One More Thing About Sony's UMD Passport System: It's Missing a Bunch of Major Publishers

Perhaps you've already read Patrick's plea for sane pricing and continuity among publishers in regards to Sony's UMD Passport program for the Vita. If you haven't, I highly suggest doing so. Once you've finished with that, return to this story and treat it as a sort of epilogue to that whole ordeal.

Now then, presuming you're all read up, today's news from Sony (by way of Siliconera) regarding the Passport program's list of supported titles isn't likely to make you feel too much better about the whole thing. As it happens, the Vita will be launching in Japan with 262 PSP games available to download at a discounted rate via the Passport program. The hitch? There are 606 games currently available for the PSP.

While such noteworthy publishers as Atlus, Nippon Ichi, Acquire, Kaga Create, Alchemist, Tecmo Koei, and SNK are on board with their PSP catalogs, major publishers like Capcom, Konami, Sega, Namco Bandai, and Square Enix are nowhere to be found on the list.

Before alarm bells get sounded, it's worth pointing out that Sony proclaims that all of the above publishers are "planning" to support the Passport service, but no time frame for their inclusion has been set.

While this might be moot to many would-be Vita owners, given that the Passport service hasn't even been officially announced for regions outside of Japan yet, it's safe to assume that some version of this concept will find its way to Vita beyond Japan, and that people who want to play their Monster Hunters, Metal Gears, or Final Fantasies might want to be able to re-download those games at a suitable price. Assuming those titles ever appear at all. Or appear at a suitable price. None of which is even remotely guaranteed in this wild, woolly hinterland that encompasses Sony's online services nowadays.

In the meantime, Japanese Vita owners will just have to settle for the embarrassment of Atlus RPGs and Pachinko simulators at their disposal when the system launches in Japan on December 17.

I like my Pachinko simulators! And as the article rightly points out, the other publishers will eventually be on board, so I'm not too worried about this.

Oh man.

Most programs get a rough start. I see this one is no different. It could still use some regulation, though.

Some really big names there...

For a second there I thought you were insulting Atlus RPG's.

@MusiM said:

For a second there I thought you were insulting Atlus RPG's.

word, I had to google the definition to retrieve:

embarrassment: anoverwhelminglyexcessiveamount;overabundance:anembarrassmentofriches.

Most programs get a rough start. I see this one is no different. It could still use some regulation, though.

@Benny said:

@MusiM said:

For a second there I thought you were insulting Atlus RPG's.

word, I had to google the definition to retrieve:

embarrassment: anoverwhelminglyexcessiveamount;overabundance:anembarrassmentofriches.

The context in which it's used is a little ambiguous. Maybe purposefully so.

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Thanks for not telling me what to do Alex. It's good just to have information and letting us decide.

@Buckfitches: exactly.

if being upset about this is enough to turn you off from a Vita, then, you're doing it wrong.

FUCK SQUARE ENIX IS NOT ON THERE?

DEFINITELY WRITING IN. All caps are absolutely necessary, by the way, as outside of Konami, Sega, and Square nobody has released content I'd ever want to play on a PSP. Forget this, dudes.

Sony Online stuff has always been a 'maybe'.

But still, with the prices of memory, i'm not seeing the great appeal of backwards compatibility at launch, with most of the best games for psp being >700mb.

Getting a Vita is completely off the table for me at this point. I had great times with my PSP, but they're gouging left and right with this system and it's just not offering enough over what I already get at home.

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Like I said in the other article, no Kingdom Hearts, so screw this program.

You know how many publishers would be missing if Sony tried to force them to give away digital licenses to their PSP games for free or almost free? All of them.

Guys, don't worry, there's no way Capcom would miss out on the chance to charge as much as the Pachinko publisher to transfer old Monster Hunter games to your Vita.

As has been mentioned elsewhere, it's no surprise to see it's the publishers who will no doubt rerelease them as "collections" later on.

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@Buckfitches said:

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Exactly. There's no reason for them to even offer this service. Be glad that it exists at all.

On one hand I agree with you on the other hand I'm left thinking "Do it right or don't do it at all".

I don't know when everybody started to expect backwards compatibility but if they're using backwards compatibility as a bullet point to help move Vitas I feel like they should be trying to do it right.

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@Buckfitches said:

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Exactly. There's no reason for them to even offer this service. Be glad that it exists at all.

On one hand I agree with you on the other hand I'm left thinking "Do it right or don't do it at all".

I don't know when everybody started to expect backwards compatibility but if they're using backwards compatibility as a bullet point to help move Vitas I feel like they should be trying to do it right.

@Shakezula84 said:

They are doing right.

