Sony looking to apply a "more tailored approach" to Vita game pricing

SCEE president and CEO Jim Ryan has said Sony plans to offer various price-points for Vita software offerings, ranging from console equivalent pricing, to lower-than-average.

Speaking with GI.biz, Ryan said Sony will take a more "tailored approach" to software pricing than it has "done in the past" in order to contend with offerings on smartphones. Ryan said this is because it would be "foolish and naive" for the company "to ignore what's happening" in mobile phone gaming.

"It's our challenge to ensure that the gaming experience that we provide is closer to that TV console experience than it is to your 69p thing that you've downloaded on your iPhone," he added. "If we do that and we provide great value to the consumer on games like Uncharted, I think the possibility to sustain historic console type price points is there.

"Absolutely it does do other things, but it has been designed as a gaming device, and a perfectly logical consequence of that is that the gaming experiences you can have on Vita are superior to what is possible on a device that has other functionality at its heart."

Elsewhere, Ryan admitted that predicting the relative popularity of the 3G and wi-fi only models of Vita was something "we agonise over endlessly internally". However, he said Sony expected the wi-fi model would "just shave it" in numbers.

"But the truth be told, we just don't know," he continued. "This is one area where we're going to have to be very nimble internally and if consumer preference skews one way or another we will adjust very rapidly to meet what the true underlying consumer demand is."

Evolution's MotorStorm RC, announced last week as a Vita launch title, may cost a bit less than a premium console title if hints from studio manager Matt Southern are any indication. However, a price for the game has yet to be announced, and since the download title will include both a PS3 and Vita version, it remains to be seen what Sony plans to charge for it.

So far, most retail listings price Vita games at $39.99 which is what the majority of PSP titles cost at present.

Vita is set for release in the US and UK in February.