PSP To Refocus on Teen Market

Wired's Game|Life blog, and writer Chris Kohler, have the news that the PSP will be aiming at teen users in the near future. This from PSP senior product manager John Koller, who connected the recent system price cut to this new initiative. "Going forward, Sony will unveil the 'Dude, Get Your Own' campaign. The idea this year, says Koller, is to 'break out of the home cycle.' A significant amount of PSP users in that 13-17 group play the device at home. 'The teens that are doing this value the ability to utilize the portability,' Koller notes paradoxically. By portability, he clarifies, he means 'I can play it upstairs while my parents are watching the TV downstairs.'"

Re:Do they even know how to market anymore?

[porcupine8]

You... do know the DS Lite has always been $129 (US), right? And considering it's been out for less than a year, I'm guessing the first possible price drop wouldn't be til Christmas, if then.

DS is for adults, PSP for "pretent to be adults"

[LKM]

The only DS games to outsell GTA:LCS include stuff like Nintendogs, Mario, Pokemon, Braintraining, and Animal Crossing. Outside of Braintraining, which does sound remotely interesting, would an adult play any of these games?

Yes. Next question?

Isn't it possible the DS is just marketed and oriented towards children while the PSP simply is not?

No. [youtube.com]

The PSP is not marketed towards adults. Really. I own both a DS and a PSP. The DS gets the "adult" games like Hotel Dusk: Room 215. The PSP gets the "I wish I were an adult and need to pretend to be one by plaing violent games" games like GTA.

Both are nice consoles, but unfortunately, the recent games on the PSP have underwhelmed me. I do play and love fun games like New Super Mario or Mario Kart, but on the PSP, there's just too much stuff targeted at teens and pre-teens who need to prove how grown-up they are by playing games they think grown-ups play. By now, I mostly use the PSP to watch TV shows and movies while riding the train.