Sony no longer reporting PS4 shipments, Final Official total 117.00m

[Bofferbrauer2]

padib said:

Bofferbrauer2 said:

Okay, you want examples. Well, here you are:

Here's the problem with the games you mentioned: Only two managed over 200k sales in Japan (Soul Sacrifice and Hot Shots Golf), and you forgot about the biggest one (Freedom Wars, with over 300k). The problem is simply that this is not enough to be a killer app. Just for comparison's sake, the Wii U, which sold less than the Vita, still has 8 games that outsold the best-selling SCE Vita game, and by very large margins even. But the Wii U was an outlier with crazy attach rates, so reaching the same crazy numbers ain't necessary - just more than the Vita games achieved.

This is why I say that there's no Killer App from Sony on the Vita. Freedom Wars comes closest to being one, but it's not quite there yet.

As for the other games you mentioned, LBP Vita sold just 20k in Japan, Killzone 40k, Uncharted Golden Abyss at least a respectable 130k, and 90k for Gravity Rush. Even for a console with only 5M sales in Japan, those numbers are not enough to really push much hardware.

Another thing to not are the release dates. Most of the mentioned games came out in 2012 or 2013, so during the handheld's 2 first years. Sony themselves pretty much dropped support for the Vita in late 2013, just finishing the games that were still in development. Of course this will cut a console short. And that's despite both 2013 and 2014 were looking up for the Vita. Had they continued to support the Vita, the sales would certainly have been quite a bit higher. After 2016 sales thus just lingered around until 2020, kept alive by Minecraft and the occasional Otome VN.

Tl;dr, Sony would have needed to develop some more Japan-centric games (which would have been worthwhile since Japan was the only region where the Vita was selling at all) and support the console longer than just until the release of the PS4, and it could have achieved sales similar to the PS3/PS4 despite it's problems.

Sony absolutely could bring a successor to the Vita. Done right this time (System price and value proposition, non-proprietary memory cards, Japan-centric games, long support), and it would certainly sell north of 10M, and how much north entirely depends on well and long Sony would support the system.

Bofferbrauer, while I like your post, you offered a roadmap but didn't offer an example killer app. That was the example I was talking about. What killer app would tilt the scales?

Something that could be played in short bursts but has long-term appeal. A start of a new hardware generation is always a good moment to come up with a new IP that fits the hardware design and limitations. I haven't seen Sony doing something like that for the Vita, though.

As for exisiting IPs, a Gran Tourismo or Crash Bandicoot would have been great. Knack also would have made more sense to me on the Vita than on the PS4. And I can't understand why no Patapon on the Vita and then bringing remasters of 1 and 2 to the PS4.

This would also have added a bit more variety to the lineup, as the Vita is also a bit lacking in that department.

Last edited by Bofferbrauer2 - on 31 August 2022