Monday, December 6, 2010

Analyst Michael Pachter Says PSP2 Will be DOA

The successor to the Playstation Portable hasn't even been officially announced yet but industry analyst Michael Pachter has already weighed in on the upcoming portable with news site MCV.

In the piece, Pachter claims that the portable market as a whole won't survive very far into the future with the dawn of the iPod Touch and it's assortment of $1.00 games.

For the most part, I agree with him- one thing though, he sites the declining sales of the Nintendo DS as one of his arguments. The problem with that is that DS sales are more than likely dropping in anticipation of 2011's 3DS launch. I know that if I didn't have a DS right now, I wouldn't buy one with the release of vastly superior hardware right around the corner.

Other than that though, he has a good point. The PSP really never did all that much globally with the bulk of it's more impressive sales numbers coming out of Japan. I personally know more than a few people who routinely sell or trade in their PSP's and buy them back when a desirable game comes out, a practise that further pads sales figures.

Will the PSP2 fail right out of the gate? I hope not but the portable space seems like a Nintendo,  now joined by Apple, dominated space.