Why would one stay after hours to watch Sony's E3 2011 presser? Probably to either a) try to get a look at Kevin Butler or b) see if Sony apologizes for losing control of their security. You didn't get a), and you got b) out of the way just as fast as they possibly could do it. Blink and it's gone.
For me, I just sat through it and I'm not quite sure if there is a c), myself. I thought the overall presentation was pretty bland, though Sony will clearly score a lot of points with some gamers for not marrying their information to the Move the way Microsoft did Kinect. However, they might well lose points with a variety of other gamers for sticking so close to the handheld.
Some of Sony's games looked pretty great. I've never played an Uncharted, but Uncharted 3 does look solid in a crowded third-person, over-the-shoulder adventure genre. Resistance 3 looks like a perfectly adequate FPS. Everything is starting to look the same, though, and that wasn't helped by following Microsoft. You can show lots of adventure games and lots of FPSes, but after a while the brief time that each game has to show its uniqueness just fails, and I really didn't see anything during the PlayStation 3 portion of the presentation that really lept out as surprising or groundbreaking.
Once the Vita emerged, though, it got pretty interesting as long as you like handhelds. The tech behind the Vita looked pretty great in the live demos, though I for one have never been fully convinced by backside touchpads (fnar). The new handheld looks very much like a PSP, with the crosspad, four buttons, and two shoulders of the current PSP. After that, they added a second analog stick and made both sticks look more like DualShock sticks, made the screen multitouch-capable, and even added a back multitouch panel without a screen and front and back cameras.
The games shown live looked fanastic, nearly like PlayStation 3 games, and it seems like the time the devs have had with the development devices and SDK has paid off. I think the AT&T offering will not help the device; I would guess that the data plans will not be reasonably priced, and with no 4G availability, there will almost surely be a new version in just a couple years. PlayStation Suite, also on the mobile front, seems like a neat idea, but how many Android phones will really have the ability to control games that originated on PlayStation platforms?
Two things to point out here: one, there was pretty much no Square Enix here at all. That's two out of three down and barely any mention of Squenix - not a great sign, in my opinion. Two, please, please, don't let devs give presentations. God bless them, they make good games. They're not public speakers.
| laszlow | Comment 1: 2011-06-07 13:44 |
![laszlow]() |
Sony Vita: $250 for regular, $300 for 3G-enabled version. Puts it at... pretty much the same as the 3DS. I'll wait and see how compelling the hardware lineup is before I buy, but as a PSP fanboy... I'm tempted. I'm the rare person that loves both his PSP and his DS, but actually plays his PSP way more. |
| Rangers51 | Comment 2: 2011-06-07 15:35 |
![Rangers51]() |
Having written this post when I was tired and busy last night, I didn't say nearly enough about Vita. Lasz added in those price points, and I just added in to my original post a lot more information about why the Vita, 4G notwithstanding, is a pretty cool looking device. |
| Neal | Comment 3: 2011-06-07 15:40 |
![Neal]() |
For those like me who didn't watch, the Vita shown was this:
Sounds pretty sweet to me. Do we know if they're abandoning the UMD format or if it will be backward-compatible with the PSP? |
| Rangers51 | Comment 4: 2011-06-07 17:27 |
![Rangers51]() |
They didn't say in the conference but I feel like they've made it pretty clear in pre-announcment leaks that they would not support UMDs, nor was there any evidence of a UMD drive on the unit. However, Sony did plan for this in their UMD to Digital Media conversion project that came along with the PSP Go, so it would be pretty surprising if there's just no way to play your PSP games on the new device at all. |
| Neal | Comment 5: 2011-06-07 21:32 |
![Neal]() |
And now the back of the Vita, which is a touchpad.
 |
| Insegredious | Comment 6: 2011-06-08 21:27 |
![Insegredious]() |
Quote (Rangers51 @ 7th June 2011 02:18) please, please, don't let devs give presentations. God bless them, they make good games. They're not public speakers.
AHHHHH GOD DO I AGREE WITH THIS
One particular example that stands out to me is when they announced Golden Sun: Dark Dawn a few years back. It was a game fans had been waiting seven years for, and whoever was doing the presentation sounded like he had no enthusiasm (or any other emotion for that matter) whatsoever. |
| BlitzSage | Comment 7: 2011-06-08 22:01 |
![BlitzSage]() |
Quote (Insegredious @ 8th June 2011 17:27) Quote (Rangers51 @ 7th June 2011 02:18) please, please, don't let devs give presentations. God bless them, they make good games. They're not public speakers. AHHHHH GOD DO I AGREE WITH THIS One particular example that stands out to me is when they announced Golden Sun: Dark Dawn a few years back. It was a game fans had been waiting seven years for, and whoever was doing the presentation sounded like he had no enthusiasm (or any other emotion for that matter) whatsoever.
Lol, seconded, or thirded, lol. Some do okay, but they oughta let the public speakers/marketers talk. |
| Glenn Magus Harvey | Comment 8: 2011-06-10 15:32 |
![Glenn Magus Harvey]() |
As for the PS Vita...
1. Will it be backwards-compatible with PSP games? The design suggests it is.
2. I was about to ask if they had plans on making the screen a touchscreen, and then...wait, how is the back of it a touchpad? How would you use that, or am I misunderstanding you?
