Techno lust readings are likely to go off the scale as the most important gadget since the iPod launches in South Africa in September. Sony’s PlayStation Portable brings you games, movies and music, and will display photos. Yes, the ”C” word may have finally come of age: but convergence isn’t the first thing you think of when you see the PSP. That honour goes to the aesthetics.
This is a sexy and desirable piece of kit — the kind of thing that will turn heads on the train. But, with a price tag of about R2 500, does it have the brains to match the beauty?
Looking at the hardware first, it is clear what the big draw is — the screen, which measures just over 10cm, with proper 16:9 widescreen dimensions. The style comes at a cost, however — the PSP’s glossy black finish is lovely, but easily smudged. Wiping the screen with the included cloth becomes an essential pre-use ritual.
The controls are only as good as any other handheld, so prolonged play is uncomfortable. Because of the layout, all the buttons are within easy reach, although the analogue stick in the bottom left is fiddly to use. But for a lot of games, especially sports titles, it is invaluable.
The PSP isn’t really a pocket device (the size of the screen dictates that) but it is relatively light and will not weigh down any bag. The standard pack includes a handy protective slipcase, but while the PSP feels tough, it is unlikely to survive any great fall. Luckily, the storage medium — the Universal Media Disk, or UMD — is sturdy. Battery life is better than expected, with about six hours from charged, though less if the built-in wireless internet connection is used.
So the PSP looks good, but what can you actually do with it? Initially, at least, the games are the most important element. ”Traditional handheld gaming has always been an apology to what you receive on a TV. Not any more,” says Phil Harrison, Sony Europe’s vice president development. And he is mainly right. The graphics are of a much higher quality than the PSP’s gaming competitor, the Nintendo DS.
UK developers Climax created one of the US launch games and Chris Keegan, Climax’s vice-president development, is positive. ”It’s an exciting device to us because for the first time we have a piece of hardware capable of creating games with a similar fidelity to the PS2 but in a handheld device,” he says.
David Brickely, development manager at Codemasters, agrees: ”What has changed with the PSP is the old assumption that a handheld game has to compromise on quality.”
Racing, sports and puzzles — the launch lineup covers all the traditional bases. If your gaming taste is a little more in depth, then you’ll need to wait a bit longer. But the launch lineup is solid enough, and the high number of titles available (about 30) is welcome.
The highlights are Virtua Tennis World Tour and Wipeout Pure. The former is a cracking tennis game that transfers marvellously on to handheld, while Wipeout is the latest in the futuristic racing series and highlights the PSP’s graphical oomph. The ability to download further content is another signal to the future. Other standouts include Metal Gear Acid — a bizarre take on the popular stealth game series — and the driving games Colin McRae 2005 and Ridge Racer.
Sports fans are well catered for on launch. Fifa and World Tour Soccer cover the beautiful game, with the latter a pleasant surprise, though the October release of Pro Evolution Soccer 5 is likely to storm to the top of this particular league. Elsewhere, EA have basketball covered with NBA Street, but the real sports recommendation is the cute Everybody’s Golf.
One of the bigger surprises is Fired Up — a vehicular combat title set in a series of Grand Theft Auto-style cities. A spin-off of GTA, Liberty City Stories, is due out in October and is likely to become the format’s biggest selling game.
Ever since Tetris arrived on the original Game Boy, puzzle games have been crucial to handhelds. The PSP’s graphical prowess means it doesn’t have to rely on abstract visuals but puzzle titles are still important. The pick of them is Lumines, but Mercury— where you guide a blob around a maze — is an enjoyable brain tease.
The kids are covered with Ape Academy, but overall, the launch titles highlight the demographic Sony is aiming for. ”Our initial target audience will be an older, more digital-savvy audience than the traditional handheld market,” says Harrison.
The stop-start nature of handheld gaming makes the ability to save your game anywhere crucial. Arriving at your destination while approaching the end of a match in World Tour Soccer isn’t the disaster it could be. Simply turn off the PSP and when switched on, the action will resume where it left off. Movie playback is the same, and the PSP even remembers where it was on a film if you have played a game in the meantime.
The other big gaming feature is its wireless connection. The PSP comes with wireless network capabilities and a PSP-to-PSP proprietary ”ad hoc” function that lets you connect several machines together, negating the need to find a Wi-Fi hotspot. The latter allows up to 16 players in the vicinity to compete or share data, and some games need only one player to own the physical title, who can then share it with others.
Looking at the launch lineup as a whole, there is no doubting the title’s technical quality, despite some issues with loading times. The graphics and audio are unprecedented on a handheld. However, at present, few of the titles show the originality that Nintendo’s DS can occasionally deliver.
There are other concerns. ”The real problem the PSP has is that what all publishers are looking to do is port over existing PS2 hits without considering whether they make for good handheld entertainment,” says Kristan Reed, editor of Eurogamer.net. ”Midnight Club 3 and its lengthy loading times are a good example of this.”
This issue hasn’t gone unnoticed by game developers. ”It is important to find a balance between pushing the hardware with high-quality graphics and sound, and ensuring the game is appropriate for someone to play in very short bursts,” said Brickley.
The UK games development community is enthusiastic about PSP. ”PSP is an extremely powerful handheld platform, which means we can look at doing games which are graphically richer than has been possible before, as well as games which require more processing power like AI [artificial intelligence], physics and animation,” said Ian Baverstock, Business Director at developers Kuju.
But the significance of PSP is that it does a lot more than play games. ”The PSP has multiple entry points with music, video and games all appealing to different audiences,” says Harrison. At the price charged — about R170 — you would have to be a real fan to buy a movie on UMD rather than DVD. But, if you do value the convenience of watching on the go, then the playback quality is excellent. ”The 16:9 screen shows that movies are core to the PSP experience,” says Harrison.
Unfortunately, the volume level on movies is too low on the included headphones. Sony is wary of litigious owners getting earache, but for the normal user it means spending more money. Connect a decent set of headphones — PSP will take any standard pair — and the sound matches up to the sparkling picture. The PSP is the first device to make watching movies on the go a valid experience.
The initial movies are skewed towards a male audience, but expect the genres to move away from action and sci-fi as the ownership demographics widen.
However, watching your own video content is a problem. The whole process of getting playable content on to the device is fiddly and unfriendly. Music and photos are added by connecting your PSP to a PC and simply dragging and dropping. But for video, the PSP can only recognise one format and it needs to be named in a ridiculously restrictive manner. This is one of the few disappointments with the PSP.
The third prong in the masterplan is music. The playback is certainly iPod standard, especially if you have upgraded your headphones. But the PSP is only really a music player for casual listeners. The standard 32MB memory card will only hold a few tracks and the on-screen presentation of the tracks is perfunctory.
The PSP is undoubtedly a gorgeous thing and it does get a lot right. The games are graphically unsurpassed on a handheld. The movie playback is excellent. But there are some issues: load times are lengthy and to get any serious use out of the device you will need a larger memory stick. The process for getting non-UMD video content on to the PSP is a farce.
However, when you consider what’s on offer now, plus the potential connectivity with PS3, this device cannot be ignored. Commuting just got to be a whole lot more fun. – Guardian Unlimited Â