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Forums - Sales Discussion - Is PSP dying outside of Japan?

HappySqurriel on 14 February 2010
Darc Requiem said:
Malachi said:
Darc Requiem said:
PSP software sales have always been horrid outside of Japan. The hardware always sold pretty well until recently. Sony needs to cut the price on the PSP or it's finished.

That not true at all, look at the americain chart and you'll notice that the attach rate is much better than in Japan(that true for all console too), it has about 50 million more games sold there than in Japan with a 5 million bigger userbase. what killed the PSP wasn't piracy like so many wish to believe (like so many wish to believe that DD sale on it is anywhere good) but the lack of third party support from western developer and Sony itself(though it can be excused to have focused on the PS3 when it was in trouble).

It had good support from japenese developer at the beginning and had at least GTA when it come to western franchise. The problem was that almost all the japenese support were niche game in the west except for SE one and that no western one jumped in the bandwagon after the GTA success. The big western developer(EA,Activison,THQ,Take2) don't seem to be interested in handheld at all, they only make game that are attached to a console game(that include the 5m GTA games), except for Ubisoft which milked a few handheld franchise on the DS for a while until people caugth on and stopped buying them.

Then Nintendo started to release their massive seller and the japanese developer who wanted to sell game in the west started to jump ship(SE being the main one) which left Sony with only the like of KOEI as company that supported the PSP more than the DS. Then SONY caugth a break and one of the PSP game became a runaway hit and a system seller, only in Japan however which didn't help in the west. Then the next installement moved to console, not even their, when Capcom wanted to make it big oversea which probably killed any hope for it's ressurection in the west. SONY tried last years with a good deal of marketing even some viral one, finaly a big first party game (GT) and a remodel which actually changed something. It failed though and I really wonder what SONY next move is going to be now.

Malachi when is the last time a PSP title has charted in the Top 10 for month? Or even the top 20 for that matter. The software sales are almost always the same for the month. You'll see Wii, 360, PS3, and even DS games but no PSP titles.

Just to demonstrate your point in another way ...

While the data can hardly be called complete, the total tracked software sales of the DS and Wii in 2009 were both greater than the lifetime software sales of the PSP; and the XBox 360 wasn't that far off. When you consider that the PSP is averaging less than 1 unit of software sold per system in a given year, and only the top 7 games sold more than 500,000 units in 2009, it should be clear that the PSP has a major software sales crisis.



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Siko1989 on 14 February 2010

Sony needs to support there little baby with some 1st party support if they aint doing it already




jarrod on 14 February 2010
Darc Requiem said:

Malachi when is the last time a PSP title has charted in the Top 10 for month? Or even the top 20 for that matter. The software sales are almost always the same for the month. You'll see Wii, 360, PS3, and even DS games but no PSP titles.

It's worse than that... in the November NPD, PSP only had one game in the top 100 (and it was 1st party).



Rath on 14 February 2010

PSP has been a very good success for Sony. It's made money, established a foothold in the handheld market and allowed them to create some great franchises for portables. But it is nearly dead.

Hopefully Sony is smart enough to do the same with the PSP2, create something that actually earns money.



Darc Requiem on 14 February 2010
jarrod said:
Darc Requiem said:

Malachi when is the last time a PSP title has charted in the Top 10 for month? Or even the top 20 for that matter. The software sales are almost always the same for the month. You'll see Wii, 360, PS3, and even DS games but no PSP titles.

It's worse than that... in the November NPD, PSP only had one game in the top 100 (and it was 1st party).

Wow, I knew things had gotten bad. I had no idea that PSP software sales have tanked to that degree. If that's the case. The PSP is dead in North America already.



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gamefreak4ever on 15 February 2010
SaviorX said:
I can't believe the PSP is still $170. I just checked on Amazon since I never knew its price and Sony wants a premium!

At least the DSi is a comparable DS Lite improvement.

If I want one, I can get it cheaper than that...unfortuntely I lost the desire b/c of the software lineup..



http://www.vgchartz.com/sigs/output.php?userid=60726%5B/img%5D%5B/url%5D">

roccerfeller on 15 February 2010

Yeah, PSP is pretty much dead. Outside of MGS, for me personally there is nothing else looming on the horizon.



jarrod on 16 February 2010
roccerfeller said:
Yeah, PSP is pretty much dead. Outside of MGS, for me personally there is nothing else looming on the horizon.

I'm really curious how Peace Walker will perform.  KojiPro's been billing it as the next "real" MGS sequel (even over Rising), so I wonder if they're also expecting "real" MGS level sales?  

I think it might match MGS4 in Japan actually.



V-r0cK on 16 February 2010

Hopefully MGS PW and the new Resident Evil PSP game can help pick up the PSP as its still a fantastic handheld.



saicho on 16 February 2010
jarrod said:
roccerfeller said:
Yeah, PSP is pretty much dead. Outside of MGS, for me personally there is nothing else looming on the horizon.

I'm really curious how Peace Walker will perform.  KojiPro's been billing it as the next "real" MGS sequel (even over Rising), so I wonder if they're also expecting "real" MGS level sales?  

I think it might match MGS4 in Japan actually.

I think it would end with 550K-600K. I could be viewed as good or bad depending on the point of view.



MikeB predicts that the PS3 will sell about 140 million units by the end of 2016 and triple the amount of 360s in the long run.