Post by Steve Farrelly @ 11:01am 24/02/12 | 9 Comments
PS Vita offers unlimited interactive entertainment anytime and anywhere. Through a unique feature set including a stunning 5" OLED touch screen, rear touch pad, dual analog sticks, motion sensors and dual cameras, a revolutionary user interface, and additional 3G and Wi-Fi support, PS Vita delivers the ultimate and uncompromised portable gaming experience, by offering a host of rich new ways to play and socially connect with the world around you.A number of launch titles have jumped out of the gate with the new handheld, which we'll explore in a PS Vita launch feature you can check out later today, right here on AusGamers.
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Posted 11:09am 24/2/12
Posted 11:15am 24/2/12
While the prices haven't yet reached steam levels of awesome, it is nice to see some better support for digital distribution from Sony after the clusterf*** that was the Go. I picked one up yesterday and wanted a copy of Lumines, but D*** Smith didn't have it. I'd seen it round the corner at JB for $59, but couldn't be bothered getting it. Got home and bought a digital copy for $48. Still expensive, but nice to see they're not afraid to sell at a cheaper price point than brick and mortar.
Super impressed by this thing, pity it's probably not going to sell very well. Then again, I thought the Go was a handy little piece of hardware too, but Sony sent it out to die.
Posted 11:29am 24/2/12
The first thing that happened to irritate me was turning it on and having to pick a timezone. The options were GMT+10 Sydney, and then a bunch of other non-useful timezones for someone that lives in Brisbane:
So even though I'm in Brisbane and I am actually GMT+10, I don't want to pick the Sydney timezone, because they're in daylight savings time at the moment - so they're GMT+11. If I pick Sydney will it mess up all my times? Or does GMT+10 really mean GMT+10?! Anyway, I resigned myself to fate and selected GMT+10.
I was also irritated that to scroll up and down through that menu you have to use the touch screen. The hardware controls on the PS Vita do not appear to interact with those sorts of menus. Not really a big deal, but ... why not wire them in?
I'll have to post images/video of what I got to after that, but basically you go through a couple other screens, then you're asked if you have a PlayStation Network account.
I know I do, because I get emails there occasionally telling me they've been hacked and all my details are in the wild, but I have no idea what my account details are. So I select "yes", assuming it will ask me for them later.
Then it gives you a Wifi network selection screen. Pick my wireless network and it does Internet stuff.
Then it comes back and tells me I need a system update before I can do anything else. It just has an "OK" button, so I assume hitting that will go off and connect to the Internet and download the update over the air, right?
I click OK, and then it takes me back to the previous screen, which is "do you have a PSN account?" I click yes, and it takes me to the system update screen. Click OK, back to the PSN account screen.
So I infer at this point I have to go back and say I don't have a PSN account and go through whatever alternate process exists for that. Or maybe I have to do some whole other different thing to update the device?
Again, I have only played with it for a grand total of five minutes; I simply haven't had time. I picked it up thinking it would be easy to just plug a game in and have a look at it but the barriers to getting to that point have irritated and enraged me!
I'm sure it's not that complicated to get working and I'll be able to puzzle out the correct sequence of buttons to tap on.
The unit seems nice physically. It is a little big for me to want to carry around regularly (like the PSP) - I'm going overseas tomorrow and am tempted to take it with me, but between my phone, Kobo book reader, laptop, and SLR camera I am going to have enough digital junk on the plane with me already.
The soft keyboard I found a little awkward to use. It stretches the whole way across the screen; I can't hold the device in two hands and type easily with my thumbs - you have to sort of lean your hands over into the middle of the screen to hit the keys that are in the middle section of the keyboard. The keyboard buttons are pretty big and easy to press (esp. coming from a Nexus One which has a pretty weeny screen and soft keyboard) so I feel like this could be resolved with a split-keyboard arrangement so it is possible to thumb-type without having to move your hand. This is probably not a big deal though unless you're planning to do a lot of typing!
I'll post more impressions once I actually get a game going!
Posted 11:56am 24/2/12
Had the exact same dumb experience trying to set up my PSN account and update the system.
They also force you to use the touchscreen a lot in games by locking out the hardware controls.
Posted 11:56am 24/2/12
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Posted 03:46pm 24/2/12