I think it was a great technical product from Sony (as most PlayStation hardware until recently) but many devs (and Sony itself) had no trust in it, making it fail with very few games. It appeared at a time where smartphones were improving a lot, there was even a Xperia phone “compatible with PlayStation”. From a hardware POV, smartphones could adapt much quicker. But just as PCs could adapt much quicker, that didn’t mean consoles disappeared, the same happened for handhelds. And Switch, Steam Deck and the AliExpress Handhelds (Anbernic, Retroid, Trimui, …) showed that people, even if they have a capable smartphone, some people want to play on a different device.
Now, mobile gaming is a cash machine, and developers were right it was the future. But the kind of games featured on mobiles are usually a different beast than traditional titles. Some people bought this consoles for the same kind of games that are playing in mobile, so it’s fair, a smartphone is probably better! But this consoles also had a fair share of some deeper, complex games, that are a rara avis in the mobile market.
I remember, as a PSP owner, that I was intrigued by the new PS Vita. I was seriously considering buying one but the amount of games in it was very poor. (Also, it was compatible with PSP, but it had no UMD drive so your legally bought games were not immediately available there. I think this was unfair even thought most of the games I played on my PSP were pirate).
Edit: Also the PS Vita marks the end of MIPS processors in “high-end devices”, a sad story
I think it was a great technical product from Sony (as most PlayStation hardware until recently) but many devs (and Sony itself) had no trust in it, making it fail with very few games. It appeared at a time where smartphones were improving a lot, there was even a Xperia phone “compatible with PlayStation”. From a hardware POV, smartphones could adapt much quicker. But just as PCs could adapt much quicker, that didn’t mean consoles disappeared, the same happened for handhelds. And Switch, Steam Deck and the AliExpress Handhelds (Anbernic, Retroid, Trimui, …) showed that people, even if they have a capable smartphone, some people want to play on a different device.
Now, mobile gaming is a cash machine, and developers were right it was the future. But the kind of games featured on mobiles are usually a different beast than traditional titles. Some people bought this consoles for the same kind of games that are playing in mobile, so it’s fair, a smartphone is probably better! But this consoles also had a fair share of some deeper, complex games, that are a rara avis in the mobile market.
I remember, as a PSP owner, that I was intrigued by the new PS Vita. I was seriously considering buying one but the amount of games in it was very poor. (Also, it was compatible with PSP, but it had no UMD drive so your legally bought games were not immediately available there. I think this was unfair even thought most of the games I played on my PSP were pirate).
Edit: Also the PS Vita marks the end of MIPS processors in “high-end devices”, a sad story