The PSP has been delayed! From
Games Are Fun:
Quote:Posted by
Luke Campbell at 03:20:54 PM EST on 02.25.2004.
Couldn't wait to see whether Sony could cut into Nintendo's stranglehold on the portable market? The wait's going to be a bit longer now, as Sony has announced the delay of their PSP handheld; while the PSP will still launch in Japan during this year's holiday season, US and Europe retailers won't see it until 2005. However, the delay is not a very long one: the system is still expected to ship globablly before the March 2005 end to this fiscal year.
"The reason we pushed it out here is we wanted to be sure there's a reasonable amount of software titles to launch with hardware," said Teresa Weaver, a spokesperson for Sony Computer Entertainment.
Sony systems have typically shipped earlier in Japan and then hit other regions later, and analyst P.J. McNealy says, "With many of the roots of the gaming industry being in Japan, it's traditional to pay homage and release a hardware product there first and then release in the U.S., even though the U.S. is a bigger market."
Either way, this development could allow Sony's loss to become Nintendo's gain: with no direct competition, Nintendo can either keep the $99 GBA SP price point in effect, or lower the price to attract an even larger userbase before the PSP takes flight. this may also allow Nintendo to release their DS handheld without playing second fiddle to the PSP.
So how many games does Sony want for its PSP? Electronic Arts reportedly plans on having 8-12 games ready to go for the PSP launch, and THQ has stated 2-3 titles will be available, so third parties are making an effort to give the PSP a sizable library right from the start. Could we end up having too many PSP titles to choose from? That would be a welcome problem for consumers, no doubt.
The launch price has still not been clarified, but it rumored to be in the $199-249 price range. We will know more as E3 nears, so stay tuned!
Source: CNN
I bet Nintendo is estatic right now. If the DS comes out on time it won't have the PSP to be compared with.
That's assuming Nintendo releases the DS on time... :D
Still, very good news. I predict GBA price drops... and the DS well might be out before the PSP. Maybe not, but if Nintendo was smart they'd come out first. That is if they have good games ready for it...
*adds PSP to list of handhelds killed by Nintendo and GB"
Okay so it isn't that bad, but it still isn't very good for Sony.
It certainly gives Sony a slightly shorter head start. If Nintendo can release the next Gameboy no later than fall 2005 then Sony shouldn't eat up too much of their market.
Um, the DS in late '04 and another GB within a year? Oh sure they call it the 'third pillar' and 'not a Game Boy' but in all likelihood it'll have GB compatibility... doing that would kill the DS. Not a good idea at all.
Nintendo claims that the DS is NOT a replacement for the Gameboy line and that there is a new Gameboy in development. I doubt the DS will do very well, let alone take over the GBA's market share.
Yeah and they claimed the GC wasn't a competitor with the PS2 too, but did they release another one that "was" a year later? Didn't think so.
Yeah but they always maintained that the GC was the succesor to the N64 and their next home console. The DS is a "third pillar", or so they say. Not a replacement for any current Nintendo hardware. Just something weird that shouldn't interfere with the GBA or GC.
But it's a handheld! Sure it's not a GBA competitor supposedly but releasing the GBA too close to it would be sheer idiocy. They want it to have a chance to grow on people you know...
You're really not getting this whole "third pillar" thing, are you?
My point is they need to give the DS time to establish a market, and grow in opinion, as they have said, and releasing the next GBA too soon will ruin that I bet... and anyway between the GBA and the DS I see even less of a reason to hurry the next GB.
Nintendo has made it very clear that the release date of the next Gameboy will not be affected by the DS.
They also have not said anything about the next Game Boy. :)
Yes they have. They said that it's in development and that the DS will have no affect on it.
You know how Nintendo is. They don't like to hype things up until the last second.
True... but still...
We'll see. But I'm betting '06.
No it wouldn't. It would be better.
And I didn't say a time in '06.
I wouldnt get the PSP untill it has some decent games namely Final fantasy ,I wonder if blizzard will port LV ,RRR, BT to the PSP?
I wonder if they will make a Granturismo PSP game and Jak and daxter?
Quote:I wonder if they will make a Granturismo PSP game and Jak and daxter?
They'd be stupid not to.
A Black Falcon Wrote:No it wouldn't. It would be better.
And I didn't say a time in '06.
Yeah, Sony having a one-plus year head start would be
wonderful.
Yeah, I don't see how that could be better.
Well it would let a portable system as poweful as a PS2 by the no.1 video game company fend off against a portable system as powerful as an SNES and another one with two screens... two screens of FUN!!!
One screen is for gaming the other is for monitoring your Brain waves.
