The Sony PlayStation Vita officially launches today, bringing with it over two dozen video games and a host of promises. Without a new version of the PlayStation console announced, Sony is clearly counting on the PS Vita to revive a few of the prestige lost in the gaming world with the troubles dogging its PlayStation Network.
Whether that will happen remains to be observed, of course, but I can say that the Vita is a remarkable achievement in handheld video gaming devices. Vita’s limited design and comparative lack of moving parts work to improve its durability. Not merely have I let my 9- and 11-year-old kids play with it, but they and it has been lowered by me several times and it still appears brand new. It fits in two hands comfortably, with miniaturized versions of the PlayStation controls that work nicely, even if using the tiny dual analog joysticks did make my hands cramp up after some time. But I’ve large hands unusually, which means that your mileage might differ.
- Allocate development checklists to the various developers
- Must be comfortable speaking and showing to clients
- You will receive your figures via email, and you need to down load them
- Home Appliances
Having touch features on the trunk of the Vita as well as on the front display can be an interesting innovation, one which I found cumbersome at first but grew able to handle with reasonable adeptness gradually. The front and back cameras are low-res enough that nobody will probably utilize them much when planning on taking photos or videos, but serve very well in their primary function: enabling the augmented-reality feature of the device.
Top everything off with an ARM Cortex-A9 quad-core processor, a quad-core graphics processor and 512 megabytes of RAM and you’ve got a powerhouse of a handheld. The PS Vita will more than simply play video games. It includes a browser, but one you’re only likely to use for quickly looking something up as it’s pretty mediocre by today’s standards. Google Maps is also included, which works pretty much as you’d expect if you’ve ever used it on a smartphone or tablet.
Vita comes with an app called Near, which adds a sociable aspect to the device by displaying you nearby Vita users, what they’re playing and what trophies they’ve won. As I only had one Vita to test, I wasn’t in a position to test this app, but I understand that it can maintain privacy criteria. The device also includes a content manager, which really is a well-designed app that allows you to transfer information between the Vita and a PS3 or computer.
And then there’s the remote control play feature, that was notoriously implemented on the PSP badly. I had been only in a position to obtain it to work a little bit and then really slowly, but Sony has promised that it will improve shortly dramatically, after more PS3 games come out that allow the feature especially.
You can also watch videos and pay attention to music on the Vita, and it seems to do fine at both just, but it’s no serious danger to the better smartphones with regard to either. But, let’s face it, no one is going to buy the Vita for just about any of those simple things. The clear selling point of the device, and Sony knows this clearly, is the games.