I know what you’re thinking … blah, blah, blah, keeping beating the ‘I hate Sony’ drum, yeah, sure, whatever. In fact I’ve gotten more than one comment that says almost exactly as much. But hear me out …
If you look at the history of the Sony PSP, there are several games that stand out – Dissidia: Final Fantasy, God of War: Chains of Olympus, the first two Grand Theft Auto games, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, Jeanne d’Arc, Resistance: Retribution, Patapon, Loco Roco … and not much else.
In 2010 we’ve had some solid releases such as Persona 3 Portable, which is the best game in the franchise and definitely one of the top 5 all-time PSP games. And coming later this year we have the sequel to another of the all-time PSP greats – God of War: Ghost of Sparta. But between these we have another big release: Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep.
What it Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep? The sixth entry, but really the fourth main entry, and a prequel to the original PS2 hit.
The game is a prequel to the original Kingdom Hearts, taking place ten years before. The game centers on the journeys of Terra, Aqua, and Ventus, characters briefly featured in Kingdom Hearts II, in their quest to locate the missing Master Xehanort. The game also utilizes an overhauled battle system different from previous games in the series with new elements such as the Command Board, Command System and Dimension Links added in.
Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep is a very major release, with broad marketing and high expectations. Looking on game blogs and forums and everywhere else you will find tons of people very excited about the September 7th release. Kingdom Hearts is an amazing franchise because it combines the tremendously popular Final Fantasy franchise with characters from the tremendously popular Disney franchises in an epic RPG series that is great for fans of all ages.
All of this is great, so WHY with the Sony hate? Because while millions of PSP owners will want to play the game, there is a problem:
No one who owns a PSP Go will be able to play the game. Not now, not EVER! As the image above indicates, the game is ‘UMD Only’!
That is right – nearly a year after the PSP Go launches and Sony cannot manage to launch top games on PSN for the people who showed support for Sony by buying their latest handheld.
I know what you are going to say, because I got the same reply blasting Sony about the slow move to bring many games from UMD to PSN: Sony cannot force publishers to bring games to PSN.
What would happen if Square Enix had wanted to launch the recent hit Final Fantasy XIII on the XBOX360 with no achievements or on the PS3 without trophies? Quite simple – Microsoft and Sony have these things called REQUIREMENTS that are simply must-have features for getting certification, which in turn is required for release.
So considering Sony has released a system that REQUIRES PSN-downloaded games, why should they not in turn REQUIRE that every publisher support both UMD and PSN versions of every new game? I mean, this isn’t a matter of supporting older technology – this is Sony’s LATEST product!
I am fortunate in a way – I own all four Sony PSP versions, so I am able to simply pull out my PSP-3000 and get it charged and ready for thearrival of my pre-order from Amazon next week.
But I have fully thrown my weight behind the download-only future, have fully invested in the PSP Go, and honestly I loathe the idea of using a UMD again.
I have supported Sony, as have thousands of other PSP Go owners … I just wish they would support us for once.