UMD Passport Won't Be Available to US Vita Owners

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UMD Passport Won't Be Available to US Vita Owners

UMDs are only good for the PSP now.

Sony before had mentioned that physical copies of PSP games would be available to Vita owners for a fee. Dubbed the UMD Passport, some, not all, PSP games will be available at a discount if you previously purchased the UMD. Except that it won't after all.

A Sony representative has told Kotaku that the UMD Passport will not be available to American Vita owners. You still can buy any digitally-distributed PSP through the Vita's PlayStation Store and you still can play PSN games you bought for the PSP but the physical UMD discs will only be good for the actual PSP.

The service is available to Japanese consumers and no explanation has been given as to why American customers won't be given this opportunity. The PlayStation Vita is set to be released on February 22, 2012.

#Psp #Vita #Umd passport #Umd

Comments

Our Take

Matt McLennan Staff Alumnus

02/07/2012 at 09:59 PM

This absolutely blows my mind; I love backward compatibility, but what I don't love is HAVING TO PAY A FEE FOR IT. Would you want to know how absolutely pissed I would be in Nintendo annouced the WiiU would no longer be compatible with Wii games? Pretty PO'd.

The point is, ever since the PS2 introduced it, console backwards compatibility has been a god-send to people like me who have extensive game collections full of games they (pathfetically in my case) haven't finished yet. Wii had it for Gamecube and that worked fine. PS3 had it limitedly for both PS1 and PS2, though their shortsightedness with the PS3 Slim removing PS2 backwards compatibility is moronic (though I heard you can buy something to fix that...). 360? Broken beyond repair. Good thing I don't have any XBox games to speak of.

Welcome to the year 2012 ladies and gentlemen. :(

Travis Hawks Senior Editor

02/07/2012 at 10:22 PM

Just to avoid giving Sony too much credit... console backwards compatability has been around a lot longer than the PS2.

Mongoose

02/08/2012 at 12:04 AM

Oldest example I can think of is the Atari 7800 able to play Atari 2600 games....

Wow. Just wow. The incompetence borders on legendary. "We'd like to reward our loyal PSP customers who stuck it out with us. Those that responded to 'step your game up.' We do apologize for that annoying kid in the ads, you guys were real troopers. We'd like to reward you by giving you the option to download the PSP games you love and own...at full price."

Don't want to come off as fanboyish, but my the first game for the 3DS was Final Fantasy III for 9.99 at the 'Stop. I was one of the suckers early adopters, I broke the bank on that purchase, even after trading my DS lite to knock off the price a little. Super Street Fighter IV had to wait for another 2 weeks...

I can't imagine 3DS with DS/DSi Ware support. Its a smart move since while the DS hardware is all but retired, the software will get a small boost for savvy 3DS owners like myself who can hunt down great DS titles for a bargain.

Still want to try out Wipeout though =p

PixlBit