Sony Leader Admits Uncharted for Vita Was Not Suited for Japan Launch

Shuhei Yoshida, who is the leader of Sony Worldwide Studios, stated, “When you look at each title, not many of them really catered toward the Japanese market. Not something where Japanese gamers would say, ‘I have to have that’.”

He added, “Uncharted, it’s a great title, one of the big franchises, but it doesn’t really work in Japan. SCE Japan marketing is making an effort, so the awareness is going up, but still, Uncharted 3 sold about 200,000 units. It’s very small sales compared to. Call of Duty did like 300,000 or 400,000? And that’s the biggest-selling game made outside Japan.”

The presence of Uncharted is expected to make the Western launch of the new PlayStation hardware much more successful, with Sony adding an impressive marketing campaign to boost initial interest.

The Vita faces tough competition from the Nintendo 3DS and both devices have seen their market share limited by the presence of game playing smartphones.