Loading ...Cause that’s kinda the impression I’m getting after like 14 negative stories he has written about the new device in the last two days over at Destructoid.
He’s bitching about the price, about the lack of packed in accessories and now about the lack of an upgrade program for people who already own a bunch of UMD games. They’re all really silly complaints.
On the price, yeah, I’m sure everyone would like it to be less than $250. Sony included, I’m sure, but it’s pretty simple. Either it’s worth that much to you or it isn’t. I think the value compares favorably to competing devices like the iPhone. The PSP Go doesn’t lock you in to a 2 year contract with mandatory data plan from a single wireless carrier, for example. But still, you could always just get a PSP 3000 which will continue to be available at a much lower price, though adding 16GB of storage will bring you back up to the Go’s price point anyway.
He really seems pissed that the Go doesn’t pack in screen protection. Though, I can’t for the life of me think of another gadget like this that included anything worthwhile. No one uses the little slip cases that come with iPods or the pouch that was included with the original PSP 1000. And the reason for that is retailers want to sell you those accessories. So they talk hardware makers out of packing in the essentials if they want shelf space. It’s the same reason printers are sold without USB cables and you always have to pay extra for some silly “wire harness” when you get an after market car stereo installed. It’s kinda lame, but I think most people can manage the 25 cents for an adhesive screen protector if they don’t already have a spare floating around their junk drawer from when they got their Zune or iPod or DS two Christmases ago.
As for an upgrade program, Sony claims they’ve investigated the possibilities but their are legal and technical issues making it unfeasible. Here’s Sterling editorializing:
Quite what those legal and technical reasons are has not been explained. I think it would have been more honest for Sony to simply say, “We want more of your money if you’re dumb enough to give it to us.”
Actually, it’s pretty easy to see why this was never going to happen. Can you imagine the contractual rat’s nest they’d have to disentangle to allow people to convert any and every UMD out their to a digital version? I’m sure publishers wouldn’t be excited about that. The reason they like the Go is the digital distribution defends against used sales, but they’d have to honor used copies as part of the conversion program because there’s no way to filter them out. And Sony would have to go to every single rights holder who has ever made a PSP game and not only convince them to make their games available on PSN, but play ball on this very questionable, free for all conversion program. The legal expense alone of trying to hash out a deal doesn’t make sense considering the possible gains. Add in to that the expense of developing and running the upgrade service as well. How is that going to work? Kiosks? A mail in center? We’re talking millions and millions of dollars here to appease the tiny, tiny fraction of PSP owners who will actually want to upgrade.
And that’s the ultimate thing to realize about the PSP Go. It’s not designed around the needs and desires of current PSP owners. The new size, form factor, distribution model and features were created specifically to address the complaints of everyone out there who might have bought a PSP if it wasn’t so big, short on battery life and reliant on optical media. But saying the PSP Go is not a good purchase for someone who already has a PSP and a library of UMD games is not the same as saying it’s a bad purchase in general. Current owners have something that works for them. The PSP Go’s introduction doesn’t take anything away from their experience, in fact they will be able to take advantage of the increased emphasis on downloadable games as well as anyone.
But there are still lots of people out there who would love to have this new, more portable, more convenient and feature-rich version of the PSP.
Sony has plenty of good reasons not to spend money on their consumers. Why doesn’t Sony say that in the first place rather than making promises they won’t keep?
Like any company, Sony has to balance the interests of customers, parter businesses like retailers and publishers and their own shareholders. These factors are obvious and implicit in any piece of PR a company produces and it’s excessive to hold Sony to the unreasonable standard of making that fact explicit every time they release information for public consumption. As for promises being kept, I can’t recall they’ve ever made any actual promises regarding the PSPgo. They responded to questions about upgrading existing customer’s UMD libraries to digital for the Go by saying they were actively looking in to it. The closest we can come to an actual broken promise is they fell short of the ~300 titles they were going to have at launch, but that blame lies mostly with publishers who’ve dragged their feet or various licensing issues.
Did Jim Sterling bang *your* mom, Brad? If you want to bitch about other people’s bitching, at least get off your high horse before you do it.
Yeah, because the PSP Go can make phone calls, access the internet via 3G, has built-in GPS and compass, and so on. Right.
Allow me to translate that for you: “I’m so used to marketing shills and corporate doublespeak that it’s all *obvious* to me. Therefore I’ll insist that it is ‘unreasonable’ for Sony not to do this despite the fact that I have no valid argument whatsoever to support that insistence.”
I only bring up the iPhone comparison because people like to compare prices, but the fact is there is hundreds of dollars of unavoidable service contract you have to pay if you want one, whether you plan to use all the services or not. And there’s no price competition for that since it’s tied to a single carrier. The iPhone is an undeniably nice device, for people who can afford the $300 PLUS 2 years of $80 a month cell phone bills. The PSPgo is $250, no strings attached.
Actually, it’s more of an “I’m not an entitled prick who makes ludicrous demands on a company when I don’t get everything always for free.” Should Sony have to explain why they don’t hand out PSPgos for free, door to door? Should Apple have to disclose the fact that the every Mac is priced to give them a pretty obscene mark-up every time they introduce a new model? Heck, should Best Buy have to explain in their upcoming release schedules that these games, movies and CDs are delivered by trucks and they can’t be held responsible if a shipment comes late? This is business. We’re customers, not babies. Use your head and it’s pretty easy to see why things have happened the way they have. Companies have to deal with a lot of different pressures, and just because some jackass like Jim Sterling is blind to that fact doesn’t make Sony poorly run. If you can’t understand these realities you’re either an imbecile, or blinded by your animosity to something as silly as a consumer electronics company.
I deny this completely