Why the Vita never caught on

[Machiavellian]

Smear-Gel said:
A number of things.

Memory Cards: The Vita is pretty costly and getting the memory cards hikes up the price a LOT. It is one of the most common complaints of Vita owners even.

Games: There's a lot of indie games and ports and Japanese RPG's. Not what people expected from what was originally a "home console on the go." Why dont people buy Wii U games? Less good than other versions. Same for Vita. The amount of japan games vs western games can be seen in Japan sales vs western sales

Sony: They've abandoned it.

Memory card was the main reason it took me a long time before I purchase a Vita.  I loved my PSP but when the vita came out with those very expensive memory cards, I was like "I can wait until the price drops".  I never ended up buying one at retail but instead a person I knew was unloading one for a very cheap price.  As far as handhelds go I think its definitely one of the best.  

In the end, it was the combination of price, memory cards, marketing, support and competition from other devices like smartphones.