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PSP Not A Sellout Hit
MilenCent writes "We're starting to see our first mainstream media reports on the PSP's (lack of) sales performance, from the Seattle Times: "But while Sony is touting the rollout as a success -- and many retailers did sell their entire stock -- the event might not have been the complete blockbuster that was expected." In summary, the article says that more systems were sold than not, that dedicated gaming stores were more likely to sell out than department stores like Target, and that the biggest reason gamers didn't pick it up is likely its price -- which wasn't helped by some retailers' sale condition that customers also purchase games, which could raise the price to nearly $350. Will demand pick up once the unit is out there and seen by people, or will it take a price cut before the system sells satisfactorily?"
.. you could buy a regular console and still have plenty left over.
Having good games other than Lumines might help. Also, having games that don't cost $40. The DS at least had backwards compatibility on it's side, which is probably why it did so well despite also having a weak launch lineup.
--The universe will not be altered by forum threads, even those which are very wry. --Tycho Brahe (Penny Arcade)
My laptop has no dead pixels. My GBA SP has no dead pixels.
But that's already been covered, it's absolutely unacceptable for a screen the size of the PSP to have any dead pixels.
But it doesn't really matter, since I'm not really in the market for a new hand-held right now. My SP suits me just fine.
If I wind up getting one, I'm waiting until at least the first or second hardware revision. I've seen way too many friends get burned (literally in the case of the PS ;p) by crappy first-gen SCE hardware. I'm especially nervous about the drives. The PS2 isn't even portable, and the first generation of drives had tons of problems with laser focus. Of all the people I know with first-gen machines (quite a few), almost all of them have had to have theirs fixed/replaced. The one who hasn't complains about skipping and stuttering. Knowing this, it doesn't take much imagination to come up with serious doubts/concerns about the PSP's robustness.
Those with lots of time to play something like this will likely skip over the thing that doesn't give them much time to play with it.
What's this, a FUD checklist? Apart from the price and the games (which are obviously a matter for you and you alone), all the other items have been proven to be untrue:
2. Ninja star discs are a hack people do deliberately by applying considerable force to the eject mechanism. They never happen spontaneously or by accident.
3. Nubs falling off? Not even heard of this one.
4. Square button sticking was confirmed to be a mfr fault and they are replacing the small number units with this problem.
5. Square button sensor position is just a lame reason the internet community invented for the above problem. Actually it was glue in the wrong place.
6. They've announced they'll replace all LCDs with dead pixels.
So you're down to 2 reasons - too expensive and not enough games. Well, I guess you're not what we call an "early adopter" then. That puts you in the center 80% of the bell curve, as you might expect.