Traveler's Tales founder: PSP Go will die if downloads don't get cheaper

You know what? If I could play PSP downloads on my PS3, Sony would get a huge chunk of my change. Then again, if Nintendo would just let me put my VC purchases on my DSi, or let me buy them over again for my DSi, they would be rolling in even more cash. Would you guys put me in charge of something already?

Sony needs to have temporary sales on new games so as not to piss off retail. Or they can have the dowload versions cheaper if they can some how make the umd versions look like a better value to the retailers with pack ins(dlc, themes,etc.). Its all about keeping price parity.

Honestly, I don't think they care lol. I think Sony never meant for this to be a high volume device... just somewhat profitable, and a platform for other developers to actually start SELLING games instead of getting them torrented.

If anything, its more like a trial for them to test out their digital distribution technology, make sure its flawless for PSP2 --> get the insane FPS's with dual analogs, and we have a winner!

The only way the Go will survive:

1. The costs of downloads becomes less than the cost of new UMDs
2. People get too lazy to go the store, or too impatient to order the UMDs online and wait for it to be shipped to their home.

We're well on our way to #2, but #1 is probably a ways off...

If the games were significantly cheaper than umd's, I would upgrade from my 2000 in a heart beat. The only way i would get a psp go, would be for the games being somewhere close to 15 to 20 bucks max. The price of the downloads has to be low enough to offset the inconveniences of the platform.

I had the first gen PSP and loved it. I ultimately got rid of it a year later because it was too damn expensive to get new games while also getting games for my xbox, computer... Too bad it's a great piece of equipment.

For all the DD haters, the gaming industry wants it (except for gamestop and gamefly) and many consumers want it. I personally love it. I live in a rural area and the best buy is a half hour away, I'm too busy with life to get good use out of gamefly, and I dont give a crap about sharing games with others. DD is just too convenient and when places like steam have sales, I don't have to get my bony ass to the store to take advantage. Not to mention less carbon footprint from production and logistics.

No one cares about your gaming trophy case and the industry would get more money in sales if gamestop wasn't re-selling their shiat. The more money the studios get the better budjets they can place on AAA stuff (or profit mongering).

DD FTW!!!

Well, I don't know what publishers in the West (US/Europe) are thinking when they price their digital copies of their games, but I know that in Japan, prices are about 15% cheaper on the PSN than in retail. That's the rule for all Sony games and for the vast majority of other publishers in Japan (some of them do put higher price than UMD though).

It's high time the US and EU follow that trend...

I think they should keep doing what they're doing so as to kill the Go. It's a pretty useless device anyway. The regular PSP is a fine device and, in my opinion, there is no need for the Go. I've used it and find that the buttons are pretty uncomfortable to play with. The regular PSP emulates the feel of a PlayStation controller nicely, but these buttons are too "clicky" and flush to the surface. Plus, only 16 gigs of on-board memory is hardly enough for a system dedicated to downloading full games onto it. Sure you could expand it, but you can do the same with the regular PSP- and get the same functionality. Plus, the catalog of of UMD games is bound to be quite a bit bigger. There's no way Sony would make every single game released so far for digital download, making some games unplayable. Sure, the PSP is larger than the Go, but it's also got a larger screen and more comfortable controls. In conclusion, PSP Go = fail. Stick with the original. It may seem slightly less convenient, but it's not.

The PSP Go is already dead.

Good.

But, even if downloads get cheaper, there's still no point in buying a PSP Go. The 3000 can do all the important things the Go can, plus you have the option for physical media.

I want a "GO" as a companion to my Itouch in my other pocket, but I'm not willing to pay more than 75% of retail price on games as I would factor in 25-50% Ebay/trade-in in pricing which would make it cheaper overall.

I see the go is droping in price all the time down to £125 in the UK now, but as Itunes has proven I'll buy anything for the equivalent of $2.

I Love my 2000 PSP and just want an excuse to change over but now it's not happening, as the PSP isn't good enough as just a media player alone.

*climb onto soapbox*
Publishers whine about lost income from secondary sales but they miss the fact that the higher initail price has the second sales factored in... If games self distructed after playing you wouldn't pay the prices now for a limited play period.

How about making both versions the same price, so either way it'll be fair.

