Sony: It's Too Early to Drop the PS Vita's Price

Don't expect a price cut for holiday 2012.

When Nintendo's 3DS wasn't selling as well as the company had hoped, Nintendo slashed the price to get things going. The 3DS ended up having a more successful year than the first 3DS, selling 4.5 million units to the original DS's 2.3 million. However, those hoping that Sony might pull a similar move to jump start sales of the PS Vita will be disappointed.

Speaking to Eurogamer, Sony's Worldwide Studios boss, Shuhei Yoshida, said that the company's engineers are working to reduce the cost of manufacturing of the PS Vita. This in turn will lead to a price cut, but that price cut won't happen this year.

"At a certain point in the future we would like to address the pricing issue for some of the people who are waiting," Yoshida said. "But this year we are trying to add value by creating different types of bundles. We announced we will provide LittleBigPlanet PS Vita bundle pack. That's affordable for people who are looking for a good deal."

When asked if that meant no price cut this year, Yoshida said: "No, it's too early." 

Sony's PS Vita launched in December 2011 in Japan, and in late-February elsewhere in the world. It packs a quad-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU; a 5-inch 960x544 multitouch OLED display; a rear touchpad with multitouch; both front-facing and rear-facing cameras with frame rates of 120fps at 320x240 (QVGA) and 60fps at 640x480 (VGA); GPS; Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; PlayStation Vita card slot; memory card slot; a SIM card slot; and a multi-use port for USB data communication, DC IN, Audio (Stereo Out / Mono In), Serial data communication, and WiFi and 3G support. There's also a WiFi-only model for those with an aversion to data contracts.

_{Follow @JaneMcEntegart on Twitter.}                     

_{Contact Us for News Tips, Corrections and Feedback}