THE BUZZ: In Japan, PSP owners were given an offer that allowed for purchasing discounted digital copies of PSP games to those who owned the same games on UMD. America, however, won’t be getting such an offer.

EGM’s TAKE: So, in Japan, Sony Computer Entertainment offered up a service called UMD Passport at the launch of the Vita. With the program, if you owned titles from a select list of PSP games on UMD, you could register that UMD with Sony and then purchase a digital version of the game via the PlayStation Store for a reduced price. The idea, basically, was that it was a way to help gamers who had PSP collections move those games to their shiny new Vitas.

Today, however, Kotaku received confirmation from Sony that the UMD Passport program won’t be offered here in North America.

As someone who owns a decently extensive PSP collection, this really stings. I already own around 20 PSP games in digital form, but have at least twice as many games on those lovable little UMDs. I had hoped to take advantage of this program to move more of my collection over—a hope I must now give up.

With the PSP never being nearly as popular here in the States as it was in Japan, it’s always felt like PSP owners here were somewhat of an afterthought compared to our Japanese brethren. This announcement today only re-enforces that feeling.

Source: Kotaku