With a tax return just sort of burning a hole in my bank account. I decided that it was a good idea to pick up a Vita. I did play my usual fate card. I went to a gamestop relatively early to see if I could pick up any leftovers. Hey lucky for me there was one WiFi one left. I was contemplating getting a 3G one. However, at the same time. I have a magical phone that can be a hot spot. I figure if my connection is fast enough to let me play Mario Kart 7 online over the hotspot. It is fast enough to be the Vita connection. Besides, the AT&T plans are a complete and total rip off. So let me being this mindless rambling.

So I have to give Sony a HUGE thumbs up on the release. They pulled the old " get it out now and patch later" trick on us. So I go to start up the PSV. Of course there is the initial boot up and welcome page. Now in order to finish that setup portion I have to do something with the PSN. Because of my own personal network security. I have to get the Mac address for my PSV. Sadly I cannot do that from this welcome area. So here comes my phone to the rescue. I try to connect to my PSN account. PSN says I need an update. Dot dot dot.... ok... so how am I supposed to get past the startup? Well lucky for me you can set up a trial account. Where I was able to get everything that I needed set up.

Now lets talk about the system itself. Because I did not really get to play it all that much. Yes I elected to not pay $40 for a new cartridge. I decided to get the only game that looked kind of interesting, Escape Plan. That is a download only game. So while the PSN servers were getting hammered. I messed around with some other stuff... so not very much. I have to say that I do not like the operating system all that much. First off instead of having a little X to close things. They do this annoying peel thing. Where I have to drag my finger across the screen to kill a process. Yes that is not annoying. It is almost as not annoying as getting asked every time if I want want to turn on Wi-Fi or share some information. Maybe I could look into how things work more... but that is painful.. so I will do it another time.

Next lets talk about the hardware. So first off, this portable is a bit too big for my tastes. I mean the PSP was not small, but at least it could pretend to be portable. The PSV might as well be a tablet. It is funny how it has a landscape keyboard on the screen. However, unless you have really big hands you are going to suffer a bit. So I get to go back to the good old says of chicken peeking. Really the huge touch screen creates an over reliance on the touch screen. There is no way to select anything using the d-pad or buttons. Plus most games have very little use for the d-pad as well. So that is kind of annoying. Then there is the back touch screen. Now maybe I am just mad because of the fact that whenever I accidentally touch the back touch screen while playing escape plan it counts as a move. However, I fail to really see the point of having a back touch screen. It really just adds an extra needless level of complexity for complexity sake. I like the idea, but it is only an idea that looks good on paper. So that is kind of annoying.

Overall, much like the PSP I feel this system has a lot of potential. Of course Sony cannot make the system cheap. So I worry that much like the PSP, no one will care. I am kind of interested to see how the AR part of the Vita plays out. However, at the end of the day. I have to say the system is not bad. Again, everything will be left to the developers... as well as Sony... so you know it will probably flop because Sony fails to accept that people do not want to have to repurchase all of their PSP games.