At a recent Sony Vita event, a spokesperson for Sony claimed Vita PSN games would be around 40% cheaper than their retail counterparts. According to the rep, the lack of hardware and packaging can be thanked for the price drop.
I was told that games would be capped at $39.99 retail. While the same game would go for around $23 if you downloaded it. A price drop for downloadable games was already confirmed for the Japanese market, but it’s not as significant as the US. In Japan, retail titles are reported to go for as high as $50 with a PSN equivalent of $40. This is only a 20% drop where the US would be 40%.
If this is true, it makes the ridiculous prices for Vita memory cards a little more tolerable. (4GB: $30, 8GB: $45, 16GB: $70, 32GB: $120) If you’re saving around $15 a game, you only need to buy 8 games from the PSN to have that 32GB card paid for.
Take all this with a grain of salt though, as this has not been confirmed by Sony corporate. Also, with a price drop this significant, I can foresee retailers having an issue with this as it gives consumers a reason not to buy from the store. We’ll find out more as we get closer to launch. If this does hold up, I will definitely be picking a larger than anticipated memory card.
That's how it should be, and if they are $25 (I'd imagine they round them up), that's a good saving if you're buying quite a few games and makes up for the memory card prices for me. Just hope ALL games get put on the Store day 1 with this unlike PSP, they need to make it mandatory for devs.
