From the Vault — originally published June 18, 2011. Some links, videos or prices may be out of date.
PS Vita was shown at this years E3. The line and wait was one of the longest only matched and sometimes outdone by the lines to see Wii U and Battlefield 3. Many fans waited over three hours for hands on time with this new Sony device.
The first thing you notice about the PS Vita system is that it is not small. Do not expect to carry this in your pants pockets. If you are wearing cargo shorts then it will fit in the larger cargo pockets but if you think about how even the PSP 2000 models barely fit in most pants pockets and PS Vita is sightly larger though thinner you will see that this is a device owners will most likely opt to put in a card case and thrown in a backpack or messenger bag. The size though made it more comfortable to hold than the PSP Go which at times may feel a bit too small. Overall the device has that substantial solid feel you come to expect from Sony devices.
Other than the size one of the other first things I noticed was the screen. The PS Vita sports a compact 5-inch OLED display and it does live up to the hype. The screen is vivid and sports a true 16:9 aspect ratio which always gives visuals that up to date feeling. The resolution is 960 x 544 which is very close to the 1280×720 HD resolution. Consider that the Vita display resolution is not to far from Halo 3’s native resolution for example which is 1152×640. The front and back screens feature multi-touch functionality. I found most of the games used this in a forced way and it was apparent that I would opt for the more traditional control options.
The room set up for hand-on impressions consisted of a few rows of podiums with a Sony rep on one end. We stood on the opposite end of the podium and plugged our headphones into a device where we could hear the rep take us though the individual games and PS Vita system features.
One notable problem I had during my time testing these PS Vita games was that it felt like the right analog stick was too close to the X button. I repeatedly would hit the X button by mistake because it was so close to the analog stick and vice versa. Granted this may be something that may not be an issue after a few hours with the device. I also found the shape buttons (square, circle, triangle, x) a bit small. Other than these things the system was impressive. There are front and rear facing cameras making skype video, and augmented reality games possible.
The long awaited dual analog sticks are significantly improved over the analog disc on current PSP systems. PS Vita analog sticks have height and are more like “sticks” which is a huge improvement.
Overall I was impressed with the Playstation Vita. It felt closer to a home experience on a portable device than any other portable device I have seen to date in terms of the fidelity of the graphics and control options. The size although larger than the previous PSP is not much larger and should not be a problem for those fine with the size of PSP 200 devices.
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