today... the games on this handheld are some of the best gaming experiences I have had on a handheld system. Happy 10 Years PSVita!
my vita modded still play it great device
Using proprietary tech for the PS3 and Vita nearly ruined the PS brand. Everyone applauded when Kaz announced the price, while Kaz knew there was a catch, you could literally spend over $400 to get a Vita with Storage and a game. The deception, greed, and anti-consumerism under his watch will always be a lesson for Sony and the industry as a whole.
Thankfully they realized this, but while PS4 benefited from it, the Vita never got a second chance.
i didn't even know what a vita was let alone it existed until around november 2015. my 3DS(had since lauch) was collecting dust and i was missing my psp (go) which got lost around 2010 or 11 so i was doing some web surfing to buy a new one when i stumbled accross the vita. i was so unsure if i should get it cause of so many negative reviews saying it sucked and had no games. I caved in because it was newer and still being "supported" and i dont regret it one bit. All in all great video it felt like a real documentary. I've recently hacked my vita with H ENCORE and it has a vast library of all ps1 and psp with a little ps2 games. Also emulates one of my fav handhelds the GBA as well as N64. In time im sure the Hacking community will be able to do more to/for the vita than sony ever bothered to do. I do still hope they make a successor with all the "vita" issues fixed!
Well I found out about the Vita this year...2018..
Edited, got a original 3ds for free and original Vita, both modded.
*I (this word should always be capitalized)
*across
*because of
*don't
*a few PS2 games (countable noun)
*I'm
Sold my vita in 2015, but couldn't resist getting one again this week. Now since homebrew is available, it became interesting again.
when you get one get sd2vita
As far as consoles go, I am deeply saddened in my “gamer” heart.... 😔
This system was amazing in all areas and so many of the games on this platform were AWESOME & portable to boot. I haven’t met one person who has given this system a decent chance, not be blown away by one or more things the Vita had to display. Most were amazed by the graphics alone...., especially pre Switch. All that is simply to say that I personally love gaming on this system and will probably never let it go. Not only for nostalgic reasons but also cuz I still play this regularly and is one of the most fun systems I have ever owned. Thanks Sony and long live PSVita!!!!
I still believe Vita was an amazing platform.
I was an early adopter of the Vita but was let down by Sony's lackluster support of it. Aside from the main VIta games drying up leaving little to no incentive to hold onto it, I wanted to play PSP and PS1 games on the go but found the PSN store severely lacking in the classics department. I'm sure the modding scene picked up the slack but at the time I just felt ripped off and wanted to get rid of the thing. I also hated the back touch screen, it always seemed to get in the way and was an unnecessary addition.
Don't forget that Sony was on a very difficult situation in 2011-2014 ..
Source?
Parody account who stalks you sOuRcE?
Trying to remember what happened around this time. You talking about the NK hacks oorr...?
@@keybyss98 basically Sony was losing money. A lot of money. They looked in real trouble for a while
Great video! Much more professional than a lot of gaming documentaries I see on YT. New sub, hoping to see more like it.
It’s crazy to think what would have happened if the Vita was successful and where the portable market would be.
ATM I have the amazing GPD Win 2 (portable gaming pc) but it’s from a independent developer, but maybe there’d be a lot more powerful portable devices or even Microsoft official portable gaming PCs if the vita created a market for hardcore portable gaming.
Sony killed the Vita very sad 😢
I got a Vita for my 12th birthday back when it first came out. I’m 21 now, and my Vita still works great. I think it’s an underrated handheld. It’s got good games that are fun to play.
Just bought two Vita’s, two memory cards, and some games before the digital store closes in four months. The PSP and Vita were such important pieces of my childhood - felt like something I wanted to hold on to now that I’m older.
So happy that the Vita store didn’t close
I love my Vita. Got the week early bundle. Then the slim and Playstation TV. Great systems that had the potential to have an even better library. However, I'm still happy we got some great games on it.
