PSP Price set $250/games $40-50, your thoughts?

Foehammer

at first I thought the price was way too high, but for what you are getting games/mp3/movie player it doesnt sound too bad, though i would like the option of buying the system itself without the "Bundle" (earphones, 32mb mem stick, carrying case, battery, batt charger) (1st Million sold get a copy of Spider-man 2 to play on psp) being the tech-game whore that I am I know that I will own one, your thoughts?

KMan

My thoughts on the PSP.

It seems that it wants to do everything out there, but is doesn't do any of them exceptionally well.

Games- sure, may be a little more advance hardware out there, but with the draw on battery life, who cares how good a game looks, if you can only play it for 20 minutes?

MP3 Player- for $250 I can get a pretty damn nice mp3 player that holds waaaay more than 32MB. Sure you can expand that to play more music, but memory sticks aren't exactly cheap.

Movies- yeah right. unless every single dvd I buy from now on comes with a standard size dvd and a umd sized one, I aint shelling out extra cash so I can watch the first 20 minutes of a movie. For $250 I could get a mid-priced portable dvd player with twice the screen-size that plays all of my dvd's I already own.

PSP... sounds more like a POS to me.

Enix

Too expensive...I even thought that the ds was too expensive... and 50 bucks is a little expensive for a handheld game....And unless they fix this short battery life thing, then there is no way im getting on...Whats the point of a movie player if it dies right before you play the freakin movie XD.

Marine

the battery life for games is between 4-6 hours of continuous use and it's other features are bonuses, not selling points.
i wouldn't buy one from the initial run, the price will come down within a few months and there's always bugs with first runs. not to mention there's not many games i want for it on release

Foehammer

i read that playing ridge racer only last 1 1/2 hours total of game time, that's crazy, especially considering the generation of hardware is coming out soon and wont cost much more that the psp, and then to think about Sony's manufacturing which is total crap in my opinion, ive had 2 ps2's both because they die after a year or less and i still have a snes that works like a champ. bad sony bad! i only wish someone would create a way to play old n64 games on the ds...now that i would buy

tubboy

too expensive. I think NOT. The original Pricing was something around 420 so stop ya bitching boyz....:P Sony did us a favor.

Foehammer

:sigh: i don't consider it bitching, i asked for their thoughts on the psp pricing and they're giving me what i asked...

lkraan

It will very likely be 250 Euro's here and I think that it's too much for a handheld. I would only use it for games and not for music or movies. Too bad they don't offer the pack without all the extra's.
I'll get a DS first and will very likely buy the PSP when it becomes cheaper or when I can get a good deal for it on eBay.
Wipeout Pure looks awesome though.

tubboy

Sorry to ruin your thread Foehammer. That was just my input.

"LIKE YOU ASKED".

Foehammer

you didnt ruin it.... "SMART ASS"

tubboy

I yi yi........sheeeesh, I'm stinkin up the thread already.....sorry bro, I'll bow out now.
Laterz.

sonic

It's not that it's too expensive for it's features, it's that most PORTABLE gamers don't need that stuff, and it's adding onto the price. If they just had a basic gameplayer with nothing with it, I'd bet they could sell it for $150-$199, and it would sell better.

ElysiumGX

the trick is to wait and let everyone else buy them up. after the hype takes a nosedive, buy it on eBay for $99. then it's well worth the price.

Toomas

sonic it hardly has any additional features, the audio/video playback is needed anyways to run games. It's like saying PC's would cost less if they couldn't play mp3's.

flaagan

i originally (a few months back) heard the psp was gonna be $180 and games were gonna be $30-40... guess i'm not gonna get the psp for a while then.. too bad, was lookin forward to gettin it right off the bat

Nostradamus

[ QUOTE ]
sonic it hardly has any additional features, the audio/video playback is needed anyways to run games. It's like saying PC's would cost less if they couldn't play mp3's.

[/ QUOTE ]

Apparently you have no clue.

snemmy

$250... yikes.. that's $50 more than my ps2.. during the height of ps2 madness i should add

i highly doubt ill even give it a look over anyway. i think the idea of a portable home console is missing the point of a portable anyway.

isnt there an external power adapter for home use? if not there should be if the battery life is indeed that 'bad'.

sonic

[ QUOTE ]
sonic it hardly has any additional features, the audio/video playback is needed anyways to run games. It's like saying PC's would cost less if they couldn't play mp3's.

[/ QUOTE ]

uhhh

Consoles and portables run off different hardware, you can't just have ingame video/audio playback, then magically have MPEG-2 playback and MP3 support.

Mishra

wow that's horrible. 250 dollars is 100 dollars more than a HOME console. it's more than twice the cost of a gamecube. that's rediculous. i really am convinced this will fail stateside.

gauss

well apparently it was cheaper in ol' Nippon because they could buy it without all that extra stuff... i dunno. i like the DS for it being more focused on the games without all the other stuff, yet the PSP is said to have a GTA title somewhere down the line. if i would buy one right now i'd probably go DS, though probably not metroid hunters because the screens are just too damn small for that kind of play. i don't think i'll be doing any portable gaming in the near future unless the price drops significantly for the PSP/slightly for the DS and/or some titles come out that i'm really interested in.

acc

I think it's going to be a tremendous success. It's the system for the mass market of people who don't want to admit that they like video games yet; and that's a huge market in North America right now. Most people wouldn't be caught dead carrying a DS around.

