I do want to say seeing Shipwreck return in ANY capacity is a good thing as I too miss his usual podcast. Especially considering I spend 40 hours a week in a cubicle and as such listen to a LOT of podcasts. Missing out on that one in particular makes my usual roundup feel a little less full. Oh well, cannot drag the feedback down too much.
I did want to address something and I know I'm probably going to get a third quote on the cast making me sound like a douche but whatever, I want to address the PSP Go. You see, I'm the kind of guy the system was targeted at. But there IS a problem, of course. Consider for a moment the following picture.
That was from around a year ago and I have since added about 10-15 games to that selection, including the imported Macross 7 game. You see, despite this massive collection of UMD games, I WAS looking forward to PSP Go for many reasons. I long ago accepted that my collection is just not going to tranfers to Go. I mean LOOK at it. Will 60-70 games even FIT on a 16GB PSP Go? Especially when you add the additional content like all the free DLC for Wipeout Pure, Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce, and all my Traxxpad save files? Doubtful.
But truth be told, I would gladly take the opportunity to have a dedicated PSP machine for the various pieces of PSN content. I've learned something of myself and it's that I hate lugging around DS carts and UMDs. I try to stick to 2-3 games when I travel. But already I have several games I bought on PSN forcing me to look into an 8GB MS Pro Duo here pretty soon. I wasn't looking at Go as a replacement for my PSP mainly because my collection is too vast and regionally diverse (I have nearly 20 import games... SCEA is very unlikely to give me credit on Play-asia purchases through your website), I was looking at it as a companion machine. Someplace to download Unbound Saga, Thexter Neo, Pixeljunk Monsters, Crash Bandicoot, and Final Fantasy VII. In other words, I'm the idiot Sony is targeting. I love my PSP and keep fighting the temptation for a Go.
And because I love my PSP, there is another issue people keep forgetting when bashing the Digital Distribution initiative of PSP. Have you been to a PSP section in a store lately? Pardon my french but it's
ing depressing. Meijers has two rows of games, nine rows of Daddy Day Care and Anaconda. Gamestop has officially reduced their PSP selection to smaller than Gamecubes area (and only 25% of that is not used). Best Buy and Walmart have the most robust selections and even that focuses on Greatest Hits. I wanted Steambot Chronicles Day 1, no store in town, a college town where gaming is big, stocked this Atlus RPG. NONE. By the time I gave up the chase seven days later, Amazon was on backstock for the game and I had to wait. For a PSP enthusiast, that's where we are at. Reduced only to internet shopping because no stores support the platform in a respectable way. So yes, when you buy Digitally, you lose trade-in value... but c'mon, it's a PSP game. I'm sure people are really upset over the $5 you can't get back when you're done with Dissidia. And that becomes a game feeding a store that refuses to stock NEW PSP games and laughs when you go in to preorder Soul Calibur (screw you, gamecrazy). I would prefer Sony switch to the digital method with PSN as opposed to the alternative, the very real threat of platform death outside of Japan.
So with that, why am I not buying the Go despite many reasons for the platform? Because SCEA seems hellbent on making PSP Go a horrible value proposition. Think of it this way, SCEE gives you GT PSP, and three other PSN games. With that, I'd be VERY interested in the $250 price tag. Without it, not buying until it drops. If SCEA was smart, every PSP Go would have $40 instore credit the first time they log into PSN. It would give people a chance to explore the variety of offerings. I know that would be enough to push me over. But for now, I'm giving SCEA six months to find out what they really want to do with PSP. Maybe if it's $200 in March, I'll snag one. In the meantime, I have to wait for an 8GB MS to arrive in the mail, it has an October 1st delivery date...