Even as a Nintendo/Microsoft fan, I find it sad how the Vita flopped. It didn't deserve to get this fate. In terms of handheld gaming it was revolutionairy. I never got to own one, I did own a PSP back in the day alongside my DS and loved it to bits. I saw how cool and how much potential the Vita had over at friends' houses. The graphics were amazing, the (hope I say this right) cross play function with PS3/PS4, it had some great games as well. Did like the PSP design more. There was something about the sharp edges and the transparent shoulder buttons on the PSP that made it super sexy together with the glossy finish, the Vita was a bit too round. I kept thinking for many times I wanted to buy one myself, just to find out the ridiculous memory card prices. Currently thinking of picking one up since you can use SD cards and a lot of awesome homebrew being available for it. Interesting to conclude that the homebrew community has been on point when it comes to the Vita, but Sony hasn't.
I like to think that Nintendo took on the legacy of the Vita with the Switch, they saw the potential in console quality-games on a portable that Sony didn't quite grasp.
“Console level’ games on a portable were were always Nintendo’s thing since the gameboy.lol just the standard of what that is has advanced. Nintendo has and will always be the king of video games.
How I would’ve handled the Vita:
*Physical Design*
• No rear touchpad. Front touchscreen and cameras optional/debatable
• Focus primarily on making the Vita as much like a portable console experience as possible by having L1/R1 L2/R2 triggers and clickable joysticks for L3/R3, making it exactly like a DualShock controller. Gyroscope and microphone can stay.
• Not necessary but maybe make buttons more like ones on controller in terms of design, color.
*Functionality*
• Don’t bother with Remote Play for PS3 since it hardly even worked. Have the Vita focus on being its own console.
• When the PS4 would come around though, experimenting with Remote Play would be fine.
• No expensive memory cards - just use the old ones for the sake of costs.
• Console itself would start off at its slashed $200 price.
*Games*
• Give developers plenty of time, money, etc to develop quality games (if Resistance, CoD, ACIII, Uncharted, etc were given the same care as console counterparts with maximum replayability in mind, I think the Vita would’ve done really well.)
• Besides AAA games we got, add more to the roster such as the Bioshock that was teased, inFAMOUS, God of War, Metal Gear, Gran Turismo, maybe even a Far Cry title, etc.
Oh ps3 remote play worked lol it was just disabled on half the games for no reason. It works fine on a hacked ps3
This video made me whip out my ol' Vita 2000 and I booted World of Final Fantasy again. I own a Switch and love the console, but the Vita is incredible in its own way, always had been, but playing with it again after 2 years in the vault feels so nostalgic and almost magical how this console even existed. I use my Switch everyday, but the Vita is still my favorite handheld console to this day.
Awesome video brotha. The hard work you put in really shows.
I WILL ALWAYS AND FOREVER LOVE THE VITA FOREVER AND ALWAYS
@Sean Mondout no
One of your best videos.
Very well executed video with a tons of information about the Vita.
Great work!
The PSVita was my introduction to indie games. I remember vividly playing Hotline Miami for days on it. I couldn't put it down. It had its flaws and I would have loved to have more significant AAA games on it (like a GTA for instance), but I loved how it got recycled into an indie beast. I have many good memories of this console despite the failure.
Awesome video, I loved the documentary! Thank you.
mines modded and I love it
I can't get enough of these documentaries. Thanks for that. I will always love my Vita(s).
PlayStation should make a new one they could call it vita 2
This is the one thing I'll agree with the Vita fans on. Vita was a cool idea poorly managed.
If it wasn't for the memory cards and other b.s I would've bought one.
Man, I love this system. I’ve got the black and white OLED systems along with a PSVTV that I love to play on. For the most part they are good for RPGs and VNs, but there are so many genres that just shine on this thing. NFS: Most Wanted on the go? Yes please!
