Lessons Learned From PSP Go: Gamers Want Physical Media

Kris Erickson • Jun 11, 2010 • Comments ()

Comments from SCEE president Andrew House lend support to the rumor that a possible PSP 2 will make use of physical media of some kind. When asked what Sony leadership thought about the lackluster performance of the PSP Go hardware, House expertly avoided calling the device a failure. Instead, he claimed that the product line has been an experiment this whole time, so the company is unconcerned about low sales numbers. We wonder what he would have said if the PSP Go had been a tremendous success at retail.

While this is obviously an outlandish comment, there is one useful nugget of information in the Sony spin-doctor's response. The company is now utterly convinced that video game consoles will only be successful if they can accept physical media:

"It was introduced in a mature life cycle to learn more about what the consumer wanted and we've definitely learned a lot. Is that measured by success in sales? I don't think it is. One of the reasons we launched PSP Go was to understand where that consumer behavior was going. We were getting signals from consumers that this was the kind of device that they wanted. But we need to recognize that consumers like their packaged media library."

Based on the disadvantages of spinning optical media (battery drain, added system bulk), we'd be surprised if Sony unveils a UMD redux with the next hardware revision. Instead we're pretty convinced that the PSP 2 will accept games on mini cartridges, much like the Nintendo DS.