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greenmedic88 on 09 October 2012
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The perceived value doesn't currently match the price.

No question about it; the device is appropriately priced (until you add either a 16GB or 32 GB memory card), but it's not a substitute for any other device most consumers already own.

It's almost exclusively big gadget fans, big Playstation fans, etc. who are buying them and that's a fairly limited niche market compared to the overall mobile gaming space.

If more of the core franchises on the PSP (which were limited compared to those on the DS) transitioned over to the PSV, more current PSP users would follow, but this simply hasn't been the case as of yet. Sales in Japan show that there are simply more games still being released for the PSP currently (in the market where it sold best), making it a fairly pointless upgrade given the entertainment value/price ratio the PSP still holds.

And of course, the shift in the mobile games space towards low priced, downloadable games with less depth, but enough entertainment value for the average mobile gamer isn't going to change, placing the PSV in more or less the same position as the PSP five years ago as a smaller niche market device targeted primarily at the smaller pool of mobile gamers who want a deeper "console experience" on the go.

As an owner, I'm aware of the irony that the games I probably spent the most time playing on the PSV, were the smaller PSN titles best suited for shorter playing sessions, much like the one's I've been playing on the iPad. The thing is, the games on the iPad are still a lot cheaper than DD games on the PSV (even if the overwhelming majority of them still aren't as deep), and more importantly, I'm always using the iPad anyway for general purpose tasks that I used to do on the laptop, making it a lot easier to open up a quick game session of whatever on the iPad in between.

Do I prefer the additional physical controls? Absolutely. Am I going to carry a dedicated portable anywhere because of them? No way. At this point, the 3DS and PSV are the middle children; turned on only when I want to play a substantial gaming session for a game that's not on any of my consoles (which have laid dark more and more since this year). It would take a pretty addictive game to get me to take either device anywhere with me, and that's something currently lacking on either device.