Hahahahahah I remember when people said it would outsell the 3DS
If it has more games and a cheaper memory card. It would've. I love my 3ds... But I knew the vita was so much better and stronger. I wanted it to be better. But it wasnt
Anyway. Now it’s piracy free real state
it did when they were smoking crack pricing 3ds the same price as the vita
Ron Leo Lol being stronger doesn’t make a console better. If Sony didn’t bring the games, oh well. That makes the console bad.
- Yeah well that doesn’t really matter.
The back TouchPad and lack of PS4 game versions is what really killed it. If they dropped the TouchPad it could've been $50+ cheaper, and PS4 games being on it, even if it was worse looking wouldve worked if maybe they just did a $5-10 uncharged if you own the ps4 version.
Obviously storage was an issue too, but I wouldn't be too concerned about that when there were so few games to buy. Sure, around 10 killer games by the first 2 years, but a lot of mobile type games. They really should've put PS2 games on the Vita. Would've been more than enough to have me buy it.
I never got to experience the PS Vita, and I'm honestly kinda bitter that I never got to. It's a wonderful looking platform with tons of neat little bits. Bits the switch still hasn't really gotten into.
I still wanna experience the console, but I fear I won't be able to before it's death in 2020-2021 due to financial reasons...man, just like the DS's wifi days.
Post end of life, HENkaku will save this device for current users.
Didn't help when a 64GB memory card cost more than the console
100% storage card prices and space size were to blame for its demise. I was a huge day one fan, and even slim model and PSTV. Years later I’m glad I busted it all back out and got a custom firmware installed and used micro sd storage now through the game card slot with an adapter. Such an amazing 🤩 system with mass storage space! I even sold my slim and bought back the OLED model I missed so much!
Good choice. The oled model in my opinion is the definitive version, the slim just feels cheap to me
Great video! I bought a Vita for the first time a few weeks ago. I loved my PSP back in the day but never got into Vita until recently. I gotta say, it felt a little gimmicky. The touch screen/touchpad, microphone, and cameras weren't really used in the games I tried and enjoyed. The proprietary cards are also a drawback. One thing that I simply could not stand was the user interface. The XMB on the PSP was perfect. Hence why they're still using the XMB design 15 years later. The Vita's interface felt awkward to use and the "bubbles" made it seem almost "cute". In the end, it was an innovative device and it's unfortunate it didn't do as well as its predecessor. This video ended saying the device was a failure, but throughout the video I got a sense that it really wasn't all that big of a failure. Millions of units sold. Lots of great games. Years of support. I mean, it had its run and it's coming to a close, but overall it wasn't all that bad.
gods if only you knew the absoulute spaghetti code that is the psvita home menu xD
From what I've heard, even now the PS Vita community is one of the most dedicated in gaming. Even the Vita homebrew community seems to focused less on piracy and more about native vita ports for games (such as the GTA games), emulation of older consoles, and experimenting with the hardware. (I don't actually know though, it just seems like this from my perspective as an 'outsider' who's never even owned a vita).
I’m a Nintendo fanboy and was never really interested in Playstation games but i’m also a lover for great design and damn, the PSP (any Version) and PS Vita are design masterpieces! They are soo beautiful! I like the design better than the designs of 95% of smartphones today. Sony products almost always have a timeless design. I personally think Sony is even better than Apple at designing their products.
For me it wasn’t just the memory cards that killed it, it was the markets in general. Smartphones and tablets were getting a lot better which instantly killed any kind of handheld game markets considering the type of games you can get off the App snd google play Store. Not to mention all smartphones have 3G/4g so you can play multiplayer anywhere whereas I think a lot of people probably bought the WiFi only ps vita model so you were restricted where you could play multiplayer. The weight and size of most smartphones were a bit more portable too even back then. Another thing that killed it was the type of games that were coming out. Initially there had a lot of GREAT games with high graphics for a handheld with uncharted, virtua tennis, even fifa was good for it’s time on the vita! And then all of a sudden more games were coming out that were just SO visually unappealing with these types of pixelated mini RPG style games with cartoony/anime looking characters I mean they look like games you could get on a game boy
Advance or a Nintendo system and that’s just NOT PlayStation. It’s no wonder when you factor in all these reasons it died a death.
it didnt kill the 3DS at all, the phone argument falls apart when I bring that point up
Now imagine if Sony release PS Vita 2 as a Steam Deck & Switch competitor
2024 still play vita
amazing how everyone who has owned a vita speaks highly and fondly about it. i still play mine and it opened my eyes to a world of games i would never have bothered looking into if it hadnt come out.
