A year into the life-cycle of Sony's „wonderbar“, also called PlayStation Portable, many assumed the multimedia all-rounder couldn't win the fight against the tremendously successful Nintendo DS. Especially after the Nintendo DS Lite hit the market, it was all but looking good for the PSP. One big failure of the console was UMD. Though being supported by almost every major Hollywood studio, the format just didn't kick off the way Sony hoped. After all, playing games from the handheld's memory stick was – and still is – just more comfortable and sleek and that is even more true when talking of movies on the go. Who is crazy enough to actually buy a flick twice, once on UMD to watch on the go and once on DVD/Blu-Ray to consume at home, when ripping the film from the DVD to your PSP is such an easy thing to do!?
Another huge problem was – and again, still is – the PSP's lack of software. Games suddenly stopped coming. There were literally months where we did not have a single, half-way decent PSP title hitting stores.
But Sony is a long time industry veteran who helped build the console market to what it is today, and one of their systems being a failure was simply not something they would have let happen easy. Sony did the only smart thing they could have done: They re-designed the PSP and released a new, more sleek, more shiny and lighter version of the gadget called PSP Slim and Lite.
What followed was a gigantic PR-campaign (PSPs were suddenly in every TV show, movie and commercial out there) which forced the good looks of the system into every kid's brain in the US, Japan and Europe.
Although the system is still not being flooded by new games, the software drought seems to have been beaten and one can expect to see a pretty cool new title now and then being released (Sam just yesterday reviewed the fantastic Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero? Head over there NOW and check it out!). In my opinion – and I like to think everyone else agrees with me on that – this quality over quantity concept is unique in a good way. Nintendo's DS is really “suffering” from a gamer's perspective (of course Nintendo wouldn't agree...): Hundreds and hundreds of crappy titles being released every month doesn't make it easier for the average consumer to figure out which one is worthy enough of being spent thirty bucks on.
Coming to an end - a rather happy one that is: SCEE is more than happy to announce over 50 million (!) sold PSPs worldwide starting from its release in December 2004 until January 2009. If that ain't success, then what the heck is I ask you?
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