New Versus Old (ish)

A friend of mine posted a blog today about the Sony Vita versus the Wii U.

For those who are unfamiliar, the Sony Vita is Sony's new handheld console that, much like the PSP, can connect/interact with the PS3. In the case of the Vita, as opposed to the PSP, it can send information not only to but also receive from the PS3, can be used in place of a television (good for those single-television homes) when playing on the PS3, is a stand-alone handheld console, has a touch screen, motion sensors, and WiFi/G3 access for on-the-go gaming.

The Wii U is Nintendo's newest handheld console that connects directly to the Wii, can be used in place of a television, has motion censors, a touch screen, and you can play Wii games on directly (the thing is huge). It is not an independent handheld console; it's more like a portable Wii than anything else.

Sony is attempting to dominate the console market, which is fine, I mean, that's the purpose of industry competition, right? But there are some cons along with the pros for the Vita, just like there are some cons for the U.

The biggest con I can see for the Sony Vita is the price tag. Current set price is $250-$300, which may not seem overly expensive for a console, even a handheld, but when you consider the speed at which the gaming industry is developing new platforms, the fact that it's so similar to the PSP is working against it. While it's true that the PSP isn't "backward compatable" (i.e. you can only play PSP games on it, and sync them with the PS3 so they're visible on the television as opposed to the handheld screen) and the Vita is (you can run games on the PS3 and connect to play on the Vita), I can see fewer instances where it would be necessary to play a PS3 game on the Vita. Also, the WiFi/G3 feature will be all but pointless so long as there are no other Vita owners to connect to. The most you're going to get out of it is downloading games, and to store them, the Vita has no internal memory. Yep, you have to buy a flash card for it, which only adds to the cost (because let's face it, are you really going to want a tiny, cheap flash card to store your games *and* saves, or are you going to go for a higher capacity, better constructed, and more expensive card?). All in all, I think the Vita will be a great handheld for those who can afford it and are interested in the potential titles associated with it, but maybe not for the average gamer who finds the PSP and PS3 combo sufficient.

The Wii U is... HUGE. It makes for an awkward controller at best, and based on the way Wii games are designed, with the motion sensor in mind, a hair pulling trial of patience at worst. In order to prevent the motion sensor from going crazy you have to hold it at a specific angle (which is more or less directly in front of your face, parallel to the wall), and it involves full body motion to direct. Nope, no flick of the wrist control as with the basic Wii controllers, if you want to keep control of your game your entire body gets a workout, thanks to the large and unwieldy design. This one's price tag is also brought into question - it's been stated it will likely be more expensive than the Wii, which was $250 at launch. That means the U will be at least $300, if not more, considering it's more or less a high definition motion censored tablet. With the U you'd be able to play Wii on the go (it does come with accessory ports, so no worries there), but I'm not sure it gets any more exciting than that.

And, after the baby demanding I feed him RIGHT NOW, I've lost my train of thought for the rest of this entry. How very uninformative of me.