I don't think that it will fail miserably but I don't think that it will do well, not only for the reasons mentioned but also because it is an extension of an existing platform- if it would have come out with a second analog nub and a touchscreen and had pspgo specific games and applications I think it could have done really well and gotten a number of people to pony the bones it takes to buy it and the games but as it is it is a little cooler way more expensive option for the same thing that you get out of a psp1000-3000

Im sure we could shout to the heavens saying "drop the price" but it would fall on deaf ears. Haven't they learned from the PS3 launch?

I think Sony is doing it wrong by putting it out at such a high price and not offering some kind of UMD to DD conversion for owners of UMD games already. That, and they need to release more games over PSN for it to become desirable. There are a handful of good titles they put up on release day, but they need to be putting out more every week.

So the PSPgo is Sony's Virtual Boy? :P

I think they're trying to "change the game" too soon. I also think that's the reason that the PS3 didn't gain much ground on release and for years to follow - people weren't ready to adapt and adopt a new technological standard, most folks didn't have an HDTV and DVD was (and still is, to a degree) the predominant standard.

I think Apple had it planned a little bit better, and I think that Sony is just expecting lightning to strike twice again, which didn't do them all that well the last time they were counting on it.

Also, this is the company responsible for BetaMax, ATRAC, MiniDisc, MemoryStick and UMD - all formats that are usually used ONLY for Sony systems, and refusing to adapt to a more widely-accepted standard. This is what surprised me the most about the original PS3 models - every kind of port imaginable for any type of removable media, even ones that weren't theirs. And here's the PSPgo, and it seems that they learned nothing positive about what steps they did right and focused again on wasting all their energy, money and time on telling the consumer "what they should want" instead of giving the consumer what they want.

It's like I said on Jim's last post about Tretton's ever-open mouth yesterday - his header image had a floating, translucent face of Ken Kutaragi in the picture - and I stated that the ghost of Kutaragi's intelligent design haunts them to this day, as they cannot replicate that genius no matter how hard they try. Tretton and Hirai can't equal Kutaragi if you were to have three each of the dynamic duo of fail, you still couldn't equal the quiet genius of one Ken Kutaragi.

He's the man that made the PlayStation brand the one Sony brand that stood on its own as more than a success, but a triumph. Now he's gone, ushered out by two people who blamed him for the downfall of the brand, and they have done worse than he ever could, or would. Poor man.

The concept is ok. The problem is that retailers won't back them. Never underestimate the power that retailers hold. Without retailers backing it, the PSPGo will not be mainstream and, therefore, will fail.

What he said. ^^

@TONX. I actually don't think the problem with the PS3 was the price, but the library. it's only this year, really, that PS3 has shown off that there are reasons to choose it over the 360. granted price doesn't hurt, but it's actually a fairly small compared to what the typical gamer spends on video games. price is not a hardline barrier, it just effects your risk assessment. because the PS3 was high priced with a questionable library, it was a risky purchase whereas the 360 was a lower price with a more solidified library, being a very stable purchase.

i wouldn't mind the PSPGo's price if it actually offered something worthwhile over the normal version. but instead it's like getting 2 versions of an Xbox360 that do the same thing, one is just 100 dollars more.

@CrocBox: I think it's more like the Game Boy Micro, TBH.

While it might fail, I have still yet to see someone (outside reviewers, heh!) who doesn't immediately fall in love with the device when they hold it.

The smaller screen is incredibly sharp (the best PSP screen yet!), the button layout looks uncomfortable but isn't at all (and I have very big hands!) the resume function is awesome, etc.

People are just angry that they can't use their old UMDs on it. That's a given, but I don't think the device deserves that much hate.

Oh, and devs stand to make more money out of DD than retail. Pricing games at the same value as retail does 2 things:

1- It keeps retail happy
2- It generates more revenue per copy sold
3- It's MUCH easier for publishers/developers to get their applications to the marketplace. You don't have to bother with Walmart internal buyers, Gamestop internal buyers, etc. You don't have to sell those stores the game, fight for shelf space, etc. The challenges are different, but they still stand to make more revenue per title.

Nazi machine: Confirned.

