13 Facts About PlayStation Vita

PlayStation Vita is a handheld video game console developed and marketed by Sony Interactive Entertainment.

PlayStation Vita's design was intended to meld the experience of big-budget, dedicated video game platforms with the then up-and-coming trend of mobile gaming as seen on smart phones and tablets.

The PlayStation Vita launched with 26 titles in Japan, with Sony announcing that there were over 100 titles in development prior to the system's release overall.

The PlayStation Vita launched in the west with 25 titles, including original titles such as Uncharted: Golden Abyss and Wipeout 2048, and ports of games such as FIFA 12 and Rayman Origins.

Sales of the PlayStation Vita started strong at launch but then stalled and greatly underperformed.

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The heavier support from Japan, in turn, helped support the system in the West as well, with many games in the Atelier, Ys, Danganronpa, Persona, and Trails series localized into English on the PlayStation Vita, or made playable through the system's backward compatibility with digital PSP games.

The PlayStation TV, released across late 2013 and 2014, aimed to expand the system's userbase by allowing for Vita games to be played on a television like a home console, though the device was discontinued in the West by the end of 2015, and did not fare well in Japan's handheld-focused region either.

In November 2014, SCEA president Shawn Layden suggested that the new approach was working on hardware level, stating that PlayStation Vita sales had increased since the implementation of PS4 Remote Play, though he and another Sony representative did not give specific figures.

In March 2016, Sony announced that instead, it would be forming a new company, "Forward Works", and be instead concentrating on bringing PlayStation Vita-based games to mobile platforms like iOS and Android.

At the 2016 Game Developers Conference, research analyst firm EEDAR estimated the sales of the PlayStation Vita to be about at 10 million unit sold through the end of 2015.

At the time of the announcement, USgamer estimated that the PlayStation Vita userbase had grown to approximately 16 million units.

Software for the PlayStation Vita is distributed on a proprietary flash memory card called "PlayStation Vita game card" rather than on Universal Media Discs as used by the PlayStation Portable.

The lack of interest from Sony's first-party teams reverberated to third-party developers, who felt the Vita was not worth the effort to develop for over the upcoming PlayStation 4, leaving the Vita without a strong software library.