3. Courtesy of TheSanityAssassin on TV Tropes, we have a pun and shout-out for fans of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha:
(For those of you unfamiliar with the Nanoha series; the character portrayed there is named Vita.) |
| Rangers51 | Comment 9: 2011-06-10 16:23 |
![Rangers51]() |
Quote (Glenn Magus Harvey @ 10th June 2011 10:32) As for the PS Vita...
1. Will it be backwards-compatible with PSP games? The design suggests it is.
2. I was about to ask if they had plans on making the screen a touchscreen, and then...wait, how is the back of it a touchpad? How would you use that, or am I misunderstanding you?
1. Not confirmed yet, I don't think, but I would say it's highly likely. They really have no reason not to, but then, they didn't really have to take it away from PS3, either, so you never know.
2. All those little symbols on the back are conductive. They can detect touch the same way many touch-sensitive devices can, by way of electric conduction between the human skin and the touch surface. You'd use it... by touching it. It won't be as useful as the front touchscreen for many games, of course, but the demo I really noticed was clever, if a bit gimmicky. |
| Glenn Magus Harvey | Comment 10: 2011-06-10 17:04 |
![Glenn Magus Harvey]() |
But if the screen is on the front, when would you use the touchpad on the back of the device?
Or maybe they'd be some sort of thing you could use with your non-thumb fingers when holding the device. |
| footbigmike | Comment 11: 2011-06-10 17:20 |
![footbigmike]() |
Quote But if the screen is on the front, when would you use the touchpad on the back of the device?
I know, right? It's almost as if you have a device that you have to use without looking at it! Next thing you know, they'll have these big screens, with a whole separate entity that you use to control the game... like, a "controller", and they'll expect you to play without actually looking at this controller. How bizarre is that?
It's new, but it's not THAT mind bending. Sure, it might be difficult to grasp at first, but you've got like 6 fingers that you don't normally use while playing games. I'm just slightly worried that a Street Fighter will be released on the Vita with crazy-ass combos that require you to double-quarter-circle-forward, press the three punch buttons and make you trace out a pentagram on the back with your finger. Simultaneously. |
| Glenn Magus Harvey | Comment 12: 2011-06-10 19:07 |
![Glenn Magus Harvey]() |
Well most people use touchpads with the touchpad facing upward. And while looking at a screen with output relevant to the touchpad. If you had a touchpad on the backside of a game console, the touchpad would seem to be inverted.
As you suggest, yeah, I think they'll be using the other fingers for something. That said, I'm not sure how much they can do. It likely won't be precision operations of the sort that the DS's touchscreen has been used for. |
| Death Penalty | Comment 13: 2011-06-10 21:05 |
![Death Penalty]() |
I know I'm usually Mr. Rain On Handhelds' Parade, but, after a year at college without a console (you can't really play RPGs on a tv shared by three other people), a handheld is beginning to look more convenient for me. I don't really care for most of the DS lineup and I like what I'm hearing about the Vita (I've always leaned PSP as far as what I would perfer were I to enter the market). My new circumstances may be what finally tips the balance.
Due to my current travels, I've been unable to pay attention to any of E3, so I'm kinda sad to hear that SE had such a let down of a performance. It sounds like this year in general wasn't as exciting as previous years, with Microsoft's Kinect obsession and Sony's boring-ness. I'm not terribly surprised though; for RPG fans, I suspect that these conferences will continue to get less interesting. For me, and, I would imagine, many of you, a lot of the FPS stuff is pretty stale. |
| Glenn Magus Harvey | Comment 14: 2011-06-11 15:48 |
![Glenn Magus Harvey]() |
^ How do the potential RPG libraries of the PSP/PSV and DS/3DS compare? I know there are a lot of RPGs on DS (Sigma Harmonics, the Etrian Odysseys, FFTA2, plus remakes like FF3, FF4, and the DQs) but I can only think of FFT:tLW and FF1/2 and FF4 Complete for PSP. That said, I have not been paying attention to the PSP's offerings much. |
| laszlow | Comment 15: 2011-06-11 20:01 |
![laszlow]() |
Quote (Glenn Magus Harvey @ 11th June 2011 10:48) ^ How do the potential RPG libraries of the PSP/PSV and DS/3DS compare? I know there are a lot of RPGs on DS (Sigma Harmonics, the Etrian Odysseys, FFTA2, plus remakes like FF3, FF4, and the DQs) but I can only think of FFT:tLW and FF1/2 and FF4 Complete for PSP. That said, I have not been paying attention to the PSP's offerings much.
I feel that the PSP has a better selection of RPGs than the DS. - Disgaea 1 and 2
- Star Ocean 1 and 2
- Tactics Ogre
- Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII
- Jeanne D'Arc
- Half-Minute Hero
- Legend of Heroes 1-3 (they all suck)
- Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky (best RPG I've played in years)
- Persona 1 remake
- Persona 3 port
- Breath of Fire III
- At least five Tales Of games
- Untold Legends 1 and 2
- Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth
- Valkyria Chronicles 2
- Lunar: The Silver Star remake
There are more that I'm probably forgetting. Plus it has Monster Hunter, which is part action game, part MMO, part RPG, visually stunning, and relentlessly addictive. Not to mention that PSPs can play all of the PS1 Classics available on PSN, including Final Fantasy VII through IX, Suikoden, Wild ARMs 1 and 2, Alundra, Grandia, and others. |
| Please Log In to Add Comments |
