Sony has released 30 “Lifestyle” photos for the PS Vita. It features three different mid twenty-something males of the hip persuasion in rather random places: a park bench, a local coffee shop, a bridge and on a soccer field. Of course, they are all over enjoying the PS Vita. Now, I was unaware that this was the market Sony was trying to reach. I thought they were marketing to people that know that gaming isn’t Angry Birds or Words With Friends.
Marketing can play a big part into how a product is received. Sure, mid-twenty-somethings are going to get the Vita. I just think that these mid-twenty-somethings are the ones that camp out for the next repeat of the next big i-Thing. Is that what the Vita needs?
Some time ago I was taught never to judge a book by its cover. But…
The Vita will grace North America on February 22nd of this year and it will need a strong leader to head off the doomsayers. It will not need hipsters. It will need the feisty (now) 15 year old, Marcus Rivers. Marcus appeared at the end of the PSP’s time. He wasn’t there to push the PSP Go, he only played it in a few of the commercials. Marcus has since disappeared from Sony’s vision without a blink. There was no goodbye, no glorious return from selling carpets; Marcus has just vanished.
Marcus would be good for the Vita’s launch. The pitch used to sell the ol’ PSP then would still work for selling the Vita now. Should he return as the same loud mouth kid? I think not. I think he should return as a more mature, young man that still consumes a healthy amount of suckas online everyday. A young man that has learned the way from the greatest VP of all time, Kevin Butler. Could Marcus Rivers be the extra push the Vita needs to stop the abysmal sales seen in Japan? Probably not. Would it be nice to see a resurgence of a more tame, better written Marcus with a Long Live Play attitude? Hell yes.
Marcus may not been the spokesperson the PSP deserved, but he might be the one the Vita needs.
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Original Images Source via Games Press, LATFH, Tech Digest TV
