66 replies to this topic

[DemonoidTentacle]

Now I understand that the PSP wasn't doing so well, but I haven't really been keeping up with the times on current gen gaming.

I walked into a few stores yesterday and noticed a complete lack of PSP systems and games. Nothing. I found one store that had a couple of games heavily reduced.

Is the PSP not supported anymore? Is it just a dead system?

[Austin]

Hard to say for me, I still see it wherever I go (Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy, GameStop, etc). I think it's basically been on life-support for a while though, which is a shame, as it's some great hardware with good possibilities..

(c'mon Capcom, make another Ghosts 'n Goblins on it!)

[Blues76]

There is plenty at amazon.
Psvita is coming out feb 2012 better than ever!

[DemonoidTentacle]

I suppose it's good for me in a way. I bought a PSP a few years ago so I could play Castlevania The Dracula X Chronicles. Now that I'm finally interested in picking up a few games for it, they're damn cheap online! Cheap RPGs here I come!

[MagitekAngel]

I got my hands on my first PSP only a couple of months ago. Dead or not, I have a pretty big library to work my way through and I like the hardware, so I'm in no rush for a Vita!

[Cebus Capucinis]

Blues76, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 12:03 AM, said:

There is plenty at amazon.
Psvista is coming out feb 2012 better than ever!

Some of us may or may not have it earlier than release date....

[akator]

The PSP was and is a great handheld. In the 90s, the biggest competition to Nintendo handhelds was the Game Gear... and it sold less than/around 10 million. The PSP has sold over 70 million, which is not a failure.

Popular opinion is that is was a failed handheld. Retailers, even Game Stop, have pretty much abandoned the PSP.

Your best bet is to shop online. As with any system, there are sorry games, but there are also tons of great PSP games. IMO there are at least 25 worth owning...

[DemonoidTentacle]

akator, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:57 AM, said:

Your best bet is to shop online. As with any system, there are sorry games, but there are also tons of great PSP games. IMO there are at least 25 worth owning...

Yeah, I've been browsing online and I've accumulated quite the list of games that I'm interested in getting.

[Cybergoth]

My tactics exactly. I just bought a PSP in august and so far got already over a dozen games for 5-10 Euro, including e.g. two GTAs, two Monster Hunter and both God of War games. Just last night I ordered the first Metal Gear Acid from Amazon for 3,99

[Classic Pac]

I got my very 1st PSP this past summer. So I am new to this whole thing, what I see is there is a vast variety of PSP games everywhere..Target, Best Buy, Comp USA and the like. They are also still producing new games for it...although I would agree not as many as in years past. Cars 2 the game will be out for the PSP very soon.

[Blues76]

I do think it is going to change. I think PSVita is going to bring lots of new and cool games! It will support older games as well.

[Seob]

Most toy stores in the netherlands have almost cleared out shelf space for the psp, i just recently bought one, but at game stores there are plenty of games available.

[Skarrj]

The most recent games have amounted to nothing but obscure Japanese ports lately. Time to retire it and wait for the psv.

I love my PSP but online multiplayer is horrible. It is either non exhistant because the dev took to servers down, or so effing hacked it is unplayable. Seriously, ive never seen an online community so messed up and lawless.

Edited by Skarrj, Fri Dec 2, 2011 10:45 AM.

[Cybergoth]

Blues76, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 9:55 AM, said:

I think PSVista is going to bring lots of new and cool games!

Just thought to mention it at least once: It's PS Vita, not Vista...

[Reaperman]

I've been digging the 'budget multipack re-releases,' and the general ease of bulking up a PSP collection on the cheap, but it seems like the PSP has largely been abandoned before its time. I'd have hoped it would be supported at least until Vita launches, if not years later (like previous Sony systems), but it seems to be too late for that to happen.

It's really strange for it to be abandoned so soon, since I haven't really seen much of substance that Vita can do that is very different than what PSP does now. That and it not being out yet.

PSP is a great little handheld, that really delivered the feeling of playing on a full console. Some things were certainly scaled back, but it never felt like I was playing a radically simplified 'handheld version' of a game. Next time around they'll have to come up with some extra awesome software for Vita if they want to overcome my 'it's from evil Sony' factor--maybe Colony Wars: Privateer. Otherwise, I'll probably wait until I can get one used for $50...

Speaking of shrinking space, I notice Xbox 360 has gone down to a single bay at my Walmart (down from 3 last year).

Edited by Reaperman, Fri Dec 2, 2011 12:53 PM.

[A_Locomotive]

I've noticed the rather abrupt disappearance of it from shelves as well. I noticed it around the same time I bought mine, it was ridiculously difficult to track down local copies of all the Ys games which were still all very recent releases which was weird. Since then I've seen it disappear further. Prices aren't dropping as much as I was expecting though. After the holidays and I'm out of saving mode I'm gonna start collecting up every cheap RPG I can. Lunar is first on my list.

[MagitekAngel]

Skarrj, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 10:42 AM, said:

The most recent games have amounted to nothing but obscure Japanese ports lately. Time to retire it and wait for the psv.

Obscure Japanese localizations are right up my alley! The PSP is a great JRPG stronghold in an era where their quality has increasingly faltered on home consoles.

[Tempest]

MagitekAngel, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:14 PM, said:

Skarrj, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 10:42 AM, said:

The most recent games have amounted to nothing but obscure Japanese ports lately. Time to retire it and wait for the psv.

