Sony Offers More Details on Remote Play for Vita

The PlayStation Vita handheld is set to be launched on December 17 on the Japanese market and Sony is keen on drumming up player interest by talking about its more obscure features, including the fact that it will have a remote play mode for use with the PlayStation 3.

Shuhei Yoshida, who is the president of Worldwide Studios at Sony, has talked to the magazine Famitsu about the ability to connect the two consoles using a cable or the wireless mode.

The feature was initially shown at the Tokyo Games Show and Yoshida says that the changes that need to be made to PlayStation 3 video games that will be using Remote Play are minimal, with some tweaks to way memory and CPUs are used.

Sony is apparently working to make the process very easy and is putting together a beta version of the feature which will be sent to developers and will allow them to begin customizing their games even before the Vita is launched.

Those who plan to purchase a PlayStation Vita handheld will also be able to use it as a complete controller for the PS3, with the screen becoming a sort of smaller monitor and apparently developers will be able to use the touch screen to interact with the main game.

This sounds very similar to how the relation between the controller of the Nintendo made Wii U will interact with the main console box.

An update in December will bring the Remote Play feature to the Vita in Japan and it will probably be offered on launch on Western markets.

Sony has not said which PlayStation 3 video game will offer support for Remote Play or which developers are working on future launches that include the feature.

The PlayStation Vita is Sony's big bet that it can capture the long term imagination of mobile players and keep them away from smartphone games.