PlayStation VITA -- Are you getting it?

[BlackMamba]

Originally Posted by MrNathanDrake

Uncharted: Golden Abyss looks better than most PS360 games to be honest

DAY 1 baby

true, but Dragon's Crown still takes the top spot

[Grim Reaper]

ill get it on day1.

i have a question. what is the MP rating on the cameras?

[Mavrick]

Originally Posted by Grim Reaper

ill get it on day1.

i have a question. what is the MP rating on the cameras?

Note that 640 x 480 is 0.3MP I don't know why they didn't put that in the box.

[CM Matty]

i might. just picked up a psp go a few weeks back (free after using blockbuster credit) and finally got around to using it after the store came back online. this is the first portable game system i've owned (not counting my iphone) since the original gameboy so i'll see how often i manage to use it. i think the next few months will be a good guage...i could see myself picking up the vita a year or so after it comes out...if there's a price drop or sale, that'll definitely help my decision.

really impressed with the specs and the videos from e3. are the games download only? disc? haven't seen info on this yet (though i haven't looked hard/at all). if, after a few months, a bunch of solid games are available cheap, that will also help my decision.

[Slim Jim]

I will buy this a soon as there are more games out that I like as of right now I don't like any of the games are coming out

[Mavrick]

Originally Posted by CM Matty

really impressed with the specs and the videos from e3. are the games download only? disc? haven't seen info on this yet (though i haven't looked hard/at all). if, after a few months, a bunch of solid games are available cheap, that will also help my decision.

Software for the PlayStation Vita will be distributed on NVG Cards, a new proprietary flash card format, rather than on Universal Media Discs (UMDs) used by the original PlayStation Portable. NVG game cards will be available in 2 GB and 4 GB sizes. 5-10% of the writeable space will be reserved for save data, patches, etc. Higher-capacity game cards are planned to be made available for future releases.

[Shin-Ra]

Announced specs are in this thread:

https://forum.blu-ray.com/playstatio...-24-980-a.html

The game card:

・New Game Medium

PS Vita adopts a new game medium, a small flash memory based card, dedicated to PS Vita software titles. Taking advantage of flash memory, this innovative card can store full software titles plus add-on game content and game save data directly on to the card. By adopting a flash memory based card, SCE will be able to provide game cards with higher capacity in the future, allowing developers to store more game data to deliver rich and immersive games.

Every single game will be sold on PSN and 'major' games will also be sold on the physical game card.

[Mavrick]

Some more pics, and the PSVita branded memory cards.

This slide, shown during Sony's Next Generation Portable GDC panel, shed some light on NGP's still-mysterious storage details. Unlike the experimental PSP Go, the NGP doesn't sport any internal storage. Things like save data and patches will be stored on the actual game cards themselves which, notably, will be offered in both 2GB and 4GB varieties, with 5 to 10 percent of the storage allocated to the aforementioned data. On a 2GB card, that leaves 1.8GB to 1.9GB for game data; on a 4GB card, that leaves 3.6GB to 3.8GB.

That puts the NGP's game media storage size between that of the PSP's, whose UMD discs range from 900MB to 1.8GB, and the PS3's, whose Blu-ray discs hold up to 50GB, though "many PS3 games" (i.e., multiplatform titles) remain around 9GB, thanks to the Xbox 360's DVD-ROM size limitation. Of course, as pointed out in a second slide (afer the break), this leaves the NGP with far more storage per game than a "10MB phone game."

But that's not all! As previously suggested, the NGP has another storage option, simply called "removable memory" in this presentation. "Cards will be large to support a variety of downloaded content," the slide says. This includes games available over PlayStation Network; and, thankfully, Sony says it's implementing a "single submission for both formats" to streamline the process of getting games approved for both card-based and downloadable releases.

We're hopeful this streamlined process obviates current embarassments like the continued absence of high-profile games in the PSN catalog of PSP titles, which has crippled the appeal of Sony's PSP Go handheld.

[Mavrick]

Some more bits and bobs they will try to entice you with

It's a shame that the Memory Cards are proprietary, which most likely means expensive

[Cook]

Why hasn't memory cards such as these taken over discs? Is there a specific reason why disks still remain the dominant format over more compact memory cards such as these for storing games and movies?

[Mavrick]

Originally Posted by Cook

Why hasn't memory cards such as these taken over discs? Is there a specific reason why disks still remain the dominant format over more compact memory cards such as these for storing games and movies?

Most likely because of read/wright speeds of the cards vs that of discs. In the case of BD:

How fast can you read/write data on a Blu-ray disc?


According to the Blu-ray Disc specification, 1x speed is defined as 36Mbps. However, as BD-ROM movies will require a 54Mbps data transfer rate the minimum speed we're expecting to see is 2x (72Mbps). Blu-ray also has the potential for much higher speeds, as a result of the larger numerical aperture (NA) adopted by Blu-ray Disc. The large NA value effectively means that Blu-ray will require less recording power and lower disc rotation speed than DVD and HD-DVD to achieve the same data transfer rate. While the media itself limited the recording speed in the past, the only limiting factor for Blu-ray is the capacity of the hardware. If we assume a maximum disc rotation speed of 10,000 RPM, then 12x at the outer diameter should be possible (about 400Mbps). This is why the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) already has plans to raise the speed to 8x (288Mbps) or more in the future.

Where as the speeds for cards are much slower.

Toshiba has announced what it claims will be the world's fastest SDHC UHS-I and the world's first microSDHC UHS-I compliant memory cards. To be available in 32GB, 16GB and 8GB capacities, the SDHC cards will offer read and write speeds of up to 95MB/s and 80MB/s respectively. The microSDHC cards will be available in 4GB, 8GB and 16GB capacities with read and write speeds of up to 45MB/s and 20MB/s.

Maybe cost as well, prices for the fastest 32gb card are as high as £227 per card, and the slowest 32gb card from £64. Which is a lot more expensive than BD But maybe someone more edjucated than me could offer a better explanation

[CM Matty]

thanks for the heads up. the fact that there can be a secondary market for games is another selling point.

[partridge]

The front and rear camera's are both VGA? That's pretty poor for a new device, I'd have expected a 5mp on the back.

[Ascended_Saiyan]

Originally Posted by Mavrick

Most likely because of read/wright speeds of the cards vs that of discs. In the case of BD:



Where as the speeds for cards are much slower.



Maybe cost as well, prices for the fastest 32gb card are as high as £227 per card, and the slowest 32gb card from £64. Which is a lot more expensive than BD But maybe someone more edjucated than me could offer a better explanation

There's a big difference between "b" (bits) and "B" (bytes). Take the Blu-ray numbers and divide them by 8, to get the "B" (bytes). Bytes are what the SDHC cards speeds appear to be listed as.

288Mbps for 8x Blu-ray = 36MB/s

That puts it 9MB/s down in read speeds of SDHC cards. 12x would be faster than SDHC read speeds, though.

[MrNathanDrake]

I'm liking the Launch line up.

I really want to see what will come after launch. BioShock and SF x Tekken are both announced. But what else? We can count on another original GOW game.

I'd really like to see new IPs on VITA though. Stuff that I cant play on PS3.

Either way, that $250 VITA is looking like a day 1.

[DonRSD]

is there anyway i can contact sony via email/phone to let them know to add a 2nd set of shoulder buttons to match the ps2/ps3 controller!!??