Sony Did Sony leave the handheld market?

[GameDadGrant]

Conjuring my @CastletonSnob energy here....

 

Did Sony leave the handheld market? Or did they get their collective asses kicked by Nintendo and *HAD* to leave the market? 

[gamer.tv]

They failed out of the market 

[Zaku3]

2 minutes ago, gamer.tv said:

They failed out of the market 

 

Ya. The market contracted and they were the odd man out. Not quite hitting "console quality games", poor 1st party support, expenive memory cards, the PSP getting as big as it did in part due to piracy, western companies abandoning handhelds, all hands on deck for the PS4, and Lord knows what I am missing doomed the Vita.

[stepee]

Judging by the first party support Vita received after like the first 6 months I’m going to say that Sony left it themselves.

[Keyser_Soze]

I think they just forgot they were in the market and kind of let it die off.

[Bacon]

"Let's make the best Handheld Console ever and then just throw it in the trash."

-Sony 

[Paperclyp]

They didn’t understand what they should have been doing. And it’s a shame. 

[Biggie]

Nintendo is the handheld market. Trying to go against the DS/3DS was a bad business decision. 

[Zaku3]

18 hours ago, Biggie said:

Nintendo is the handheld market. Trying to go against the DS/3DS was a bad business decision. 

 

The PSP did well enough but the market contracted due to smartphones and Sony was the odd man out. 

[Mr.Vic20]

No. That would require the Vita to have died, and as we know, Vita is life! 

[Brian]

Did they? Gonna be playing GoW, Days Gone, and HZD on the Deck

[Zaku3]

27 minutes ago, ManUtdRedDevils said:

Did they? Gonna be playing GoW, Days Gone, and HZD on the Deck

 

Deck and handheld PCs best Sony handhelds ever.

[stepee]

29 minutes ago, ManUtdRedDevils said:

Did they? Gonna be playing GoW, Days Gone, and HZD on the Deck

 

Deck already has better support from Sony than vita ever did. Uncharted is coming too and who knows what else is coming.

 

Definitely anyone still dreaming of Sony coming back with a handheld should abandon all hope. I think vita was their last shot, timing wise.

 

Now I especially do not see a place for them. You have Nintendo who releases the main go-to handheld with franchises people specifically want a handheld for.

 

And the Switch 2 unless they go crazy with under powering it should be able to take ports of current gen just fine. The returns are diminishing on a tiny screen and the scalability of where resources are these days is much more accommodating to porting down. I can’t imagine the mass market caring how powerful a Sony handheld was in comparison if they didn’t care too much outside of Japan with vita/psp when it actually mattered as far the actual types of games they could produce.

 

For the niche enthusiast market you now have Steam Deck which is a better platform for enthusiast level and can be updated on a more constant cycle. 
 

Sony has no place in the handheld market and even if they did support the vita I don’t think they would have lasted much longer.

[HardAct]

On 4/10/2022 at 9:14 AM, Bacon said:

"Let's make the best Handheld Console ever and then just throw it in the trash."

-Sony 

Though not in the Switch class, I agree with you statement. It's an amazing console and I'd love a VITA2! We'll never get it but one can wish...

[HardAct]

1 hour ago, stepee said:

 

Deck already has better support from Sony than vita ever did. Uncharted is coming too and who knows what else is coming.

 

UNCHARTED: Golden Abyss

    I LOVED THE UNCHARTED game that released on Vita. It used the consoles features very well, ie the back touch screen etc. Great game. I had it on cartridge so it's lost now but a fun game many whom like the Uncharted game aren't really in the know. Not paying 69.99 to replace it. I have a Replacement Vita now but not a single game on cartridge, sucks.

[Zaku3]

6 minutes ago, HardAct said:

UNCHARTED: Golden Abyss

    I LOVED THE UNCHARTED game that released on Vita. It used the consoles features very well, ie the back touch screen etc. Great game. I had it on cartridge so it's lost now but a fun game many whom like the Uncharted game are really in the know. Not paying 69.99 to replace it. I have a Replacement Vita now but not a single game on cartridge, sucks.

 

I don't even think there is a vita emulator to recommend for the deck. 

[stepee]

40 minutes ago, HardAct said:

UNCHARTED: Golden Abyss

    I LOVED THE UNCHARTED game that released on Vita. It used the consoles features very well, ie the back touch screen etc. Great game. I had it on cartridge so it's lost now but a fun game many whom like the Uncharted game aren't really in the know. Not paying 69.99 to replace it. I have a Replacement Vita now but not a single game on cartridge, sucks.

 

I did beat that, it was pretty good! It was such a weird system, it actually had a really nice launch and it just all stopped before it even had a chance.

[Fizzzzle]

I think the vita just hit at a bad time. No one (at least outside of Japan) was really looking for a handheld powerhouse handheld. 

[thedarkstark]

Downvote

[DPCyric]

On 4/10/2022 at 11:15 AM, GameDadGrant said:

Conjuring my @CastletonSnob energy here....

 

Did Sony leave the handheld market? Or did they get their collective asses kicked by Nintendo and *HAD* to leave the market? 

 

Yes they left the market the day they released the Vita didn't talk about it again after that...

[DPCyric]

21 hours ago, Fizzzzle said:

I think the vita just hit at a bad time. No one (at least outside of Japan) was really looking for a handheld powerhouse handheld. 

 

No Sony totally mismanaged the Vita they put it out there and never talked about it after launch I remember several big events the first year it was out where they barely acknowledged it's existence.

[HardAct]

38 minutes ago, DPCyric said:

 

No Sony totally mismanaged the Vita they put it out there and never talked about it after launch I remember several big events the first year it was out where they barely acknowledged it's existence.

Shame,

   Really was an amazing console. I doubt there's much room for another handheld out there now with the Monster that is the switch and the Steam Deck taking up the high-end side. I'd buy a Vita 2 day one, or any handheld brought out by Microsoft too. Really have been playing my switch much more recently since I got the Online Booster what ever it's called. Some real JEMS in there Nes, Snes, and N64 titles

[TwinIon]

Sony left.

 

Yes, the Vita was a failure, but they absolutely could have continued if they wanted to. It's not like they failed so badly that they could never have recovered. During most of the Vita's lifespan, Sony was again the dominant player in the console hardware space. Also, they remain Sony, a multinational conglomerate that could easily decide to throw significant resources at a product space should they wish to without risking the future of the company.

 

The failure that Nintendo had with the WiiU was so much worse than what Sony had with the Vita, but they continued on just fine, and all their money comes from games.

 

The failure of the Vita coincided with the increasing ubiquity of smartphones and Nintendo's refocused efforts in portables, leaving Sony a diminished opportunity in the portable market. Sony could easily have weathered more than one Vita level failure in the portable space if they thought that's where the opportunity was, but I think they were smart not to chase it.

 

If you want an example of a big company really failing in a market so completely that they had no real choice but to leave, look at Microsoft and smartphones.