I don't think it'll make people reluctant to enter the digital race if Sony fails. In all honesty, I think it might create an arms race to see who can do what Sony couldn't.

I think it would be a different story if the PSPgo wasn't gimped with bad battery life, no second analog nub, no way to reclaim games you already own on UMD, MSRP download games, an obviously high price tag, and horribly unreliable wireless on a system that doesn't save downloads that cut out half way (STILL wireless b? Really?).

All someone has to do (hell, it might even be Sony!) is make another system that addresses some of those concerns and they'll get my money.

Really though, any 3 out of 5 those problems fixed and it would probably be a purchase for me. Seems like they just jumped in there thinking everyone will eat it up because it's pretty and didn't notice how annoying the damn thing can be.

At least the PSPgo2 has a lot of space for improvement!

Aw poor Sony. They need a UMD slot in the PSPgo!!! That would make all the nightmares go away.

@somnambulist

As a business owner he doesn't see it as a product worth promoting since there's not a huge incentive because he won't see any profit from people buying the games for it.

Guys let's stop kidding ourselves here. There's nothing wrong with digital distribution, it's UMDs which have been the mistake this entire time.

Nintendo's strategy with it's may peripherals and control styles doesn't work on an all digital platform. Nintendo's strategy is the most successful. Therefore, if the most successful strategy can't work in the format of the "future", I have trouble believing that said format is the future.

The opposite is also true. Nintendo's strategy with handhelds involves a touch screen, and the strategy was twice as successful as it's nearest competition. Therefore, the future of handhelds has a lot of touchscreens. (and about time too. The technology's only been around for what? 15 years now?)

you forgot to add captain obvious on the front jim.

I tried the Go at E3 and loved the ergonomics of the thing. This biggest issues are price and their lack of solution for owners of current UMDs. It had the potential to be very successful, but they screwed the pooch. The PSP minis are also way too expensive. If they really want to compete with the iPhone, then more apps need to be $0.99 or $1.99. The lower price point is part of Apple's success.

1. Drop the price on the PSPgo
2. Drop the price of games that are bought via PSN (THe problem with this idea is that would it shift gamers to buy games digitally?)
3. Offer a UMD - Digital Conversion
4. Give some profit to retailers.

It's a 14GB mp3 player ($150 new) that doesn't care what formats or headphones you use stapled to a tiny PS2 ($100) that can play stolen movies. It's reasonably priced. Much of the download library is $20 or lower and easily has 10+ games I can pick out until the stuff I wanted transfers to the store.
I can't name a single portable game I would keep the disc/cartridge forever that I'm not just gonna play 15 years later after this console is emulated.

After the first two days of annoying setup, PSPgo becomes better than that cigarette you have after terrific sex.

@Captain Quincy

Your definitely right that he has good reason as a retailer to dislike it. The issue I have with it is that he seems to be trying to project his opinion of the psp go onto consumers when maybe they shouldn't dislike it as much as he does. I mean, it does seem to be in a weird grey area between the regular psp and the iphone, but again, I think that if the psp go fails, it will probably be due more to retailers than consumers, which takes some wind out of his argument.

It's overpriced, if it doesn't have a physical media drive then shouldn't it be cheaper than the psp-3000??? The whole push for digital media is because it would be cheaper than using physical media. On top of that there's no transfer of physical games to digital media which makes you buy your collection again. This isn't even the right time for this sort of thing either. They should have waited until the next generation of consoles come out to get rid of physical media drives completely.

Something else that puzzles me... Where's the marketing and advertising space for digital distribution? Game devs who go digital are also abandoning their marketing venues that come through with retail prescence. Unless you're there on your PSN account where else is there advertising that you can buy Fat Princess or Noby Noby Boy? Find me a dev that's willing to create a fully developed
UMD level title and have them go digital only and compare it to a retail branded game.

U bet you'll see more notes there than plain and simple packaging costs in the risk and cost factors associated with going without physical media.

BluDesign has a point. On top of the whole "no refunds" policy with digital downloads, there's virtually no advertising that goes into them. Tell me the last time you saw an ad campaign for a digitaly downloaded title. Can't name one, can you? And no, the GTA IV DLC doesn't count.

What Black Nexus said.

"being 50 bucks short of a ps3 is just dumb."