Headline RePLAY – 1.24.12

Today on Headline RePLAY: Microsoft Points may get discontinued and the PS Vita could’ve been thinner.

 
Microsoft Points may be a thing of the past, if rumor is to be believed. An unnamed source told Inside Mobile Apps that the currency system could be phased out by the end of the year.  

Instead, transactions would use real money to purchase content for the Windows Phone, the Zune Marketplace and Xbox Live.

Of course, when asked for confirmation, a Microsoft spokesman responded with the usual “we do not comment on rumors or speculation” line.  



If you thought the PS Vita wasn’t thin enough, PS Vita designer Takashi Sogabe agrees with you.  Sogabe spoke at a round-table interview at Sony Computer Entertainment’s Japanese HQ last month and told journalists that the original design was slimmer than the retail version.

“Speaking not only about the PS Vita, we always have a battle between engineers and designers. The original design of the PS Vita, for example, was very much thinner than the current retail product,” said Sogabe. “From a designer's point of view, thinner is better-looking, but the engineers wanted to put all the features in.”

“Maybe it will become thinner in the future, but the engineers would have to come up with a means to do that,” continued Sogabe. “The main effort for me was to make this product happen.”

Sogabe went on discussing other details about the design process, “The buttons and analogue sticks were perhaps not in the best position from a design point of view, but we felt they were the best solution from a publisher's point of view.”

“As a designer, I wanted to use metal rather than plastic,” he added, “but because there are a lot of antennae in the body, we couldn't use metal.”

*Source: CVG

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