Why Did The Vita Take A Back Seat At E3?

As many of us who watched the Sony conference may have noticed, the Vita was scarce throughout the presentation. Most gamers were expecting a huge Vita blowout of games and features being announced left and right, but what we were shown were a few games (Assassins Creed and Call of Duty) and the announcement of Playstation Classics. Sure those are great games and the possibility of having a growing library of Playstation games is a great idea, but aside from that there wasn’t much to offer to fans who invested into a system that hasn’t supplied a notable selection of games.

[Cablephish]

Because the Wonderbook took the front seat and stole the show... :S

[ABizzel1]

Exactly, and it's unfortunate because the Vita actually have over 20 games at the show.

[SoundGamer]

Which is just as, if not more important than the keynote address/conference.

E3 is not just a set of conferences for gamers to watch on TV and online. It's a trade show and many more Vita games were shown on the floor and behind closed doors.

It really didn't take a back seat except on stage.

[xAlmostPro]

Bloody wonderbook being so epic :(

On topic, i don't think it did take a back seat. They announced more games, more integration and that's all it needed really, unless you're a person who still thinks the device is 'over priced'.

Wonderbook maybe ran longer than it should have but hey there was plenty of awesome stuff for both Vita and PS3

[BattleAxe]

I agree, they announced Playstation All Stars for Vita with cross platform play, Assassins Creed Liberation and Call of Duty Black Ops. Three really big games, but it was weird that they weren't able to show any gameplay footage of Cod for Vita, especially since it is releasing in about 5 months.

[admiralvic]

Too many people are basing opinions off of the conference and not the actual show. To date, the Vita is still stuck with a lot of ports or things that really weren't shown elsewhere either. Atlus didn't display the Golden, XSeed was showing off a Japanese version of Ragnarok, very little on CoD / AC III, so understandably Sony didn't talk about it. However if you went to the show, Sony had QUITE an expansive area for the Playstation Vita.

They were showing off (if I recall correctly...):
Littlebigplanet PS Vita
Jet Set Radio
Sine Mora
Strangers Wrath
Hatsune Miku
Orgarhythm
Munch Odyssey
Gravity Daze
Resistance Burning Skies
Metal Gear Solid
Retro City Rampage
Little King Story (I think)
etc

Beyond that list I know I am forgetting several. There was roughly 15 games showcased, so I am missing a few. However from this list of what I can recall, only 3 games are truly exclusive for the Vita. From what I saw of Oragarhythm, it wasn't worth showing and Littlebigplanet is in Beta mode, so that really only leaves 1 (2 if you really want LBP). With this in mind, Sony prob thought it was better to show that they haven't given up with the far less successful Move.

[smashcrashbash]

Does it really matter? We are not only getting PS1 games to play on the VITA but thirty more games including Assassins Creed VITA and COD VITA. We are still getting the games. People are acting like because the games weren't shown on stage that they don't exist or something. Check all the game sites and Youtube. They are all over them. They showed them to tens of thousands of people on the show room floor who got to play them. How long are we going to b***h about this? Even Sony said they had no time.Did you really expect them to show each of the thirty VITA games on stage? And please don't talk about a montage. Three second glimpses of each game is not any better.

[KUV1977]

Yes it is. Showing VITA-stuff is pretty irrelevant to us VITA-owners but it is important to create desire for people to become new VITA-owners and thus increase the install base and thus improve third party support which in turn will be important for us already VITA owners.

Why have a press conference at all when the stuff that are shown are not important?

That being said, I am really looking forward to Assassin's Creed: Liberation!

[smashcrashbash]

The convention is just as important as the press conference. People seem to think that the press conference is the only part of E3. What makes you think that because I didn't have the time to show everything it isn't important. If it wasn't important then why bring it to E3 at all then. My point is stop acting like because it wasn't paraded on stage. Nintendo barely touched on the games they are getting for the Wii U. Does that make you want a Wii U less? Aren't you still getting games for it. Sony themselves said they had to settle for a shorter conference People make everything sound so simple. 'Just spend three hours talking, no wait make it four hours and spend at least half an hour talking about VITA.It's like people don't seem to realize that businesses have schedules and time tables and budgets. These decisions don't just come out of the blue you know. they are discussed and what ever the CEO says goes whether you agee with it or not. Try owning a business or learning about running one and you would see how many sacrifices you have to make and and how little freedom you have to make them. People think businesses just have wads of cash they just throw around. 'Hey can we spend another hour and a half on stage. Sure screw the budget and the CEOs let's do what the people non business owners posting on the game site say we should do instead'

[KUV1977]

So, spending 10 Minutes on Wonder Book and virtually none on VITA was a smart decision in your book?

And if you read forums people are indeed disappointed by the Nintendo showings and some claim that they are even less interested than they were before and that they won't buy it. Sure most of them overreacht and will still buy it once it is out, but I am not really interested in the Wii U from the beginning but what I saw at the conference didn't change that at all. They showed close to nothing interesting.