That still remains to be seen as far as I'm concerned.

I think any program that has the potential to mislead uninformed customers falls under "not doing it right". I don't think people should expect UMDs to work on the Vita, but if a mother buys one because the box says it will allow her kid to transfer his UMD games onto it and doesn't clearly state that there are substantial fees to do so, and that many may not apply, I don't think that's the right way to do it.

How heavily and clearly this feature is marketed will decide for me whether they did it right or not.

Personally I think all these companies should just drop the whole backwards compatibility mess.

Sony is really good at turning me away from things I want. The memory sticks alone look like a really fast way to make up any loss incurred by the fancy hardware.

Having cheap or maybe free first party umd passports could really turn me on to the system quickly, but as it stands this and needing to dumb nearly $400 into the console on launch is pushing me away. Especially when a 3DS is just $170 and you don't need to buy an expensive memory stick.

Times like this I'm glad to be a PSPGo owner. All my shit is already digital. I rarely get to feel proud of that too.

Interesting how the biggest publishers are not on board.

Nobody cares because nobody has PSP games and if they do they don't play them anyways.

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@Buckfitches said:

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Exactly. There's no reason for them to even offer this service. Be glad that it exists at all.

Yeah, I mean remember how all PS3s are perfectly capable of playing PS2 discs.

Oh wait.

It seems premature to just wildly speculate that all those major publishers won't sign up for the UMD Passport thing, and even if they don't, whatever, people with UMDs will still have their PSP.

Hey guys? why don't you look on the PSN store in the US? That shit's already there at a discounted price and they always have sales and price drops in the fall and spring. SMH @ patrick and alex

This seems like a lot of work for no good reason. That Sony is doing anything is crazy to me, people that want to play PSP games, just keep your PSP and buy a Vita for Vita games.

Love how this is a launching pad for the anti/pro Sony crowds tho. If they did nothing, they can't win, when they do something, they can't win.

99 things to bitch about Sony (and MS and Nintendo if we're going to be honest), but this ain't one.

I demand Chili con carnage on my Vita.... I'm serious!

metal gear acid isnt even on the psn right now so .....this will all go swimmingly

you know this is pretty god damn pathetic and the Sony suck ups should be ashamed, this company is sick on a fundamental level and deserves no one's money or help, they need to go away

I can play all my DS games on my 3DS and all my DSware games on there as well. Nintendo isn't asking me for some asinine fee or pawning off some ridiculously overpriced memory card I can only use with their system.

VITA is dead on arrival. D E A D spells DEAD.

I suspect that the unwilling publishers all want to give ports of their games to people who already bought it and therefore, I suggest that all of these games that have already been purchased be issued for free.   There's no way that any of those companies like Capcom and Konami (in particular) would think that it's okay to put a last gen game, on a brand new portable console, for $15 - $20, maybe even less, and charge me the same amount for my Monster Hunter, MvC, or MGS collection, and expect me to pay the same amount as if I never owned it before.    Why, because you'd be flippin' mad!
 
Heck, I could buy a dusty, old psp for the money I'd save and still have all those games.

Now look, I love backwards compatibility just as much... hell, MORE than the rest of you. I still play my PS3PHAT... but I gotta ask... are all of you people just planning to play PSP games on the PSVita when it comes out? I could understand if it didn't have any games available at launch, but seriously?

... and what the hell did you do with your PSPs?!?!?

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@Buckfitches said:

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Exactly. There's no reason for them to even offer this service. Be glad that it exists at all.

Yeah, I mean remember how all PS3s are perfectly capable of playing PS2 discs.

Oh wait.

It seems premature to just wildly speculate that all those major publishers won't sign up for the UMD Passport thing, and even if they don't, whatever, people with UMDs will still have their PSP.

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@BisonHero said:

@Vegetable_Side_Dish said:

@Buckfitches said:

Oh god, I have to play these games on the system I purchased them for!

THE HORROR!

Exactly. There's no reason for them to even offer this service. Be glad that it exists at all.

Yeah, I mean remember how all PS3s are perfectly capable of playing PS2 discs.

Oh wait.

It seems premature to just wildly speculate that all those major publishers won't sign up for the UMD Passport thing, and even if they don't, whatever, people with UMDs will still have their PSP.

What has PS3 backwards compatibility got to do with this? Really, explain how this is related. I can't figure out what you're trying to say in that first sentence.

I was continuing your point of "be glad that Sony is even bothering to do this", given they have a track record of dropping PS2 backwards compatibility on the PS3. And never having any UMD support on the PSP Go at all. People are acting like this is the end of the world, but whatever, someone who already owns all those UMDs will always have the option of just playing them on a PSP.