Sony Unveils Low-Price Vita Game Console

Sony(SNE) announced a lower-than-expected price for its next-generation portable console as it faces growing competition from smartphones and tablets.

At a news conference at the E3 video game trade show in Los Angeles, Sony revealed the device previously known as NGP would be called the PS Vita - from the Latin word for "life" -- and a basic version would cost $250 in the U.S., €250 in Europe and 25,000 yen in Japan when it goes on sale later this year.

Analysts had questioned whether console makers could sell portable gaming machines in the tens of millions of units any more, with smartphones and tablets with touch screens, fast processors and motion sensors proving equally adept at rendering games.

Sony has sold 70 million units of its first portable device -- the PSP -- since its debut at $250 in 2004.

A price in the $300-$400 range, while perhaps justified by higher specifications, could have inhibited initial sales of the PS Vita. Sony's pricing of $250 matches that of Nintendo's latest handheld, the 3DS, and gives it mass-market appeal.

"PSVita has a chance at $249/299. [I am] surprised price is so low," Michael Pachter, video game analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities, tweeted from the conference.

The basic version is Wi-Fi only, with a Wi-Fi plus 3G version costing $300 (€300, 30,000 yen), where AT&T (T) will supply the network in the U.S.

The Vita has a 5-inch touch screen that uses organic light-emitting diodes for a vivid picture. There is an innovative touchpad at the rear as well as the analogue sticks and buttons familiar to gamers on regular controllers. There are dual cameras for augmented-reality gaming.

In game demonstrations, Sony showed how either touch or the buttons could be used to control the action, with easy to use touch gestures making the Vita more appealing to non-hard-core gamers.

Kaz Hirai, president of Sony Computer Entertainment, predicted these consumers would be tempted to buy a Vita after trying out games on Sony PlayStation-certified Android smartphones and tablets -- the just-released Sony Ericsson Xperia Play is the first such device and has a slide-out controller pad.

Hirai said cell phones had advanced since the PSP was launched and were now capable of PlayStation-like experiences.

"We're confident that once new customers get a taste of PlayStation content on their certified devices, it's only a matter of time before many of them come knocking on the door of PlayStation 3 and our next-generation portable," he said.

Sony began the news conference with another apology to gamers for the PlayStation Network's lengthy downtime after attacks by hackers, but it said gamer activity was back to 90% of what it had been before the network was forced offline in April.

There were reports on Tuesday that the company's problems were continuing, with the suspension of a Brazilian music service due to a possible security breach, while Sony was said to be investigating a hacker group's claim that it had stolen data related to its video game operations.

3D glasses were required for many of the game demonstrations at its E3 conference as Sony emphasized the extra capabilities of its PS3 console compared to the Xbox 360 and Wii.

The company announced a PlayStation-branded 24-inch 3D display that would allow two gamers wearing 3D glasses to both see a full-screen view of their own perspectives on a game, rather than the normal shared, split-screen view.

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