If you have a PSP, you've probably noticed that the shelves aren't overflowing with must-play games for the system. There are occasional gems, like God of War, Valkyria Chronicles, and Persona...but software for the system has been anything but consistent. Sony's senior VP of marketing, Peter Dille, theorizes that one of the main reasons is piracy.
Dille outlined his thoughts in an interview with Siliconera. To be fair, he isn't trying to lay the entirety of the blame on piracy, but he outlines why it may affect a publisher's decision to throw support behind the handheld: "That has limited a publisher’s ability to make money on the platform because it is a hacked platform. There is a lot of piracy, I’m sure you’re familiar with some of what’s going on. If you aren’t, you can find sites selling pirated games."
The death of the system isn't immediately at hand, though, as Dille emphasizes the system's capacity for digital distribution. "A game that you could put on the PlayStation Network can find its audience because there is unlimited shelf space...We’re trying to encourage publishers to make sure they exhaust their internal catalogs and content and keep that on the platform as well."
Regardless of the reasons publishers are avoiding the PSP, it would be nice to have more than a handful of games worth playing every year for the system.