The Vita hasn’t exactly set the sales charts of fire since its debut earlier this year, causing concerns over its long-term future.
Senior industry analyst Billy Pidgeon recently sat down with NowGamer and told them exactly what we all know – the Vita needs a hefty price cut badly:
Although the hardware is high quality, Sony may need to follow Nintendo’s lead and cut price drastically next year if the installed base remains below five million or the platform will not be viable for publishers.
Pidgeon raises a valid point – with the current Vita sales, it’s difficult to see high profile 3rd party releases like Assassin’s Creed: Liberation, and Call of Duty: Declassified continue releasing for the Vita in the future. PSLS recently shared a similar view on one of our Daily Reactions.
Billy Pidgeon then talked about how the Vita should adapt to fit in with the smartphone market, suggesting a service akin to what PlayStation Mobile hopes to achieve:
Also the proprietary memory cards for PS Vita are prohibitively expensive. There should be more downloadable software, including inexpensive or free games, and these must be higher quality than popular iOS and Android games. It would in fact be helpful if the best and most popular smartphone and tablet games were also available for download to PS Vita.
Mr. Pidgeon isn’t particularly negative about the Vita in general, though, but he does believe sales could be more healthy:
PS Vita sales are improving, but could be much stronger. The software library is improving – there are some very good triple A third party exclusives like Persona 4 Golden and Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation, and there are some very good downloadable titles like Sound Shapes and Escape Plan – extending PlayStation Plus subscriptions to PS Vita also helps to add value.
Do you believe a large Vita price cut akin to Nintendo’s sudden $70 price reduction on their latest portable console will make Vita competitive with the 3DS, or is Sony’s second portable gaming console doomed to just struggle on? Sound off in the comments.
