Japanese hardware sales, Dec. 7 - Dec. 13: Wrap it up edition

My recommendation is to go with a PSP-2000. I found the quality of the PSP-3K's screen to be worse than that of the 1K/2K. Plus, they are easier to hack than the 3K (not impossible to do so, but easier on the 2K).

Why hack?
There's homebrew, for one. PSP makes for a great portable emulator (Anything prior to the 3D consoles works fairly well, as do several arcade boards). And many, non-emulation related homebrew apps (my favorite being PSPTube, which allows you to watch videos from ANY streaming media site).
You can easily convert any PSone game to be playable on PSP (well... depending on the control scheme).
And you can use the PSP itself to make ISO backups of any UMD game, and then play it off of the Memory Stick. Thus, your game library isn't limited to what's available on PSN (and you can get many games for cheaper than the PSN prices), and you'll still have the benefit of faster load times.

The only downside (currently) with going the custom firmware route is that PSN is blocked to all but the latest firmware, and CFW has been stuck at 5.50 for some time. You can still download PSN stuff, but not directly through the PSP itself. It has to be done through the PC application, or through a PS3, then transferred to the PSP.

The PSP Go... I can't justify it, especially at its current price. Yes, the form factor is nice and so is the 16GB internal... but you sacrifice a good portion of the PSP's library for it (not to mention, the ability to sell them, should you hate the game). And then they swapped from the pricey Memory Stick PRO Duo to the even pricier Memory Stick Micro (for added storage).

khan, what the hell are you talking about? haha. i have a hacked 2000, and i've bought a couple games off the PSN straight from the PSP store.

but i do agree with the suggestion to get a 2000 and hack it. the 2000 is the best PSP IMO.

Exactly what I was thinking...l

The DS sales are split over three consoles. If you add the DSi, DS Lite and DS Colossus up then you get sales of 140,000

From last week's post:

"For the PSP, it was Phantasy Star Portable 2 (286,896 units) and a game called -- we swear we're not making this up -- Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam vs. Gundam Next Plus (222,985 units)."

@Huh: Yeah, but of course you have to remember, the same thing applies to PSP. So you have to add up the PSP and PSP Go sal- oh wait, it's still exactly the same... ;)

Some good stuff there. Arkham Asylum was the only big release I didn't snap up (not sure about Borderlands yet), so it's on my list as well.

Darth, you seriously need to go pick up borderlands. it literally have thousands of gun and the multiplayer rocks my socks.

I'm having to replace my 360, so that's putting a crimp in my 'exploratory' purchasing at the moment.

Should be a merry christmas, especially given the diversity of that lineup.

What i'm technically getting for christmas is Tales, Crystal Bearers, and a mystery downloadable game for Wii via secret santa. Should be good for all this free time i'm getting.

And yeah, I might need to get new headphones. Any suggestion for great gaming headphones?

I think Borderlands is underwhelming at best ... so far anyway. Don't see the big deal in loading screens and random loot.

All I want is a new rifle ... preferably an AK-47. Already got a new pistol grip and recoil reducing stock for my tactical shotgun and kevlar shooting gloves for my pistol. So, in that respect I'm good. I'm sure I'll get some games or something and maybe that split fish dual frag controller which looks pretty tight.

And let me go on, in the spirit of Christmas (since everyone else is mostly concerned with sales numbers in this post and I don't give a crap about that).

This year I bought games for most of my friends. For my PS3 owning friends I tend to buy games that I want someone I know to co-op with, like Saints Row 2 or Resident Evil 5. I don't like co-op with random people as they randomly could be idiots.

For a girl I know that has a Wii and gets easily frightened by horror movies; Resident Evil 4. >:-D

For a 360-owning friend: Dead Space. Because everyone should own that game.

Anyone else buy games as presents?

Yeah, I'm giving NFS Shift and Midnight Club LA to my little brother, and Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games to my sister.

It's the only real way to get new GBA hardware these days...

Maybe some people would rather get the cheaper DS. Ever think about that, son?

Longer battery life, GBA slot, cheaper.. there are probably other things there too - like not having to worry about scratching up the cameras its got all over it.

DSiware has future potential but otherwise I'd just by a light for the reasons listed above. I'm not Beyonce, I don't need to dick around with photos and check my facebook.

@Brad
Yeah I hear you

@Cheezie
Well why not just save up an additional $50 for the Dsi then?

@Mabui and Jesus
Well lets say you still have a GBA/SP lying around, then what? I highly doubt most people going out to buy a Ds/Dsi knows how long it can live before it needs to charge.
Plus when it comes to price, you could just wait a little longer so you can save up the additional money to buy a Dsi.

I personally haven't made the jump to a Dsi because it's not doing anything spectacular when it comes to Dsiware games so I'll hold out until I see a few must own Dsiware/Dsi only titles come out.

Just saying.

100% sounds like a lot, but it's really not when it only sold 5,000 in the first place.

Some day - PSP go might be a good thing.

Some day..

Maybe.

if it was cheaper it'd sell better. on the bright side it highlights the value of the psp 3000 and has boosted its sales.

Conker...Microsoft really needs to sell Rare back to Nintendo. They've killed them.

Of course, they'd need the Stamper brothers back...

The stamper brothers sounds like an old game in the 16 bit era. Like a Mario Bros knockoff or something.

@Johnny:
I don't think price is all there is to it. While it hasn't been setting the world on fire, it has been doing better elsewhere. From my understand, the general feeling of Japanese game players is that they're not fond of digital distribution, and prefer to actually "own" their games

And the Stamper brothers were the former owners of Rare. But I don't thinking going back to Nintendo would help Rare, as it's clear the talent that existed in that company back in the N64 days and earlier is now gone.

It probably would've sold more if it was called "Fantasy Warfare 2."

And this, gentlemen, is why the rest of the world doesn't like the USA.

Well, that's plenty enough really, digital distribution isn't necessarily a bad idea per se, but it is when it's more expensive than UMDs, fewer games available than on UMD, can't trade in/resell digital copies of games (For when you don't like a game or are just finished with it), the PSP Go costs more than a PSP-3000...

Sony basically released a device that does less and costs more, and shockingly enough: it's failing in a huge way, who'd have thought?