Last month, we reported that according to some rumors in the industry, Sony is seriously considering relaunching their portable gaming device, the PSP Go, with a price cut and marketing campaign. And today, Tokyo-based research firm Media Create released [JP] the latest hardware sales numbers for Japan, one of the biggest video game markets in the world.
And these numbers indicate that sales-wise, the PSP Go is poised to go down as the biggest failure in recent video gaming history: According to Media Create, a mere 1,275 units were sold all over Japan between March 1 and 7. By way of comparison: The Nintendo DS Lite (not the DSi or the XL) found 4,316 buyers in the same time frame. The regular PSP (the best portable gaming device ever in my opinion), on the other hand, was the No. 1 console, selling 64,808 units in that week.
Sony was able to sell just 17,618 PSP GO [GER] in the ten weeks between December 28, 2009 and March 7, 2010 - an almost unbelievably low number. Good for Sony that in the same time frame, 667,961 of the regular PSPs were sold, making that device the best-selling game system in Japan in 2010 (if you ignore the three-way split of the DS systems).
In Japan, the PSP Go currently goes for 26,800 Yen, a more than steep price when compared to the 16,800 to 19,800 Yen buyers have to pay for a PSP-300o or the 29,980 Yen a PS3 costs (10,000 Yen=$110).
It looks like the rumored price cuts, marketing campaigns and hardware changes don’t come out of nowhere.
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