UPDATE
Do you have a PlayStation Portal? If so, how are you enjoying it? Let us know below!
ORIGINAL STORY
They say you don’t know what’ll work until you try it out, and that’s been a staple of the gaming industry for decades! Between arcades, consoles, handhelds, and everything in between, publishers and developers have tried anything and everything to get people to come to their systems and try out their stuff. It doesn’t always work, but sometimes, you get a revolution, and that can lead to big things on the horizon. Last year, Sony unveiled the PlayStation Portal feature, which would give fans a mobile way to play their PS5 games in a more mobile capacity. At first, it seemed like a “weird peripheral” to have. However, the heads of Sony have been blown away by what it’s doing.
This comes from Sony’s VP of product management, Hiromi Wakai, who noted in an interview with GameFile that the PlayStation Portal was “exceeding expectations in terms of sales.”
To be clear, he didn’t drop specific sales numbers. However, it should be stated that the portable device sold out in the US and UK before it even launched! Thus, it wasn’t the “niche” item many felt it would be.
For only $200, you’ll get the dual sense controllers, a nicely sized screen to play it on, and as long as you have a stable Wi-Fi connection to your PS5, you can play it on the go, even outside of your house. Again, it depends on the Wi-Fi connection, but there have been many reports of the portal controller working over the span of many miles from the PS5 itself.
But what does this prove? The first thing it reaffirms is that Nintendo was right to make their Nintendo Switch a portable gaming console and that Sony was right to follow in their footsteps once again. It used to be a rather “forced thing” that to play console games, you must be at home with the system. However, the Switch proved that this wasn’t the case. You could play your games on the go anywhere in the world and have fun with them via the handheld screen.
With this happening on Sony’s system now, it’s further boosting the notion of “console mobility,” and that could lead to big things on both sides going forward. First, it’ll push Nintendo to make their console handheld as good as possible for their next system. Then, for the PlayStation 6, whenever that comes out, they’ll likely have another PlayStation Portal option, albeit with some improvements, so that gamers can enjoy their titles on the go without issue.
