Sony: Here’s Why The PS Vita Eventually Failed In The U.S.

Let's just say it right now – the PlayStation Vita is an impressive piece of technology. It enables players to take a lot of their game experience on the go, whether it's a AAA title like Sly Cooper: Thieves In Time or an indie hit like Nuclear Throne. So…why did it fail again?

Sony pretty much dropped support for the system a couple of years back after the company's port of Borderlands 2 didn't quite pan out as expected…though it's since lived on through support from indie developers.

As for why the company decided to stop building for it, Sony Interactive Entertainment America President Shawn Layden, speaking with The Verge, explained that that the platform is still quite viable in Japan, but the lack of its reach in the U.S. has turned off the company from developing new things for it.

"Vita is still a viable platform, chiefly in the Japanese and Asian markets," he explained. "We still have developers in Japan who are building for that platform. But it just didn't get over the hump in Europe and America. It's hard to know exactly why, but it didn't garner a large enough audience here for us to continue to build for it."

That said, the system won't be seeing any sort of comeback at the Electronic Entertainment Expo next week, despite high hopes from fans that it would see some kind of Nintendo Switch-esque resurrection. "To be honest, the Vita just didn't reach critical mass in the U.S> or Western Europe," Layden added. "I don't know if it was that it was more technology people had to carry around, or more things to charge, or whether their phone or tablet was taking care of that. But once the content slowed in that pipeline, it became hard to keep the Vita as a growing concern."

Again, the system is still seeing bits and pieces of support in the U.S., mainly from third party developers and indie companies providing their games for it. Perhaps Sony may want to look into a program where they'll be able to support it more openly…?

Hey, we still love our Vita. It's the best way to play Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 at the office, after all.