Sony's director of hardware marketing John Koller says that the driving force behind the PS Vita's design is to be superior to the mobile gaming market for the next five to six years. The feature set for the portable system was determined by how consumers deal with home consoles as well tablets and smartphones.
“Seeing how those gamers played and seeing the frustrations they have with control and with graphics and with longer-form content, really allowed us to build a system that took advantage of everything we do well at PlayStation: the biggest and best gaming experiences, great franchises, and integrating new ways to control them, new ways to play as we call them,” said Koller to Fast Company. “We think we have created unequivocally the best handheld gaming system ever designed. I think that when people get their hands on it, it is a beautiful, near-HD experience. A lot of people have called it a PS3 in your pocket. And I think that it is exactly what we wanted to get when we first started to design it three and a half years ago.”
The PS Vita was also designed in part to correct many of the issues the PSP had. “I think we had a lot of learning out of PlayStation Portable. The PSP was an absolute success--it has a 70+ million global install base now,” noted Koller. “And there were some things, looking at that particular product, as we saw next generation coming, that we wanted to improve upon. We really did look, not only at PSP, but also at mobile phone and tablet. That was really where we started.”
While the portable electronics market is currently filled with devices like tablets and smartphones that hadn't been as established on the market when the PSP released, Koller isn't worried that it will be more difficult for the PS Vita to find a market. “The market was completely different in 2004--we launched in 2005 in North America--it was a completely different market: tablets were not in existence, mobile phones weren't as powerful as they are today,” described Koller.
“We knew mobile phones were going to get smarter, though--you can see that trend line even then. We really relied on the core strength of the PSP, those big game franchises. We opened it up to a more casual audience as we went along. I think that Vita will appeal to a core consumer at launch, there is no doubt about that, with games like Uncharted, like FIFA, and Marvel Vs. Capcom 3. Those kind of games really provide something for that core consumer. That all said, as we go into the back half of 2012, we fully expect to be able to convert a lot of the casual consumers that are currently playing on tablet and mobile because of the types of experiences that are accented so well and are so easy to play and engage with on Vita. So we are really relying on that Wow factor. Going into the marketing, the biggest part of our marketing campaign is getting people to pick it up and try it. So the experiential part allows the casual consumer to come to this market in large amounts.”
When asked why the mobile phone the Xperia Play and the PS Vita are on the market at the same time, Koller responded, “It's a broader Sony question, because PlayStation doesn't launch Xperia Play, Sony Mobiles does, but the idea is that wherever you are, wherever you want to experience content, PlayStation is there. So the Xperia Play--it's the PlayStation Suite on the developer side--is designed to allow for smaller game types, mobile game types, to include PlayStation content. Those more engaging experiences, the ones that allow you to affect the world around you and the world affects your gameplay, will only be available on Vita. The Vita is the premier product in that portfolio, where it has the biggest and best franchises, as well as the smaller pick-up-and-play games. It has so much range and diversity of content, and that's where Vita is really going to shine. And on the PlayStation Suite side, the ability to have the phone you currently use and play existing PlayStation content, that's really special. There is a definite umbrella strategy to having the PlayStation content anywhere you are, but Vita is certainly the premier device.”
As far as the value proposition of the system goes, Koller said, “I think it's underneath the new ways to play. Our tag line is, 'Never stop playing.' It really fits well with who we are as PlayStation. Those new ways to play, the way you interact with your environment, is really so critical. That also includes a social aspect. One thing we heard at the launch of PSP was a derisive term, calling it PlayStation Personal--it was very much between you and the device, and there was no connection to others. Vita's been built with exactly the opposite, to connect all of us, to have all of us in a region playing together, or in a location. Everybody can become part of the Vita movement through a game, or through the Gifting, or the Treasure Hunting, or the sharing of content. It's a very important trend in our society, but it's also very important in gaming. You want to be able to share your content, be able to play others. I think ultimately the social component, that's really going to be a critical part of this launch. Communication is a big part of it--we will have cross-game chat, which we are calling Party Mode. Those are really important parts of how people game outside of their home.”
The PSP was a significantly bigger success in Japan than it was in the U.S. or Europe and the PS Vita has already launched in that country. Koller talked about the lessons learned from the way they view portable gaming in Japan and the way they hoped to apply their learnings to other regions.
“Traditionally, the Japanese handheld market has been a much more socially engaging market. If you look at a game like Monster Hunter, where they get together locally to play the game, we haven't had that as much in North America. I think the difference now is that location-based gaming, Near applications as we call it, allows you to play with a wide range of people that are in your area. In many ways, it's the equivalent to what happened with Monster Hunter in the last generation, and brings that to Vita and allows you to all to play together,” said Koller. “That social component that was so successful with the Japanese market, I think is brought to Vita for virtually every game. What could be different is the games accented at launch. Japan certainly has their big publishers that are ion board, and are on board here in America as well. You will see a few of those games pop more there. We're going to see more of Uncharted and MLB and FIFA do well here. But across the board, I expect the hardware to be strong in terms of sales.”
“I will iterate again that we really do think this is the best handheld gaming device ever created. We are going to be marketing it as such, talking about it as such, and pushing developers and publishers to continue to make those kinds of experiences,” he added. “If you look at 2012, we have a good sense of the roadmap, about 100 games. If you look at 2013, we are going to have a significant amount of launches. There is going to be a lot of learning out of the types of games and what games do well in the first year for Vita.”
