PlayStation TV didn't capture consumers' imagination - Yoshida
Sony president of worldwide studios says Vita-based microconsole did lots, but wasn't great at any one thing
The PlayStation TV, Sony's Vita-based experiment in microconsoles, launched in North America last October. Last month, Sony Computer Entertainment president and global CEO Andrew House called it a legacy platform.
Clearly, the system was not successful. In an interview with Game Informer, Sony president of worldwide studios Shuhei Yoshida offered an explanation as to why.
"It didn't capture the consumers' imagination," Yoshida said. "It's a hard concept to explain. You could say it's a mini-console, it's a video streaming device. If we say it's a mini-console, like other mini-consoles, people expect a better device like PS4 or Xbox One. It's short in that delivery. When you say it's a video streaming device, there are other devices with higher def video. It has some unique things like remote play of PS4 games. It can do many things, but it's not easy to say this one thing is extremely good. I think that's the reason we were not able to convince people at the original price."
The PlayStation TV sold for $100 at its US launch ($140 when bundled with a controller and a game), but has been discounted in recent weeks to as low as $40.