The PlayStation Vita TV (aka PlayStation TV) launched in Japan back in November 2013. Today, via AV Watch, Sony confirmed that it will cease shipping the hardware (in Japan, at least) at the end of February. That’s today.
According to AV Watch, the reason Sony gave is that, in Japan, while the PS Vita TV was originally designed as an easy way for people to play games on a home console, now, the PS Vita is doing well, as is the PS4. It sounds like the PlayStation TV isn’t really needed any more.
The PlayStation Vita TV’s official Japanese site states the microconsole is no longer being shipped (出荷完了 or shukka kanryou, which translates to “shipping has concluded” or “shipping has ended”). The PlayStation.com page does not mention anything.
What does this mean for the West? AV Watch also reports that Sony will no longer be pushing the PlayStation TV name outside the country. Kotaku reached out to Sony for clarification, but did not hear back prior to publication.
In case you missed it, here is Kotaku‘s review of the PlayStation TV (AKA PlayStation Vita TV), which launched in the West in 2014.
[AV Watch]
Comments
5 responses to “Sony Is Killing The PlayStation TV In Japan”
It was a bit of a wasted opportunity.
I bought one on the cheap to use as a PS4 streamer but it didn’t even do that very well (even over wired network, or perhaps it was my network that was the problem). I don’t own a Vita but have been getting the free PS+ games anyway, and a fair chunk of those aren’t even compatible with the PSTV.
It might have been better if it came with a controller that acted as a screenless vita (with touch panels on the back and front) so it could play the full Vita library, or they could have at least patched alternate control schemes for the Vita library so that it could be played on a PS3/4 controller.
Not just you, well known issue that the PSTV had bad networking, which blows my mind because I think a lot of people only even wanted it for this feature. Streaming to a Vita from a PS4 is also pretty mixed since the PS4 has bad wifi, and even via a router the Vita streaming isn’t perfect (tends to start hitching after a few minutes).
I had a vita and one of these. I assume it’d function exactly as the Vita for streaming from the ps4, it didn’t. Also the fact that the library of vita games it could play was a whole lot more limited, I returned it a couple of days after.
So basically business as usual? I bought a PSTV when they first came out and it’s been a mix of regret and, well, not regret. It’s fantastic having an easy way to play my (supported) Vita and PSP games on a big screen with a controller but Sony’s insistence on it just being a Vita that can connect to a TV has meant that it never reached the massive amount of potential it had to be a great companion device for the Vita and to a lesser extent, PS4. Hopefully the NX inspires Sony to rethink the strategy assuming it’s what I think it is.
I’ve had my PSTV for about a year and use it almost daily. I’ve got it hooked up to a monitor in the study, so I can still play PS4 when the wife’s watching TV.
There is a little bit of input latency, so it’s not great for games which require fast reflexes. But for everything else, your brain just adapts to it pretty quickly to the point where I don’t even notice it.
The only real gripes I have with it is 1) 720p only, and 2) no support for headset on controller.
It’s not perfect, sure. But if it wasn’t for this device, my PS4 would only get about 10% of the use it currently gets.
A BIG piece of advice for those who still have bad latency and quality, though. The usual advice is to use a wired network. This is very important but is generally a no-brainer. Sony provided an update to the PS4 firmware, in which you can enable higher quality remote-play quality in the system settings. This takes the two extra cpu cores which are normally used for streaming and game recording [and disables it in the process] and dedicates them to remote-play streaming instead. Turning this on was a complete game changer for me!