Or your Bo Jackson factor!
Bo Jackson!! Wooo!!
Or it could be a mind-control device which will brainwash the children of America into buying Nintendo products thus fulfilling Nostradomus's final prophecy when he said "...I wish I had a time machine so I could into the future and buy a Nintendo DS" which may or may not have been a reference to the Nintendo DS that will be released near the end of this year though we can assume that it probably is since Nostradomus is a pretty dependable guy and he probably wouldn't say anything unless he thought it was really going to happen although there those several thousand times when he said that the world was going to end really soon and then it didn't, but I'm sure that aside from that and perhaps a few other things he probably has never said anything that wasn't completely 100% psychically accurate...that's what he told me anyway, you agree right?
See you're just the kind of person Nintendo was talking about when they talked about that 90% that will have to be convinced... :)
What?
OB1's pessimism about the DS...
Yeah right, like there's one single person at TC who thinks the DS sounds really amazing.
Thing is, I don't care that Nintendo thinks it's just a 3rd pillar (and no, they don't think that, which is why, from what I've heard, it'll be GBA compatible). It's what the BUYER thinks it is that matters. They will think it's the new Gameboy. They won't think of it as a 3rd unrelated market just because Nintendo tells them to. I don't even think that. Seriously, Nintendo must consider us idiots to buy into this whole "3rd pillar" thing.
I'll only add this. Why two screens again? I can think of many things an added screen can do, but not a single one of them is something that merely having a larger screen with the same size as the two screens put together can't do.
Well... you would be right but I think that Nintendo thinks that they know what the buyer wants more than the buyers do themselves, you know... but yeah it would be kind of odd to have two handhelds at the same time. As you say people will be confused... they won't look like seperate markets to just about anyone. So releasing the next GB soon would be very, very stupid.
As for why two screens... um, I guess it's cheaper to make two than one giant one?
That's a possibility I considered, but I believe the mount for the second screen, the seperate attachment cabling inside the system, plus some other stuff, would make that second screen more expensive. Then again, I don't know enough about screen making to know if there's actually some sort of exponential growth in price when increasing a screen's size. Maybe it's something like when the size is doubled, the price in making is quadrupled, which would explain it. Another thing that would help me understand it was if you could actually move the screen around the "main" screen, so you could make it vertical or horizontal if needed. They don't do that though, and I also realized if they wanted to do that, they could simply have the one huge screen alternative be having that huge screen be rotatable.
ABF, your comment that I "WOULD be right except" doesn't make much sense to me. I said I don't CARE what Nintendo THINKS, so them thinking they know us better than we know ourselves doesn't really matter as to whether or not I'm right does it? I'm not saying "they won't do this because", I'm just saying "they are stupid because".
Quote:Thing is, I don't care that Nintendo thinks it's just a 3rd pillar (and no, they don't think that, which is why, from what I've heard, it'll be GBA compatible).
You don't care that they think it's a third pillar, but they don't think that it's a third pillar?
That sentence didn't make any sense.
Right now we don't know
what the buying public will think of the DS, so you can't say that they're just going to go "hey it's a new Gameboy!". We barely know
anything about the system, just that right now it sounds kinda dumb. Nintendo is constantly saying that it's a third pillar which will not interfere with the Gameboy market, so until we get further information we'll just have to take their word for it. I'm skeptical, but won't get ahead of myself here.
What I mean is, I believe Nintendo is just saying this whole 3rd pillar thing as marketting. I don't think the makers actually consider it a 3rd pillar. I accuse them of lying to us about what they think it is. That's what I mean.
For that matter, since I'm fairly sure this 3rd pillar thing is marketting, I won't pay a lick of attention to it. Seriously, it's a portable system. Why would the public think it's anything but another Gameboy? It would have to look so incredibly different from the GB that it actually LOOKS like a 3rd kind of system to really make people think that. I believe the last time they did that was with the um... virtual boy... No that's not a comment about how this will be a failure because of that, because I don't think that. I'm just saying it would have to be on THAT level of difference to really make someone think it's something totally different from a Gameboy. I'm talking from a customer's viewpoint because that's who's opinion will matter, not Nintendo's.
Now maybe it WILL look so utterly different that it'll just have to be considered a 3rd kind of system, and honestly there's a decent chance of that, but I'm leaning towards it basically looking like an SP with a second screen on the side.
Quote:What I mean is, I believe Nintendo is just saying this whole 3rd pillar thing as marketting. I don't think the makers actually consider it a 3rd pillar. I accuse them of lying to us about what they think it is. That's what I mean.
Well it's too early to tell. We'll see just how weird it is come E3.