Obscure Japanese localizations are right up my alley! The PSP is a great JRPG stronghold in an era where their quality has increasingly faltered on home consoles.

When they start to clearance those JRPGs out I'll stock up (Gamestop must be doing this eventually). But at the moment I'm too overwhelmed with PS2 RPGs!

[MagitekAngel]

Oh there is no getting through the entire PS2 JRPG library. I love 'em but I've still got titles I've barely even started, like Rogue Galaxy, Dark Cloud, and Star Ocean 3. And the Persona games. And the .hack// games. And the. . . you get it.

[A_Locomotive]

Skarrj, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 10:42 AM, said:

The most recent games have amounted to nothing but obscure Japanese ports lately. Time to retire it and wait for the psv.

Haha you say that like its a bad thing? Obscure Japanese RPG's are the initial reason I bought a PSP.

MagitekAngel, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:23 PM, said:

Oh there is no getting through the entire PS2 JRPG library. I love 'em but I've still got titles I've barely even started, like Rogue Galaxy, Dark Cloud, and Star Ocean 3. And the Persona games. And the .hack// games. And the. . . you get it.

Dark Cloud is a real gem, I' say its up there among my favorite PS2 RPG's, thinking of it now I need to buy it. I've beaten it but that was through repeated rentals.

[onmode-ky]

Actually, while I think GameStops in my area have completely abandoned the PSP (at least as far as new material), the machine still lives on at other local retailers. Best Buys, Targets, and Wal-Marts in the area still stock both hardware and games, new. Sure, the selection isn't so hot, but it exists.

Classic Pac, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 9:13 AM, said:

Cars 2 the game will be out for the PSP very soon.

It's already out. Its release date was early November. The UMD version seems to have limited distribution, though.

A_Locomotive, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:13 PM, said:

it was ridiculously difficult to track down local copies of all the Ys games which were still all very recent releases which was weird.

Where were you looking? Since the Ys titles (and pretty much everything else by XSEED) were niche releases, they just about never appeared in places other than gaming-specific shops. The smaller publishers almost never get presence elsewhere except online, in my experience.

Even with physical distribution of PSP product fizzling out, though, you can still find a fair amount of its library on the PS Store, if you don't mind not having something you can hold in your hand. True, there are some clueless publishers who have never bothered lowering their prices in the Store, but XSEED, as an example, recently dropped a bunch of their Store content to surprisingly low prices. I think Aksys has some PSP stuff in the Store with very cheap prices, too. The Store also has a large amount of exclusive content, much of which is good stuff (I'm mostly referring to the Minis program; I currently own nearly as many Minis as I do UMDs).

I do wonder when the final (North American) UMD release will be, but even after it's happened, software may still release exclusively on the PS Store, to minimize publishing costs. With luck, though, we'll still get some of those Japanese localizations on disc. I think Grand Knights History and Hakuouki are up next on UMD. Don't expect to find them in a whole lot of stores, though. If that international version of Final Fantasy Type-0 does come to the US, however, I would expect to see it in the big box shops.

onmode-ky

[A_Locomotive]

onmode-ky, on Sun Dec 4, 2011 1:30 AM, said:

Where were you looking? Since the Ys titles (and pretty much everything else by XSEED) were niche releases, they just about never appeared in places other than gaming-specific shops. The smaller publishers almost never get presence elsewhere except online, in my experience.

Gamestops are where I looked since they were the only stores that had them listed online(list as not available at the time I might add) but calling around to every store in my city 2 had them in stock, natch they were on opposite sides of town. So I went to one and picked up Ys I & II and Oath in Felghana then drove to the other store to get Seven. Each was the last copy of the games both stores had.

[Austin]

akator, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:57 AM, said:

As with any system, there are sorry games, but there are also tons of great PSP games. IMO there are at least 25 worth owning...

Agreed. In my opinion, there is something for nearly everyone on the PSP. Strictly into modern console games? The PSP has plenty of those home-like experiences. Into RPGs? The PSP has them in droves. Into puzzlers? The PSP has tons of them. Into retro games only? The PSP has some of the best compilations around, and some. Hell, the system even has strategy games, ha.

[akator]

A_Locomotive, on Fri Dec 2, 2011 1:13 PM, said:

I've noticed the rather abrupt disappearance of it from shelves as well.

I use Amazon and eBay to get my PSP stuff... my local Game Stops have next to nothing, Target and Walmart are even worse. Thankfully there is still tons of stuff available online, and for often less that Game Stop sells them for...

Austin, on Sun Dec 4, 2011 3:38 PM, said:

Agreed. In my opinion, there is something for nearly everyone on the PSP. Strictly into modern console games? The PSP has plenty of those home-like experiences. Into RPGs? The PSP has them in droves. Into puzzlers? The PSP has tons of them. Into retro games only? The PSP has some of the best compilations around, and some. Hell, the system even has strategy games, ha.

Yeah... the PSP got a bad rap. When modded, it is an amazing portable emulator, better than the "open source" handhelds I've owned. Plus there are tons of modern titles available that are excellent.

[cimerians]

I have a modded 1000 from way back when.

I finally grabbed a 3000 today. I could not find any stores that had PSP's except for Toys R' Us which had one left (which I got). I also mostly use Amazon for PSP stuff. I just got the component cable too. I wonder how well it will look on a 55 inch TV.