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Why Is the PSP Such a Massive Success in Japan?

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PSP World Writes:

"Sony may be struggling to wrest market share away from Nintendo in the handheld gaming space, but in at least one territory they have already achieved what some thought was impossible. The PSP has sold more than 10 million units in Japan alone, and the success of the console seems to be accelerating. During much of 2008, the PSP sold more on a weekly basis than even the mighty Nintendo DS, proving that Sony had well and truly sliced off a pie of the Japanese handheld gaming market."
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pspworld.com
clinker - contributor
Published: 270 days 6 hours ago | Article | Sony PSP | Gaming | Industry News
 
 

Showing: 1 - 21 of 21 Comments
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clinker - 270 days 6 hours ago
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1 -
I wonder if piracy is less of a problem in Japan? For some reason, Japanese developers have not been scared away from the system the way western devs have.

In fact, it seems like Japanese publishers are tripping over themselves trying to get new titles onto the device over there.
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andron666 - 270 days 6 hours ago
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1.1 - I guess japanese devs like the low cost of developing for the PSP...
I think that plays into it too. They have much experience making PS2 games, that easily transfers to PSP.

And since Japanese people seem to like gaming on the go there is a much larger market...
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CrazzyMan - 270 days 5 hours ago
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1.2 - PSP slim + MH2 :)
After that, Japanese developers saw, that games can sell on PSP and that PSP can sell greatly itself, after slim model release. =)

Looking forward to PS3 slim and FFXIII+GT5. :)
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Kigmal - 270 days 4 hours ago
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1.3 -
That's because everyone in Japan owns like 3 DS's already. They have to buy the PSP sometime.
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pain777pas - 270 days 2 hours ago
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1.4 -
PSP can put out pretty good games. Alpha3, tekken, Ridge racer, Wipeout, lumines, FFgames and GOW:CC just to name a few.
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pwnsause - 270 days 6 hours ago
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2 - "Why Is the PSP Such a Massive Success in Japan?"
-RPGs
-coming out with new skus with different colors
-a ton of services that PSPs in NA dont have.
-its a very attractive portable.

@clinker
thanks for telling him what I meant by that. bubbles up
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FelinePornographer - 270 days 6 hours ago
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2.1 -
"-a ton of services that PSPs in NA dont have."

Will you describe them?
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clinker - 270 days 6 hours ago
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2.2 -
Actually, he's right.

In Japan, the PSP has GPS, online tunnelling thru PS3, camera and video editor, and TV streaming over wifi.
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Steven Colbert - 270 days 6 hours ago
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2.3 -
Also JPN store gets more PSP themes and demos not to mention they also get a much larger catalog of PS1 games for download
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ThanatosDMC - 270 days 5 hours ago
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2.4 -
Also, their Monster Hunter games are connected via infrastructure and not ad-hoc like the rest of the world.
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pwnsause - 270 days 5 hours ago
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2.5 -
the PSP looks to continue that momentum it carries thru 09 with games like Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, Parasite eve: the third birthday, and a few 1st party games.

the only problems that the PSP has is price and a weak lineup, and when I mean weak lineup, I mean, there isnt a huge goldmine of games coming out year by year, but in terms of quality, PSP games are amazing.

I would gladly sacrifice that goldmine for Quality.
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silvacrest - 270 days 3 hours ago
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2.6 - price isnt a problem
you can get a used PSP for £74 in the UK and even cheaper if you look on the net also, all the extra functions the japaness get can be get by anyone via homebrew

the sheer amount of homebrew apps avalible has made my psp much more then a simple handheld and being able to get 32GB (64 in the future) makes it functionallity limitless
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ThanatosDMC - 270 days 1 hour ago
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2.7 -
I'm actually looking around for a PSP-2000 to replace my fat one. I dont want to get the PSP-3000 because of the screen lines or whatever you call it.
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ultimolu - 270 days 6 hours ago
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3 -
Rpgs?
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cmrbe - 270 days 6 hours ago
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4 - Handheld
is alot more popular in Japan and PSP have alot of games specific to the Japanese market.
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v1c1ous - 270 days 5 hours ago
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5 - easy
RPGs

which consequently explains the PSP's ho-hum performance outside of japan.
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Nightwing12 - 270 days 5 hours ago
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6 - Easy my friend RPG's
For example, take a look at http://www.joystiq.com/2009... Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G which just sold over 3 million in Japan and it's very easy to see why the handheld is doing so well over there. What we need in the US is more original IP's. Forget remakes of games we already own on consoles. The DS has so many original games, how about Sony taking some of those games for starters. The PSP has so much untapped potential it's f**ing ridiculous.
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farhsa2008 - 270 days 5 hours ago
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7 -
well if you think its been a success now, think of how big it would be if more third party devs created more games
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8 Iceman100 | 270 days 1 hour ago - User only got 1 bubble - Show
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jams_shop - 270 days ago
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Why Is the PSP Such a Massive Success in Japan? PSP is massive success in Japan because there are new games coming all the time.
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Argento-Nox - 269 days 23 hours ago
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I think the psp will do fine, it's got some really good looking titles coming to NA down the line; like FF dissidia, Resistance retribution, MLB the show 09, 2 level-5 rpgs (forgot names), parasite eve 3rd birthday, LocoRoco 2, Patapon 2, Tales of Radiant Mythology 2, Kingdom Hearts: Birth by sleep etc.

I don't expect Sony to take the crown from Nintendo for handheld systems any time soon, but I think they've done what no one expected. Sony's taken a huge chunk of the handheld market, even if it's only a third or so of the pie. I think the future of the PSP2 is looking quite bright if Sony can continue to bring back 3rd party support for the current psp.
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