Part of the problem is the retailers. If Sony is selling downloadable games through it's store at less than MSRP (being as they're the manufacturer), who's to say retailers won't cry foul?

That's the problem with Sony running their own store. Their hands are tied by their own MSRP. Sure, they can have sales, occasionally, but if they consistently priced games lower than MSRP, retailers would be up in arms.

PSP Go is going to die? I would like to ask House M.D. for a 2nd opinion.

I think a big step will be somewhat regular PSP game sales on the store. Knocking $10-15 off the price for a week here and there won't break anybody, and it will drum up sales. If I read on Joystiq, "hey, $10 Gran Turismo PSP on PSN this week" I could get down on that.

Also, some form of full game on demand rental service through PSN for PSP would be terrific!

Sell physical games in the form of memory sticks instead of UMD's. That way retail stores can carry them and all PSP owners can use them. Problem solved. It NEVER made sense to me that the PSP uses UMD's for games when it has a perfectly good memory stick slot, especially after the hacking community showed that you can indeed play full games from it.

This goes for all things digital but retailers are holding it back.

Somebody mentioned MS and it's "games on demand". I can only guess those insane prices are working because before they renamed it "games on demand" it was Xbox Originals or something and old games were and still are $15!

*...PSP Go will die - there, fixed.

I'm fine with the concept of the PSP go, but the fact that you can do everything you can on a PSP 3000 that you can on a PSP go, and *more*, and it's *cheaper*, is insulting. Oh I almost forgot, the memory cards are different sizes between the PSP's also.

Kill the PSP go, the PSP go is dead, long live the PSP X000.

we all want digital titles to be cheaper but retailer are forcing Sony to keep prices high (reason being they dont want to be underpriced be PS Store), just look how retailer (gamestop) don't stock up on pc games ..... they dont have a resale market. USED sales dont help developers at all, they money come from the original sale (oh btw that's the retailer like gamestop not the end user that's us). Retailer make their money from us, then they (gamestop) RAP us with piss poor trade in deals and overpriced used game sales.Sony needs better sales (and more offen), maybe offer a trade in program, and add a rental service to drive up sales on the psp go, it's a cool system that i really enjoy ..... hope Sony get it together just look at what apple did with itunes.

Phat will rule the world yet

This guy has got a point, Amazon Kindle books for instance ARE cheaper then the hard copy versions.

Hey, no worries, guys! The pirates will solve this problem soon enough. If Sony doesn't wise up, the hackers will crack the PSP Go, then pirates will load PSP games onto memory sticks and avoid the overpriced versions of games in favor of pirated versions.

Which is why Sony needs to get it together and stop overcharging for PSP games on PSN. It's ridiculous that I can get a new PSP game from Best Buy, with packaging and resale value included, for LESS than the cost of the same game WITHOUT packaging, resale value, manuals, etc. from PSN.

When I get books for my Kindle, I sometimes pay 50% less than the hardcover version. That's worth it to me. I'll do that.

Why should Sony earn all the money that was once going toward packaging, shipping, etc. as pure profit? Why not pass the savings on to consumers instead of being so damned TRANSPARENT in their greed?

I love my PSP, Sony, but you guys really screwed the pooch with the PSN store games. Just stop it. Either provide a discount for digital versions, or accept that you're pretty much asking PSP Go owners to pray for the device to get hacked.

The thing about free market capitalism is that the consumers-- not the provider-- determine the actual value of something. If people buy fewer overpriced PSN games, then Sony makes less money than they would if they slashed the price in the first place.

The PSP Go is such a fricking disaster.

2 words HA HA.I still have my old PSP-1001.

Yeah, PSN has to not only compete with retail store selling at a lower price at launch, used games trade-ins but also ISO. Only low price can attract people to download. For me I only bought Motorstorm because I got a PSPGo to test out the game. I didn't even other buying GTA Chinatown, Assassin's Creed Bloodline nor LBP

I think retail stores should start selling downloadable games so Sony can't control all the pricing at MSRP.

Amazon has been selling Xbox Live Arcade for awhile, it's only a matter of time for them to sell PSP downloadable games.

everyone let me just say that the regular psp's are better than the psp go because u can download games and buy games from the store also
and plus the psp go u need credit cards all the time if u need reasons y psp gos are bad just fing the aneswer on google i am not a pervert to give u guys my email