At what level does the Vita become a success?

[DucksUnlimited]

JWeinCom said:

DucksUnlimited said:

JWeinCom said:

DucksUnlimited said:

Salnax said:

Now that there has been another round of news for the Vita, including a $50 price cut and more indie game announcements, people are arguing whether the Vita can become a success.

My question is: "What exactly is success for the Vita?"

For 6 years, from 2005 to 2010, the PSP sold from about 9 to 14 million units a year. Not a bad sum, and the PSP was largely a success.

Does the Vita have to reach the same high standard? Bear in mind it only sold 3.6 million last year, and is under 1.4 million in 2013 so far.

Could a lower bar like, say, 7 to 10 million a year for a few years be enough to make it a sucessful platform? Should it aim lower?

Does the very fact that the Vita is still on the market make it a success?

Does it have to beat the 3DS?

Is it enough to be sucessful in only one or a couple of markets?

Does being profitable make it a success?

 

I'm asking this because, from where I'm standing, I don't understand some of the optimism around the platform. I suppose that the Vita can succeed, but I'd like to know what that means before arguing the point.

That's the only one that matters.

Not really.  I mean, yes profit is the point, but it's also a question of how much profit it makes.  If the Vita makes a profit of a million dollars over a life of five years, that's not a success.  I mean, sure they made a million dollars, but they could have made far more money investing in other activities.  Simply being profitable isn't enough.  

By that thinking nothing is a success, because there's always the possibility that a company could have invested in something different and made more profit.

You can't know that something was absolutely 100% the best investment, but you can take a reasonable guess.  To make things simpler, lets use games as an example.  Let's say that Sony earns an average of 20 million dollars for a game they spend 50 million dollars creating.  So, if they make a game for 50 million dollars, and only make 5 million dollars on the investment, then they know they made a poor choice.  It's not an exact science, but companies know how much of a return they should be getting for whatever amount of money they spend.  

To give an extreme example, lets say the Vita ends up profiting $1 dollar over its life.  While Sony may not know exaclty how much they could have made on that investment, they know for sure they could have made more than a dollar.

Even if it only made a dollar, it would still be a success (albeit an extremely minor one). You're arguing that something isn't a success because something more succesful could have been made. That doesn't make the initial investment a failure, just less of a success.