The big show this time was for over 500 gamers, including some die-hards who stayed overnight at the Metreon center, all waiting in line for the first of the new PlayStation Portable systems to be sold on the West Coast in North America. A similar event was held three hours earlier in NYC for the very first PSPs to officially be bought in North America, but for those waiting for the clock to strike midnight and the cash registers to start ringing, this was the PSP Launch Ground Zero.
Customer numero uno was Richard Roth of San Francisco. An employee at a pet supply shop with a number of friends also in line (including PSP buyer #2, Jossle Sison), Richard lined up the day before at 8AM, and stayed all the way until reps at the PlayStation Store here at the Metreon brought him in to buy his PSP. (A system which SCE Executive VP Jack Tretton ran the register for -- you would have to be pretty hardcore into Sony to recognize him, but these are the kind of folks who line up days before a system's launch to own the new system, so that's still a brush with celebrity.) On Richard's list of must-own games were a fleet of racing games (Ridge Racer and Wipeout Pure were two he was getting the system for) and also any fighting game that the system can put up. To reward him for his wait, Sony arranged for a limo to take Richard and his friend home. WATCH THE VIDEO FEATURESony seriously turned it out for the people assembled here tonight. The company handed out PlayStation hats and T-shirts, and a few company reps from Sega and Koei were also on hand to check out the event and toss out some spare schwag. (We also saw somebody from Backbone Entertainment, developer of the upcoming PSP game Death Jr., queued up for a PSP to play his game on.) Sony hired local DJ 'Party Ben' to spin his rip-worthy mashups through the last few hours of the event, and also gave out snacks to those in line (which couldn't have helped relieve the stress of being allowed only the few bathroom breaks they could get in once the building shut down for the night.) The store itself was closed down all day to prepare for the event -- the entire place went through an overhaul, with PSP displays installed all over the store.
The PlayStation Store at the Metreon stocked 500 systems, and they went through that allocation before the end of the night. In fact, wristbands for confirmed system buyers ran out some time around 11:20 PM, and stragglers were still lining up not expecting this midnight sale to be so big. A list was handed out of the PSP games that were available so that they could pick out their buys ahead of time -- this was the only issue of the night, as the anxious and exhausted buyers did not find a few of the games they planned for on the list (in particular, Lumines did not seem to be in supply -- shipping of games has been chaotic these past weeks, to say the least, and many stores we visited this week are not expecting shipments of Lumines and a few others until tomorrow afternoon.)
Going through the crowd, we got a good feeling for the group that came out for this event. Though there were the clear bluebloods, most folks we talked to were all-out gamers, with PlayStation being an obvious passion -- we even caught a few in line playing Nintendo's DS while waiting to buy the rival PSP. We talked with a fellow who wore a sign saying that would "Trade Game Gear and Virginity 4 A Spot In Line". We found one fellow who was in line holding his baby in a papoose while he waited. And we talked with #3 from the PlayStation 2 launch, who already had his import PSP and was just out for fun to check in on the festivities while his buddies braved the line.
Many of the PSP gamers we talked to said that they're already planning to be back for PS3. We'll catch up with those folks then.
Follow the truckload of PSPs to our photo gallery...The Babes Of A Cold-Ass PSP Launch Night
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