By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla
Canadians will finally get their hands on Sony's next generation handheld gaming console the PS Vita. The successor to the PlayStation Portable, the PS Vita is a chock-full of new technology and innovative features. Dual cameras, a multi-touch OLED screen, rear trackpad, dual analog sticks, a quad core processor plus the ability to pick up on PS3 games and continue them on the move.
Sony is going back to the cartridge (or disc) paradigm it abandoned with the PSP Go (which was a download-only device), so while these games are all downloadable titles for the PS Vita, they can also be purchased ones in shrinkwrapped discs costing $30-$50 apiece.....Expensive!
The PS Vita itself retails for $249 and will offer various content streaming and access features such as Netflix and Sony's vast movie rental and music offerings.
I had a few opportunities to try the PS Vita during Sony events as well as at CES 2012. Having owned all the PSP variants through the years, the PS Vita offers a lot of improvements over its predecessors. The large 5-inch OLED screen is simply sublime and we found the graphics quality to be 'near' PlayStation 3 levels on some games. I liked the rear trackpad controller, the dual control sticks and the sixaxis motion control as well as the touchscreen. There's definitely a lot of potential here, not just for games but for other forms of entertainment like Netflix.
We had a chance to speak to some PS Vita developers last year as they demoed their innovative musical platformer Sound Shapes, see the video below.