If you have a different opinion then fine but all the major gaming sites seem to share my opionion on Wii U and VITA at least. SONY still had the best of the 3 conferences and I don't care little about missing content for myself but as I said. There are thousands of people who watched the conference but were not at the convention afterwards and SONY desperately needs to sell more VITAs so that we will get more games for it in the long run.

[xAlmostPro]

They didn't show virtually none on vita because it was integrated and set with announcements through out.

It had it's own 5 minute-ish set followed by multiple announcements through out the show along side PS3 reveals.

Also Sony revealed plenty before E3 and there's plenty more game conferences to come.

[SandwichHammock]

I agree with you for the most part,but...
For someone like you and me, and excuse me as im assuming here, we are on top of these kinds of things and know just how much is in the pipeline.
from psone classics to zone of enders to warriors lair. What has not happened, and what I think people are nitpicking at, is there was no "mega" unexpected annoucement. Something like,and I know this is very relative, Chrono Break or something. Imagine, a new chrono trigger exclusively for psv with all the boys from chrono cross back on board. I personally would need to change my pants ;)

[jamesensor]

It would help the console's sales to have addictive type of games like Gladiator Begins, Harvest Moons, some stuff like what Kairosoft is doing on android and iphone too, with less loading screens and on-the-fly gaming. Monster Hunter would also help in those matters. Some emulation would also help, apart from what the psx has.

[WagFanger]

God knows. I'm still looking for great, exclusive games to back up my purchase, but so far there are not enough.

[Haha123]

A console that was announced year ago all the development time and all they had to show for it was a COD logo, Assassin's Creed and a lot of PORTS...

[Megaton]

Because the Vita has taken a back seat in consumers' minds and the global market.

[EffectO]

Wonderbook killed it.

[jek7]

they should've shown the games for the vita. although the games are available typical gamers won't look for it in the internet. they will only know the games that are shown in e3

[FinaLXiii]

Sony doesnt know how to play the cards sometimes..

[tehpees3]

Oh they know how to play cards. Just not the right ones. I do believe a price drop will give Vita a boost. And more games. Needs more games.

[avengers1978]

there are already a ton of games to get out for the vita... and lots more on the way.
I already have 7 games for the vita and plan on gravity rush this week.
Go buy one and play the damn thing for a day and tell me your not Impressed by what it can do.

[Outlaw1986]

Bestbuy has buy a vita get a free 50 dollar gift card this week. I already got mine sadly but that is a good deal. I just got to decide wether to get gravity rush or metal gear solid hd collection this week.

[gamingisnotacrime]

selling the point of getting new hardware is usually a burden. Let the gamers enjoy the games (suffer wonderbook) and keep releasing games games games.

I got my vita since early adoption days. truth is once you get one you know it is great and its potential will come through eventually

[HmongAmerican]

Vita game are mostly just console direct port or the other way around.

[avengers1978]

um no

[Gamesgbkiller]

because there is GamesCom next month and it will be Vita only
I HOPE!

[GuyThatPlaysGames]

Because nobody cares about the Vita!!

[DigitalRaptor]

Sony brought loads of Vita games to E3. The problem was that they weren't shown at the conference. Strange!

GamesCom is here next month and that is like the E3, part 2 for Sony in Europe territory. I'm confident that they will show almost all Vita content there. And some PS Move reveals.

[tweet75]

this is the first year that most of big games werent even shown at the press conferences. Its as if the companies are saving big announcements now away from E3

[AgreeFairy]

Because nobody cares about the Vita.

Vita has no games (just ports that are inferior compared to console versions).

[SpinalRemains138]

Maybe it did on television, but as far as I know, E3 is an expo. Where one goes to see everything and walks around to see and try the products.

There were close to 30 operating and playable Vita games there.

[irishyort]

Can I just add to the negativity here by saying, Sony still hasn't struck up a deal with major retailers in Aus.

Not that we seem to matter much down here to the rest of the global gaming community, but gaming has become a majorly significance here to most households, however standard places like KMart, Target, BigW and many other retailers still dont stock the actual handheld or games.

That to me is shocking! How do you sell a system successfully without it being at a countries' major retailers?! That 1.8m worldwide could have easily been pushed beyond 2m if the thing sold everywhere over here.

[Omar91]

im not worried about games for the vita because in my case, i never had a psp so every psp game thats available online I can try out and experience for the first time on top of all the vita games coming out. What I was a bit disappointed about was that like someone above said, there weren't any huge announcements that stood out for the vita. It would of helped if they announced a ps3/vita bundle or from now on each vita will come with a 8GB memory card. Something that will make consumers buy the vita, along with an amazing line up of games. but this didn't happen, so I am still gonna wait until a price drop or something major comes to the vita.

[crazy_gooner]

What a lot of Vita haters don't realize is the unit itself is ahead of anything that can compete with it, in terms of hardware. They've released a good list of games coming out that will do the console very good, but it will also have years ahead. A big add on will be the use of it as a tablet, just how Microsoft will use android devices for smart glass.