If you didn't think Sony was serious about making development on the PlayStation Vita as straight-forward as possible, then perhaps this will change your mind

The platform holder's announced that Vita development kits will be available for as low as €1,900 — a staggeringly low price considering PlayStation Portable kits cost €15,000.

“The PS Vita development kit is going to be very affordable,” said SCEE's George Bain during GDC Europe. “And when I say affordable I mean €1,900 plus VAT. There is no cost to join the PS Vita Develop Program.

“There’s just that cost of the dev kit. If you’re a small developer, we happy to talk to you about this. It will help if you have a games portfolio. There’s no reason we won’t speak with smaller studios about joining up.”

This might not sound like a particularly exciting announcement from a consumer perspective, but it's an incredibly smart move in terms of Sony encouraging development on its new handheld. And that should result in more software for the likes of us. So in a roundabout way, this announcement is supremely exciting.