I had a great time at E3 today, and I paid particular attention to the Vita.
I played:
MGS HD Collection: It looked awesome, and well, it was MGS3 on my Vita. I couldn't ask for more, really.
LBP Vita: Amazing visuals. Same fun LBP game play. I can't wait.
Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time: Visuals disappointed me a bit during cutscenes (no cel-shading it looked like), but the visuals when actually playing the level were sharp as hell. Game was fun too. I love Sly.
Gravity Rush: They had the full game there, so I got to play a mission that was longer and more involved than the painfully short demo. Visuals were great, controls were great, fun, fun ,fun game. I cannot WAIT until next Tuesday.
PS One Classics: I played Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, and Final Fantasy VII. They had more, but those were running. I was impressed with how they looked on the Vita. TR is horribly slow and clunky. The genre has evolved too much to make that a title I want to revisit.
FFVII looked surprisingly good on the screen, even though it was only running at 4:3, and it is, in my opinion, the "least attractive" of the PS1 Final Fantasies. The Sony guy there assured me that there would be options to make it full screen, and map the controls. It was set to Japanese style controls. I'm really looking forward to playing SOTN, Alundra, FFIX, Chrono Cross, and Vagrant Story on my Vita. They will look amazing.
PlayStation All Stars Battle Royale Vita: Visuals were super impressive and sharp. I played against PS3 and other Vita players (2 Vita, 2 PS3). Controls were nice and smooth. The combat was fun and hectic, and the KO with supers only wasn't bad, and was actually kind of fun, as you need to have an opening to pull of the super, but you can be interrupted by people. It was hilarious yelling at the other people to gang up on the Kratos that had a full Level 3 super, and was trying to unleash it on all of us.
First round, I played as Kratos on Vita, and got served. Second round, I played as Sly Cooper on PS3 and got even more served (Sly feels like an advanced player character; he's super quick and agile, and his various skills seem like they have some strategy to using them). Third round, I played as Kratos again on PS3, and that time I came in first!
I'm a huge Smash Bros fan, and this feels similar, and yet, different. I really enjoyed it, and they mentioned that they are looking to do a two pack deal like with MLB The Show, where you pay $80(USD) or something, and get the PS3 and Vita versions.
If so, then sign me up. I'd probably get the Vita version, if I only had to choose one, because it looked amazing on that screen.
The colors are a lot more vibrant on both PS3 and Vita.
It was actually kind of funny, because I was playing on the Vita, but I could also just look up at the screen, and play it on the TV, without having to play on the Vita. But, dat screen.
I think a lot of the negative reactions to this game are blown out of proportion. After spending some time with it, I think it's awesome. I'll be there day one for this one.
It's a shame, because there were some other games on Vita that looked awesome that I didn't have time to play(and I wasn't allowed to play Guacamelee), but it's disappointing that Sony didn't mention any of those games at E3, or showed them during their conference. It gives the impression that the Vita doesn't have anything, but I think there was significant floor space dedicated to it. There were rows of Vita's, all playing various games.
Also, Sound Shapes looked AWESOME, but I didn't have time to play it (and there were quite a few people waiting in line too).