During an EGX developer session Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony Computer Entertainment, was asked about Sony’s plans for the PS Vita and what could come next. Yoshida said he loved working with the device but warned that, “the climate is not healthy for now because of the huge dominance of mobile gaming.”. He also said that the smartphone gaming market, and the abundance of free and free to play games, was much easier for consumers even if the Vita was designed for gaming.
It shouldn’t come as a big surprise that Sony isn’t planning on a follow up to it’s handheld. While the Vita and PSP were certainly popular they weren’t runaway successes. And the rise of smartphone gaming, especially in markets like Japan, makes it harder for any company attempting to carve out a market share.
Now the question remains, as the Nintendo 3DS begins to age, will Nintendo also choose to bow out from the handheld gaming scene. Nintendo essentially help popularize handheld gaming with the original Gameboy and would only have smarthphones to compete with for the time being. Rumors are abound that the NX will have some sort of mobile component or connectivity but that remains to be seen. Is there still room for dedicated handhelds anymore or do we all really need to be texting and checking Twitter at the same time?
You can watch the entire developer session from EGX below:
