Sony Next Generation Portable (NGP) console is no more… long live the Playstation Vita, yes at last night’s Sony Keynote the Japanese manufacturer finally laid to bed the NGP codename for its PSP successor console and has revealed that the portable gaming device will now be called the Playstation Vita.
Well, we are not sure on the Vita name but gosh is the device very cool. The name “Vita” itself means “Life” in Latin and that’s exactly what Sony are trying blow some life into the portable gaming sector as the 5-inch OLED touchscreen with 960 x 544 res device will come in two forms a Wi-Fi only model and a 3G version!
The specs of the device are nearly unchanged from the Playstation NGP’s official announcement and launch back In January as the device will come with a ARM® Cortex™-A9 core (4 core) processor, Front camera and Rear cameras, Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), Three-axis electronic compass, Built-in GPS (3G/Wireless model only), Wireless location service support a rear capacitive type Multi touch pad.
New features wise the PS Vita will come with a new “Near” application near“, which will come pre-installed on the system and will allow users to find out what other PS Vita users in their vicinity are currently playing and what titles are most popular in the area as well as a new ability for gamers to start playing a game on the PS Vita and then carry on playing that game on the PS3 when they get home via a system linkup.
At the moment Sony were focusing on the Near service with US carriers AT&T and have stated that gamers will be able to share their game information, play location-based gaming features such as gifting, in which a user can access virtual game-related items that other users are sharing, through checking in at geographic locations that others have also visited
Additionally, PS Vita will come pre-installed with a newly developed application called “Party”. “Party” is an innovative application for a portable entertainment system which enables users to enjoy voice chat or text chat not only during online gaming, but also when users are playing different games or using different applications such as the Internet browser.
With “Party”, which offers a new form of social networking, and “near”, which enables users to share their game information with other users anywhere, anytime, users can dramatically expand the boundaries of interactive communication.
In addition, a tutorial application called “Welcome Park”, developed specifically to guide users through the PS Vita system’s brand new user interface such as the front touch display and the multi-touch pad on the rear, will come pre-installed. By playing “Welcome Park”, users can easily become accustomed to the three dimension-like finger motions used on PS Vita.
Games wise Sonya are not falling into the same trap Nintendo did of releasing better games after the release of a new products by announcing a huge lineup of games for the iat including: Uncharted Golden Abyss, Little Deviants, Everybody’s Golf (working title), Reality Fighters (working title), Hustle Kings, ModNation Racers (working title), Wipeout 2048 (working title) and Super Stardust Delta, and possibly the games getting us most excited is Oddworld: Munch’s Oddysee and Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath which will be coming later in the year!
The PS Vitas (or PCH-1000 series as its officially known) will be launching at the end of 2012 with a Q4 forecast and will be priced at €249 (£222) for the Wireless model and €299 (£267) for the Wireless/3G version.
PlayStation®Vita product outline
Platform Name: PlayStation®Vita
Model number: PCH-1000 series
CPU: ARM® Cortex™-A9 core (4 core)
GPU: SGX543MP4+
External Dimensions: Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection)
Screen (touchscreen):
– 5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED
– Multi touch screen (capacitive type)
Rear touch pad: Multi touch pad (capacitive type)
Cameras:
– Front camera
– Rear camera
– Frame rate: 120fps@320×240(QVGA), 60fps@640×480(VGA)
– Resolution : Up to 640×480(VGA)
Sound:
– Built-in stereo speakers
– Built-in microphone
Sensors:
– Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer)
– Three-axis electronic compass
Location:
– Built-in GPS (3G/Wireless model only)
– Wireless location service support
Keys / Switches:
– PS button
– Power button
– Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left)
– Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square)
– Shoulder buttons (Right/Left)
– Right stick, Left stick
– START button, SELECT button
– Volume buttons (+/-)
Wireless communications:
– Mobile network connectivity (3G/Wireless model only)
– IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1×1)(Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure Mode/Ad Hoc Mode)
– Bluetooth® 2.1+EDR （A2DP/AVRCP/HSP）
Slots/Ports:
– PlayStation®Vita card slot
– Memory card slot
– SIM card slot (3G/Wireless model only)
– Multi-use port (for USB data communication, DC IN, Audio [Stereo Out / Mono In], Serial data communication)
– Headset jack (Stereo mini jack) (for Audio [Stereo Out / Mono In])
– Accessory port
Power:
– Built-In Lithium-ion Battery,
– AC adaptor
Supported AV content format:
– Music: MP3 MPEG-1/2 Audio Layer 3、MP4 (MPEG-4 AAC)、WAVE (Linear PCM)
– Video: MPEG-4 Simple Profile (AAC)、H.264/MPEG-4 AVC Hi/Main/Baseline Profile (AAC)
– Photo: JPEG (Exif 2.2.1), TIFF, BMP, GIF, PNG