Sony surprised everyone today with a couple of potentially game-changing announcements for the struggling (if not completely dead) PS Vita. Firstly, a tiny (6cm by 10cm) brand-new product is hitting Japanese stores on Nov. 14th for the equivalent of $100 US called the PS Vita TV (pictured above). This contraption combines the Netflix/Hulu/etc. streaming features of an Apple TV/Roku/WDTV/etc. box with the ability to play PS Vita games straight from the card and access the PlayStation Store. It can be used as a way to stream your PS4 games to a separate TV elsewhere in the house, as a way to stream your PS Vita games to your PS4, or as a way to play your PlayStation Store-available PSOne and PSP games via the TV. At launch it will support the use of a PS3 controller to control said games (limiting the PS Vita selection to only those entirely controllable via button input (not requiring touch screen/camera interactions)), but support for the PS4 controller and thereby PS4 game streaming will be available through a patch at a later date. There is no word yet on whether the touch functionality of the PS4 controller will be used to enhance the playable game selection of the PS Vita TV or not.
While the breadth and quality of the features listed for the PS Vita TV are indeed impressive, there are a few considerations that may yet mar the new devices capabilities. Firstly, consider how for the 3DS line of systems, moving to a screen that was even 90% larger than the original on the 3DS XL started to cause noticeable pixellation of the graphics. Unless some unprecedented algorithms are used to up-convert the PS Vita’s 960×544 resolution to 720p or 1080p, the games will likely end up looking pretty blocky on a large HDTV (not to mention how the PSP or PSOne games will look). These resolution concerns extend to the streaming and video features of the device as well — as far as we can tell Sony has made no announcements pertaining to the output resolution of this device; if it’s under 1080p there will be no point using it for movies or media if your TV is 1080p when there are so many more capable and similarly priced choices, if it can’t even do 720p everything it does will look blurry and/or pixellated on modern TVs. Secondly, when the PS4 controller is implemented for controlling the PS Vita TV there are no guarantees that the PSVTV will be able to use its touch area for otherwise unsupported games — if it doesn’t it would be a sadly missed opportunity. Thirdly, no details about a launch outside of Japan (however likely it is) have been made yet. It’s very possible that the PSVTV could carry a larger pricetag when it comes to non-Japanese countries and go beyond the magically enticing $99.99 price. Lastly, even if the PSVTV comes out at $99 in North America, it could spell trouble for the PS Vita brand as a whole; developers would have more than primary output method to program for and may start thinking that it isn’t worth the time to try to code games for the PS Vita that will also look nice on a TV or PS Vita-proper sales could completely bottom out with a much more versatile option for playing the games being offered at half the price.
The second bit of PS Vita news from today (yes, there’s more!) was that a slimmed-down version of the portable PS Vita is being launched in Japan on Oct. 19th at the same price as the current iteration ($199 US). Similar to the changes made with the PSP-2000 update, the slimmer PS Vita is 20% thinner and 15% lighter than its immediate ancestor with a battery life expectancy clocking-in at a full hour longer. Aside from the multiple colours now available (pictured above), one thing of great note in this product refresh is that the glorious OLED screen in the original PS Vita is being replaced by what from currently available information seems to be a run-of-the-mill LCD screen. What customers already not terribly attracted to the console will think of trading a cutting-edge screen for a slimmer profile, multiple colours, and a smidge more battery life remains to be seen, but that is one aspect of the system that it is questionable to make economies on.
If/when any North American details are released about these intriguing new PS Vita products we’ll let you know. Having an in-house PS Vita ourselves, we’re definitely more interested in the possibilities inherent in the PS Vita TV than in downgrading our current pretty-screened device.