KDR_11k

sonic: Not just that, most formats have licensing fees associated with them.

EB Games apparently sells the PSP only in bundle form, which forces you to shell out 400 USD minimum and get three games plus an accessory.

I don't get why people expect handhelds to cost LESS than a home system. Look at laptops, all of that power and size-optimized stuff and things like the screen and battery add to the cost. The PSP has to include the stuff a home console does (minus controllers, obviously) plus a screen and battery. If you added the power outlet plus cabling and the TV to the price of a home console you'd see the PSP is still a deal.

Well, deal as much as it CAN be a deal. My PDA cost ~20 EUR more, came with pretty much the same stuff the value pack does (has 32MB built-in flash memory instead of a memstick, though) and adds a software bundle to that. Adding some of the free software available on the internet to the system and perhaps that 1 GB CF card it offers WAY more value than the PSP does. Okay, no games but I have my DS for that (since I expect some very creeative games on the system, or at least better controls).

Toomas

[ QUOTE ]
Consoles and portables run off different hardware, you can't just have ingame video/audio playback, then magically have MPEG-2 playback and MP3 support.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ok so some fans can make a mp3 and DIVX player for PlayStation2 yet it would cost Sony huge amounts to make PSP support it? Its just a fucking piece of code, its CHEAP especially if you are going to copy it 100million times.

KDR_11k

License fees. Plus you might want to use specialized hardware to save power.

Toomas

Wee mp3 decodeing license costs $0.75 per unit.

KDR_11k

And all those video codec licenses? Plus maybe specialized hardware since that 300MHz CPU is barely powerful enough to handle MP3s?

Toomas

300MHz is more than enough to play mp3, you can play them on 486. And even if those video codecs cost $5 total per unit, still wouldnt make much of a difference.
Also adding features to processor costs hardly any money, they have to worry more about the space they eat up that could be used for game specific stuff (i doubt they went with smaller semiconductors to support audio/video).

Hardware that costs considerable money is the display, disc drive and maybe battery and ram.

sonic

[ QUOTE ]
300MHz is more than enough to play mp3, you can play them on 486. And even if those video codecs cost $5 total per unit, still wouldnt make much of a difference.
Also adding features to processor costs hardly any money, they have to worry more about the space they eat up that could be used for game specific stuff (i doubt they went with smaller semiconductors to support audio/video).

Hardware that costs considerable money is the display, disc drive and maybe battery and ram.

[/ QUOTE ]

lol
Just forget about it.

Richard Kain

Yes, forget about it. All this speculation is moot until the system is released in March anyway. I'm sure there are some enterprising young hackers out there right now trying to develop software on a Japanese import model. Given the PC-compatability that the PSP features, as well as the fact that you can update the system BIOS, I'm sure there will be quite a bit of hacking on this system.

No one is arguing whether or not the PSP is worth $250.00. That price is entirely reasonable, especially for a value pack that comes with accessories. (those memory sticks aren't cheap) The problem is that most people simply don't want to buy a portable gaming system that costs that much. Portable systems are more risky than home consoles. They are much easier to lose and break. Everyone is going to be awed by the graphical power that the PSP will be able to produce. But how many people are really going to want to pay to take that power with them? Most people consider handhelds to be "value" systems. They are perfectly willing to take a hit in graphical power if it means that the price will be lower and the battery power will last longer. The original GameBoy thrived for a long time with the same crappy low-res, two color grahpics. And yet people ate it up. I still think the initial run of the PSP is going to sell out within the first week, perhaps the first day. If it doesn't, it will be a huge setback for Sony and the progress of the PSP. Just the name "Playstation" should be enough to move inventory off the shelves. If it doesn't, it will show that the market just isn't ready for a handheld system this advanced.

KDR_11k

I still think the initial run of the PSP is going to sell out within the first week, perhaps the first day.

Well, that's a given considering Sony's shipment sizes. Even if it sold as well as the NGage it would sell out.

JO420

What concerns me about the Psp is the price and durability.


the screen has no cover,it works on a drive system like a cd,stationary thats fine but on a portable how long will that drive remain functioning after a little wear and tear.

then theres the weak battery life

and 250$ price


im afraid to buy one based on how vunerable the system looks.

Weiser_Cain

I wouldn't want to drop something that expensive, which will happen if the games are any good. They need to cut the price in half again. Fifty bucks for a game on a disk made of super thin foil and super-soft plastic that I can't make back-up copies of and that I'm supposed to cary around in my pocket?
How about I cut out the middle man and tape money to my nerf crossbow bolts and shoot them out a moving vehicle?