The music that starts playing at 21:00 makes me cry every time. It makes me think of the year 2012 to 2013 when i was excited for gaming. Great little 🎶
Memory Cards and the fact it was way ahead of its time killed it
Incredible video! it genuinely breaks my heart the Vita failed. I absolutely LOVE my Vita til this day and have owned one since launch. Sigh..... Dammit Sony!!!!
If monster hunter stayed with Sony I think Vita would've made it.
If we ever get a follow-up to the PSVITA, maybe they should include a 32GB Memory Card to go with the console then people won’t have to spend extra cash on the Memory Cards upon Purchase/Pre-order.
Not only that, include the Rear touch pad, PS5 Remote play, Wi-Fi/cloud connection, Backwards Compatibility with PSVITA, being able to play PSP games by downloading them (Since we don’t have UMDs anymore) on the console, Face ID for easy log in and certain games (Like the Rear Touch Pad was for Tearaway), special headphones for games like Minecraft and Fortnite, camera on the back for photo taking, inclusion of PSVR2, and Airplane mode like on your phone.
Not only will these features help the next PlayStation Portable console, but also combat whatever Microsoft is planning for their Portable XBOX. (If we ever get a Portable XBOX)
Realistically speaking, the next PS handheld (assuming there is one) will likely just be a PS4 Portable. Rather than have its own exclusive games, a concept that’s kinda redundant nowadays, you’d be able to log into your PSN account and natively download all PS4 games you digitally own, and also have access to PS Plus cloud streaming. It would have crossbuy and crossplay enabled both ways, basically allowing you to take a PS4 wherever you go. I’d imagine it’d also have Remote Play capabilities with PS5.
As for design, imagine the Vita, but replace the rear touchpad with DualShock 4-style L2/R2 triggers, and also with DS4-style clickable analog sticks, as well as replacing the Start/Select buttons with Options/Share. Touchscreen that would double as both the DS4 touchpad and also an alternative way to navigate the UI, which I imagine would be like either the PS4 or 5. Probably no cameras though.
@18:09
i was surprised to see he was honest and open about the reality of smartphones. instead of just going on a profit driven illusion and saying something like "yes smartphones as portable gaming platforms are good but the PSVita does it better" or something of that nature. clearly a smart person that understands the current situation at the time and makes decisions based on that.
It seems as everything that someone calls a failure actually has a use and everybody always recommends it
PS Vita still is my favorite handheld console even then I have a Nintendo SWITCH also. Persona 4 Golden, Soul Sacrifice, Gravity Rush, Muramas Rebirth, Killzone Mercenary, Hatsune Miku Project Diva F 2nd, MGS HD Collection, Summon Night 6, Ys and The Legend of Heroes series gave me a lot of great feelings and memories, that not any home console can give. I still play in my PS Vita (now I almost beat a Trails of Cold Steel II) and I still have around 15 unfinished games (I have 47 catridges in total) and after I finished them all, maybe a SWITCH will be my main handheld console.
Right on. I have quite a few Vita games to get through. It's such a great system with quality games. It's the last game console I plan to collect for.
I still have my Vita, and I admit I don't use it much, mostly because of its proprietary memory card. With all these cheap high capacity microSD cards one can buy at local retailers and online, it would have been easier for me to buy more titles and carry them with me, and continue getting more miles out of my Vita. Also, I really had hopes Polyphony had made a Gran Turismo game for the Vita, which I'd put a lot of hours to.
Closest I've got to GT on vita is either GTPSP or GT2 on my hacked vita. Awful graphics but at least it's a full GT game with dual analogue support.