Quote:For that matter, since I'm fairly sure this 3rd pillar thing is marketting, I won't pay a lick of attention to it. Seriously, it's a portable system. Why would the public think it's anything but another Gameboy? It would have to look so incredibly different from the GB that it actually LOOKS like a 3rd kind of system to really make people think that. I believe the last time they did that was with the um... virtual boy... No that's not a comment about how this will be a failure because of that, because I don't think that. I'm just saying it would have to be on THAT level of difference to really make someone think it's something totally different from a Gameboy. I'm talking from a customer's viewpoint because that's who's opinion will matter, not Nintendo's.
Well maybe it is incredibly different in a VB-kind of way. Nintendo hasn't even mentioned just how portable the system is.
Quote:Now maybe it WILL look so utterly different that it'll just have to be considered a 3rd kind of system, and honestly there's a decent chance of that, but I'm leaning towards it basically looking like an SP with a second screen on the side.
I think it'll be very big for a handheld. That's my hunch.
DJ, you're probably right that the "third pillar" thing is more marketing than anything else. I mean, this is a portable system. Okay, it might be a bit bigger than your average handheld... actually that could be their point -- it's too big to fit in a pocket or something like a GB so it's not a true portable and it's a 'third system'? Hmm... maybe... but still it IS a portable so as such it WILL be compared with other handhelds. Nintendo knows this and will undoubtedly prepare for it as such. It'll defintely be bigger because it'll have two screens (supposedly close together so having one be able to be moved is doubtful...), and that will also cut the battery life as will other things like 2 cpus, but it'll still crush the PSP for battery life... but as for if it'll be really different in some way or if it's just pure marketing-speak to differentiate this thing from the Game Boys, we'll have to wait and see.
*jots that down on his list of things that Sony has stolen from Nintendo*
It's a long list.
Haha, I know. Miyamoto even joked about how he's sure Sony will copy the connectivity idea last E3.
I don't like the idea of having to buy two versions of the same game though. Why not just to it like it's done with the GB Player? Play the game at home on your PSP player, then take the game with you on the road. No need to buy a PS2 and PSP version of the same game.
Forget what I just said if that's only a rumor.
PSP Player? Why, if they can get you to buy the game twice... :)
Hmm... I missed this... Gamespot's rumor article here pointed them out.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/2004/02/20/...89802.html
Well if this is true, OB1, you should be very happy.
http://www.the-magicbox.com/game021604.shtml
Quote:- UNCONFIRMED: Sony has allegedly finished the prototype of PlayStation Portable, it is reported that the rechargeable battery can last for 10 hours, but the finalized version will have a longer lasting battery. The PSP is tentatively scheduled to launch in Japan on December
This one is a lot less surprising. The PSP will evidently ship without the WiFi or MP3 playback, which will be added later as updates... oh and they're assuming that it'll be able to play straight PS2 ports because they think you could use the same savegames for the PSP and the PS2 and just transfer them over to your PS2 when you come home... and games will include both PS2 and PSP versions in the box, supposedly.
http://www.pspinsider.com/modules.php?na...cle&sid=51
Quote:New Features and Concerns
Posted on February 16 by Josh
Topic: News
I was sent some information today from a reader who has been involved in a focus group for the PSP. There are some interesting statements made by Sony during this particular focus group, which causes, at least me, some concern. Namely, some features which have been included on the spec sheet may not be included at time of purchase. Here is what we have learned…
* The user will have the ability to save progress on the PSP version of a game, and continue the progress on the PS2 version of the same game (and vice versa). So if you own both the PSP and PS2 version of a game, you can use the saves on both versions.
* Sony mentioned that they may sell a bundled package of both the PSP and PS2 version of the game to save the user cost in using this feature.
* Some of the features mentioned on the specs sheet may not be available until after launch. Mentioned in particular was the WiFi and the ability to play MP3s.
Those of you who follow other Sony news will recall that something similar to this has happened recently with the PSX (released in Japan). The uber-PS2 was not shipped with all features, and was just recently upgraded to spec with a firmware upgrade. While I do not like the fact that some promised features won’t be activated until a future date after launch, I do understand that Sony wants to get this device out on the market before the holiday season. We'll keep you updated when more information becomes available.
Thanks goes out to JiggaWhat for the info.
It's still just rumors, of course, but given how few facts Sony is giving out it's all we have to go on...
Well I'm not too surprised seeing as how we've never been given a confirmed battery life number, which I TOLD YOU AT LEAST TEN BILLION TIMES BUT YOU REFUSED TO LISTEN TO!!
They said three hours in some press release or something like that about a year ago. Things change though.