Once upon a time, portable gaming consoles were all the rage and owning a PSP/DS was the norm. Moving forward a gaming generation, portable consoles didn’t remain as popular due to mobile gaming and the PSVita’s sales and game library were greatly hit by this. Now, the PSVita’s life has more or less come to an end as Sony has officially ended its production forever!

PlayStation Vita production has ended; what else will go down this year?

Earlier today (March 1), it was spotted by Gematsu that Sony updated the PS Vita product line-up page on their Japanese website to inform us that they fully discontinued the console. This update came in the form of a “Shipment Complete/Ended” notification on the remaining two PSVita console SKUs (Black and Aqua Blue PSVita Slim models) still in production up until today.

As things stand, it’s unlikely that news will leave many people crying their eyes out but it’s still unfortunate to see a console that has so much potential, especially when hacked, joining the discounted console bunch.

Unfortunately, there’s more bad news when it comes to stuff for the PSVita being discontinued because this year will also see:

• Game cartridges will stop being produced on March 31 (which is a mere 30 days away)
  • However, it seems that Sony might still continue to produce cartridges for the Japanese market after this date according to SlashGear.
• Starting from this month, the will be no more free PSVita games with a PlayStation Plus membership

How will this affect me? Will PSVita prices go up?

If you currently own a working PSVita console, then this news will probably not affect you much but it might have some effects which include:

• In the foreseeable future, it might become difficult to buy a new in-box PSVita console as stores will obviously no longer be receiving any new stock.
• The prices for new PSVita consoles on online marketplaces like eBay might go up so if you’re in the market for a new PSVita, you should strongly consider getting one now
• Prices for used PSVita consoles may go up if it becomes hard to find one in stores
• On the bright side, the highest firmware that any brand-new in-box PSVita can come with is firmware 3.70 which TheFlow has promised to release a hack for later this year!

Conclusion

While it’s a bit sad to see Sony discounting PSVita production, it can be said that it was inevitable as the console is already over 7 years old and it never did too well in the first place. That being said, there’s still lots of fun to be had with a hacked PSVita and many will be pleased to know that TheFlow is currently working on a native resolution hack for the PSP’s Grand Theft Auto games on the Vita which will make them look much better!