I had the PSP as a kid and was so excited when the Vita came out but the memory cards killed it for me. With the money I had saved up I chose the 3DS and honestly I’m glad that happened. IMO it was the best Nintendo handheld since the GBA, which I loved. And on top of that it made me rekindle my appreciation for Nintendo after being with the PlayStation for my adolescence.
The Vita will always be a success in my eyes...it came at a perfect time in my life...disposable income and a 1st time father in 2011...this portable console was a life saver
I love earning trophies on the vira. Sooo many good and fun games.
VintageWrestling Fan just got the platinum for uncharted golden abyss myself
Fireassassin16 Awesome! I personally gave up on the platinum, because those bounty set trophies are bullshit.
rob d which bounty? I found a solution for the arcana bounty set
Fireassassin16 Arcana, Spanish Gold, and Cádiz
rob d I love it when youtube doesn't show me a response
Awesome ryan! Can you do one like this on the PSP also??
JeremyTheLakerFan arhn.eu has made psp video its "psp timewarp"
One solution SD2VITA... Best handheld in the history of man kind.
アレキサンダー 佐藤 Let's not forget the entire Homebrew system.
Omg yes. 128gb sd card with PKG. This means you have the entire PSVita psp and ps1 libraries at your fingertips just waiting to be played. Not to mention the numerous different emulators for the system.
I blame the lack of advertising, majority of the public has no clue this even exists.
I see a lot of people saying the system mainly failed because of those memory cards. I don’t think you can ignore the broader market effects in the handheld gaming space. The market for handheld games consoles was way smaller in the 3DS/PSV generation than it was in the DS/PSP and GB/GBC generations. That was because of phones and tablets.
Nintendo had spent several generations carving out a niche on handhelds, designing new games and even some IPs like Pokémon specifically for handhelds first, rather than designing games as spin-offs of home console games. Nintendo had forged an identity in consumers’ minds as a company that had good handheld games. Sony had not, so they were the ones that had to go.
Eventually handhelds as we used to know them went away to be replaced by the Switch, a genius move by Nintendo because having downgraded home console/PC games gives the console a much bigger 3rd party library than it otherwise would have, and their own first party library provides the tailored-to-Switch experiences.
Nintendo essentially fused their home console and handheld lines and have abandoned the DS size of handheld console because it can no longer provide a viable ecosystem. The people that really wanted AAA handheld gaming experiences are largely happy with the Switch and Switch Lite, and the casuals have moved to mobile and tablets.
So yes, if Sony had simply used standard SD cards for the Vita, the system would have probably sold about twice as many units, but we would have still ended up where we are today.
I don’t mind having a proprietary memory card to prevent piracy, but they could’ve made those cards closer to the price of micro sd cards
I’ve watched this along with your PS3 and PS4 documentaries over the last few days, really great series.
I love my Vita. It helps a lot if you like Japanese games but I can see why people were disappointed with the library if you were expecting AAA action games and shooters.
oh man I remember buying it for my nephew that wanted it badly... memory cards killed it. Otherwise a phenomenal portable. I on the other hand had a blast with the 3DS and n3DS with many fantastic games for it. It is still to this day the best portable ...Switch doesnt even come close imo.
It was a fantastic console that just didn't have the games to support it. The PSP had exclusive games in the GTA, God of War, Metal Gear, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Jak and Daxter, Ratchet and Clank, Dragon Ball, Resistance etc series. More than one in some cases.
The Vita had none of those. It had a exclusive Uncharted, Assassin's Creed, Killzone and Call of Duty but not all that much more.
I picked mine up again recently, and given it had a menu with pages of icons on it, a black top bar with various icons including battery and a top bar, a notifications menu, SIM card support, and a web browser that feels surprisingly really good to use with a digital keyboard that the form factor feels really nice to use, I wonder what it would have been like if they went all the way and made it a hybrid smartphone/handheld console. Not sure how it would have went but it woulda been nuts for sure