As detailed in this PS Blog post and hinted at earlier by the ESRB rating revelation, what for now appears to be the last UMD release to be put out by Sony in North America turns out to be a strange beast: Cars 2: The Video Game.
So what's so strange about this? 1. Cars 2: The Video Game released on PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, PC, and DS this past summer. 2. The console (and PC, I guess) versions were developed by Avalanche, while the DS and 3DS versions were developed by Firebrand. 3. The releases of all those versions of the game were/will be handled by Disney Interactive. In contrast, the PSP version of this game is releasing next month (at about the same time as the 3DS version), published by Sony instead of Disney, and having been developed by Virtual Toys. I suspect that Disney originally did contract Virtual Toys specifically to make a PSP version for them but then canceled the game's release, at which point Sony (both SCEA and SCEE, from the looks of it) stepped in and said, "We'll take care of publishing this one for you!"
With nothing else coming from Sony in the PSP pipeline that I can think of besides Invizimals: The Lost Tribes (which may not release outside Europe, considering there's been a 1-year delay for the series' previous 2 North American releases) and Ore no Shikabane o Koete Yuke in Japan, it sort of seems like this third-party license might end up as Sony's final UMD for North America. . . .
. . . Or maybe this will be the first in a series of UMD games that Sony rescues from other publishers who've given up on the PSP in the West? *sputter*Valkyria Chronicles III*cough* Well, maybe not, given that Cars 2 was already done, in all languages. If this really turns out to be the last Sony UMD game, it will be kind of strange.
Oh, that blog post also notes a new PSP-3000 bundle that comes with a voucher code for this Cars 2 game along with a UMD for FIFA 12.
