[QUOTE="drphizzle0"]

Have fun buying your car new for the rest of your life.

You know, because buying a used car from a car dealer is stealing from the manufacturer.

 

This made my day.  Thanks!

Cranler

Umm, no.

How would the number of owners of an existing car not affect the car manufacturer in the same way?  If the car is changing owners, then transactions are being made that do not go towards paying the car maker. This is the exact same concept as the used games market that people are whining about.

Used games can have scratches, potential wear in the booklets and cases (or sometimes missing completely), and if the console is deprecated, the manufacuterer doesn't even make the game anymore. If you never use a car, it won't depreciate.  If you never use a game, it won't depreciate.

I bought a pre-owner Atari as a collector's item a couple of months ago.  Does that mean I'm stealing from Atari, who doesn't make the console nor the games anymore and hasn't for years?

You mentioned cars are built to last a certain mileage. Yes, so what's stopping developer's from embedding their own form of depreciation on the video games their company is selling, such as a usage limit?

Have fun buying your car new for the rest of your life.

You know, because buying a used car from a car dealer is stealing from the manufacturer.

This made my day.  Thanks!

[QUOTE="drphizzle0"]

I don't think it can be saved. The niche and configuration of the Vita is fundamentally flawed and they cannot bounce back unless they change the handheld itself.

Considering this was developed in an attempt to bring a console experience to a handheld, here are the underlying issues as I see it:

1. The Vita is NOT as powerful as a PS3, thus most of the games developed for their flagship console cannot be ported to the handheld.
2. Because of #1, the only existing franchises that can arrive on the Vita are ones that are custom made for the Vita. This means slimmed down, half-assed versions. Think COD declassified and AC Revelations.
3. The handheld further buries itself by incorporating hardware gimmicks like the touch panel, accelerometer, and touch screen. This means even if a game CAN be ported, the additional development to use these features results in half-assed implementation. Seriously, was the log balancing in Uncharted necessary at all?
4. The game uses proprietary memory cards which are severly overpriced. This is more of a barrier to entry than a lock-in strategy at the moment.
5. More broadly, the handheld doesn't try to fill a market gap or offer something that consumers were ever asking for. In a world where tons of handheld gaming is on mobile devices, Sony needs to find a way for consumers to justify owning another electronic device that can do things that a mobile phone cannot do.

I think the Wii U will be in a slightly similar situation but not nearly as severe, especially in the realm of popular third party support.

You cannot fix a fundamentally flawed product without coming out with a new one. Hopefully, they've (Sony) learned from this.

p4s2p0

I don't think you understand the points I was trying to make, and comparing to PSP does not paint an accurate picture. When the PSP came out, there was no other handheld that could play graphically intense games. People didn't do their casual gaming via mobile phones like they do today. In fact, 'd argue that the issue IS with using a PSP type of strategy when the handheld market and landscape are completely different now. The handheld gaming phenomenon has changed entireley and putting out a beefier verion of the PSP signals that Sony is not listening to the market nor making the type of case it needs to make as to why someone should buy it.

Mobile developers win these days. Why? Because anyone with a smartphone is already an owner of that "handheld console" needed to play the game. It completely cannibalizes the otherwise separate electronic device needed to handheld game. The PS Vita does not have that luxury, and actually has that going against it because people now have to justify the purchase of another electronic device to game. This creates a barrier of entry. In that regard comes justifying the price of a 40-50 dollar slimmed down variation of the actual game. How is that EVER going to sustainable success?

Consoles are the other end of the spectrum, where they tend to get the AAA games. This leaves a horrible middle ground where the PS Vita lives alone. Eveyone keeps stating "needs more AAA games". Oh! Why didn't I ever think of that?! Sony, the vita is saved! Maybe because no one is going to develop a AAA game for a handheld that is failing to sell, has proprietary controls, and cannot play the same graphical intensity of the console games for which they are already developing. Of course having AAA games will help, but knowing the answer is NOT the same as getting there.

My personal thought was that the PS Vita needs to cannabilize the console. Therefore, in the same way smartphones have cannabilized handhelds, the PS Vita will be a lot more attractive in that:

1. You can justify the cost of paying for the handheld, since it incorporates the cost of owning a console as well.
2. Games, true AAA games, have an easy entry point to the handheld. No more graphical purgatory.
3. Full-fledged, console experience multiplayer on a handheld.

I don't think it can be saved. The niche and configuration of the Vita is fundamentally flawed and they cannot bounce back unless they change the handheld itself.

Considering this was developed in an attempt to bring a console experience to a handheld, here are the underlying issues as I see it:

1. The Vita is NOT as powerful as a PS3, thus most of the games developed for their flagship console cannot be ported to the handheld.
2. Because of #1, the only existing franchises that can arrive on the Vita are ones that are custom made for the Vita. This means slimmed down, half-assed versions. Think COD declassified and AC Revelations.
3. The handheld further buries itself by incorporating hardware gimmicks like the touch panel, accelerometer, and touch screen. This means even if a game CAN be ported, the additional development to use these features results in half-assed implementation. Seriously, was the log balancing in Uncharted necessary at all?
4. The game uses proprietary memory cards which are severly overpriced. This is more of a barrier to entry than a lock-in strategy at the moment.
5. More broadly, the handheld doesn't try to fill a market gap or offer something that consumers were ever asking for. In a world where tons of handheld gaming is on mobile devices, Sony needs to find a way for consumers to justify owning another electronic device that can do things that a mobile phone cannot do.

I think the Wii U will be in a slightly similar situation but not nearly as severe, especially in the realm of popular third party support.

You cannot fix a fundamentally flawed product without coming out with a new one. Hopefully, they've (Sony) learned from this.

How're you liking the Vita so far?

Ovirew

Haven't gotten it yet; just shipped and should be here Friday!

I've been so busy working full time that I haven't gamed in almost a year. I had to sell off my gaming PC to build savings which was hard, but today I decided to bite the bullet and got a like-new PS Vita 3G/Wifi with 8 games on ebay.

Games:

• Unit 13
• Ninja Gaiden
• Uncharted
• Mortal Kombat
• MLB
• Wipeout 2048
• Rayman Origins
• Super Stardust

Needless to say I'm pretty excited and happy to get into gaming once again. Which of the games above are your favorites? I've only played MLB, Wipeout, and Rayman at stores.

[QUOTE="drphizzle0"]

I don't ever understand why threads like this come up.

Jankarcop

The SystemWars bit I understand, but the former I do not. If this was such a terrible service, people wouldn't pay money to use it. Companies would also not pay premiums to put their ad revenue on the service. Microsoft would not be so profitable from XBL.

I don't ever understand why threads like this come up.

Microsoft doesn't create XBL to be nice. They are a business. You, as a consumer, have a choice on what you want to do with your money; vote with your dollars. If you don't like it, don't buy it! Microsoft will adapt accordingly.

Seems to me like Microsoft is doing something right if they're managing to make a lot of money off of their products.

I don't ever understand why threads like this come up.

Microsoft doesn't create XBL to be nice. They are a business. You, as a consumer, have a choice on what you want to do with your money; vote with your dollars. If you don't like it, don't buy it! Microsoft will adapt accordingly.

Seems to me like Microsoft is doing something right if they're managing to make a lot of money off of their products.