The PlayStation Vita is nearing the end of its lifespan as its production has ended, according to the official PlayStation website in Japan.

According to Gematsu’s translation, just the PCH-2000 ZA11 (PS Vita Black) and the PCH-2000 ZA23 (PS Vita Aqua Blue) SKUs only remain. The shipments for these two last models too are ‘scheduled to end soon’.

At this time, no specific date has been given. However, Gematsu said that when Sony ended production of the PlayStation 3, the same website made a similar statement such as the Vita’s just a couple of months before the PlayStation 3 was finally withdrawn.

Sony has already omitted the Vita out of their future plans in regards to the free games from the PS Plus subscription and has reminded developers and publishers that they would no longer be producing physical copies of Vita games by the end of March 2019.

While the PlayStation Vita is about to end its life cycle, there is a glimmer of hope in the future of Sony handheld gaming in the form of this patent. The patent was filed at the Korea Patent Office in November 2017 and was made public in November 2018. According to its design, Sony Interactive Entertainment Inc. has patented an “electronic game cartridge” device.

There are no specific details of the patent as of yet.