... Are they big-time consumers? Soccer moms buy like 2 games a year, tops, don't they?

That's what I've been waiting for =)

@alanshearer

Though I'm not sure if "dying" is a right word, but what impur1ty said, all platforms are pirated. My take on this...

There's a common believe that piracy is source of the problem. I believe it's not, not entirely. Piracy is an effect of a bigger problem, not a cause. Usually people are reffering to PSP demography, when speaking about it's piracy.

According to John Koller's interview he gave to Wired this year, 40% of PSP demography are teens 13-17 y.o. (he didn't specify the details, but I suppose those're likely males), that's basicaly all info on PSP audience to date from Sony themselves afaik. Some people say this demography is likely to pirate since they have ability and knowledge to pirate and aren't fully independent financially, thus explaining relatively low PSP attach rate btw. That's a reasonable argument (but again some claim at the same time that "hardcore" buy more software - I'm confused)... but if PSP piracy is due to it's demography, therefore this rule also should work with other platforms, but it's not.

According to last year's Nielsen research X360 dominant age group are male teens 12-17 y.o. (>30% time spent playing among all age groups), in other words pretty close to what Koller said about PSP demography. And despite being heavily pirated, X360 is an impressive software seller, it's attach rate is considerably higher than PS3 attach rate (and we all know the latter platform has no piracy at all).

The problem with PSP is in something else than just demography that's "likely to pirate", X360 is doing well having the same people on board. What're those problems? I don't know. I assume overcrowded console market. Nowadays developers and customers have a wide range of platforms to choose from, like Wii, DS, X360, PS3 etc. PSP is literally like a fifth wheel, last choice of a developer to put a game on it, and last choice of a customer to buy something for it (not the case with Japan, since the most relevant consoles in there are DS and PSP). Other consoles are eating up PSP potential software sales, to be more precise, I reckon, those're X360 and PS3, since their dominant audiences intersect with PSP demography heavily. People are likely to spend their free money on X360/PS3 rather than PSP, while DS, yet another great software seller, unlike PSP, has an ability to differentiate oneself from home consoles with it's best-sellers aimed at wide range of ages and both sexes, unlike PSP once again.

//I see where it's going =) I'll quote myself from another thread on that matter:

"A little bit offtopic, but it's funny how the same damn argument could be used to prove opposing statements ^_^ Here's a couple of stereotypic logical chains:

a) PSP is more hardcore than DS => hardcore = computer nerds who know how to pirate games, casuals don't, 'cos they're computer retarded people => DS sells more software per unit than PSP

b) X360 is more hardcore than Wii => hardcore = more dedicated crowd to games, than casuals, hardcore people buy more software => X360 sells more software per unit than Wii"

^It's a little bit complex than that I think.

I don't think piracy is the issue. I'm sure it has an impact, but it can not be the single excuse for such terrible sales.

I think its more likely that PSP owners prefer playing other consoles. PSP used to get a lot of exclusives, but it doesn't receive as much support anymore and many of the games are lower quality ports of whats found on other consoles.

The DS is both hardcore and casual

I pretty much agree with you on this, but also It may not be as bad as it seem's

1) the PSPGo help's in stopping some pirate software effect's

2) more 3rd party indie developer's see online software for the PSP as a viable market. thus the digital download software off of PSN will help keep the PSP a viable unit because even the psp1000 on can still download those PSN PSP game's.

not saying it will spike above the DS or anything like that, but for people thinking the PSP will get dropped will be sadly mistaken, more and more ps3 and psp interactivity in software is being used not just by Sony 1st party but also 3rd party is also making use of that function.

the PSP is far from dying In my Opinion. the way i See it support has increased for the PSP not decreased.

Mai seems to have summed the situation up pretty well. With references too. Agreed.

I was their first attempt... How does that make them morons? It was a very successful attempt. Until now Nintendo had a monopoly for 20 years. Coming in and claiming 30% of the market when before you the closest the competition was less then 5% is a good thing.

Yes the PSP is dying. Its a 5 year old system. But its profitable. Its worth to keep around for a little while longer. I see 2 more years worth of life. Hell, look at Ps2 sales. Its probablly worth it to keep the psp even at those levels.

terrible sales?

what is that number need to be in order not to be terrible?

It's pretty subjective.

for one what you might think is a terrible number/ Sony or Nintendo or Microsoft may look at it that it's performing better than expected.

Nintendo has quite a number of year's experience on the handheld market over Sony did people at Sony expect for the handheld to do this well

the PSP sold 50+ million systems world wide in less than 5 year's . there's a point you have to be realistic when looking at this, the more Game system's on the market the slower the adoption rate is going to be.

think: when the psp was first released

what game system's were on the market?

I think many people are looking at this through very narrow view based on just "how one unit does v's another" i n the market

that's not a good way to look at how well something is doing in the market, because every company like's to sell more unit's no doubt

but there is a point when you look at it as being realistic on how well your product will perform against the number of other "system's" that are in the market that compete directly with a product you have.

not to mention this is Sony's direct entry into the market.

j

Do soccer moms pirate games? unlikely

Do soccer mom's KIDS pirate games?? VERY likely

to single out PSP for piracy is just... like someone already pointed out... blind fanboyism