RIP PS Vita: Sony officially ends its production



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Sony has stopped production on the PlayStation Vita, as of today. The company announced that the last two SKUs of the platform had been removed on Vita's official product page.

The imminent death of the handheld was known well in advance; A senior executive from Sony announced last year that manufacturing and shipping of all versions of the device would end this year. Hiroyuki Oda also said at the time that there was no follow-up project, which seems obvious.

Sony has ceased to regularly publish individual platform sales in 2013 in its investor reports; there are no official figures on the sale of PS Vita over a period of seven years. According to third-party estimates, it would be between 10 and 15 million units.

Sony itself stopped creating games for the Vita in 2015 and ended in 2018 the production of physical media games for the device. In February, the PlayStation Plus subscription service also distributed games for the platform.

The original PlayStation Vita (PCH-1000) was launched in Japan on December 17, 2011 and in North America on February 15, 2012. A revised tapered model (PCH-2000) followed in 2013 and 2014. While has progressed The ideal of the PlayStation Portable consisting of integrating video games, visuals and console quality experiences to a handheld: the PlayStation Vita has been struggling to attract attention. At the time of its launch, mobile video games were booming on smartphones and tablets, making the dedicated gaming console a niche product more efficient than in the first decade of the century.

"Vita just did not reach that critical mass with the audience," said Shawn Layden, president of Sony Interactive Entertainment's global studios, to Polygon in an interview for 2017. "And, as a result, the development community do not endorse it and, therefore, the public does not come, and it's a quick negative spiral effect. "

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