Wednesday, September 06, 2006

 

Playstation Portable Initial Impressions

I had been hesitant to get one of these newfangled PSP's every since the initial launch because I thought that $250 was too much to spend on a portable gaming device. Now, things are different. Now there are plenty of exclusive games I can only play on the PSP, to make it worth my while to justify a purchase. Plus, I didn't have to splash out any cash, I was able to procure a PSP via trade for an extra Xbox 360 I had received from doing one of those "free offers" sites. In fact, I got a nice, excellent condition used PSP and ten (10) games for it. Schweeeet.

Here are the games I snagged, and my tentative grade on F to A scale, based on pretty limited gameplay time so far.

Daxter - A+
Burnout Legends - A+
Syphon Filter: Dark Mirror - A
Mega Man Powered Up - A
Mega Man Maverick Hunter X - B
Street Fighter Alpha 3 MAX - B-
Wipeout Pure - B-
Ridge Racer - C
Field Commander (haven't tried it yet, it was sealed, didn't want to devalue it)
Frantix (just haven't had time yet)

I also picked up PoPoLoCrois, an RPG, but haven't had time to play much yet so no rating.

I have rented:
Blade Dancer: Lineage of Light - B+ (an RPG)
Legend of Heroes: A Tear of Vermillion (no rating yet)

What do I think about this device? Well, it's far too precious to actually use as a portable gaming device. :-P

Actually I have used it a few times on the bus ride to and from work and it does very well. The screen is amazing, absolutely mesmerizing. Sound is fantastic as well with my earphones, heck even without earphones the built in speakers aren't too shabby compared to say the Nintendo DS. But the buttons on the right side are a bit too far apart from each other, and it is awkward to try and use the D-pad AND the analog nubby in any games that make you use both (thinking of Syphon Filter here). I haven't gotten used to the shoulder buttons yet either but in time I'm sure I will.

How does it compare to the Nintendo DS? Well, the DS is still more fun overall I think. I have a ton of DS games and the touch screen just adds a lot to the gaming experience, plus stuff like the microphone and being able to hold in in different ways is innovative. But there is no doubt that the PSP is a much beefier system, and capable of doing a lot more graphically, and not to mention the UMD format allows PSP developers to put more frills in like voice acting and FMV movies.

Load times, on the other hand, are non-existant on the DS but plague just about every single game I have on the PSP. While 5-10 seconds of load time doesn't seem like much to bitch about, when you have that over and over and over in games, it can get pretty irritating once you realize you're spending a considerable percentage of your precious play time staring at a progress bar.

Overall I do not regret my "purchase" of the PSP, I think I will definitely enjoy it especially for all the great RPGs that are out now and more on the way. Some of the games are really amazing, such as Daxter which could easily be mistaken for a PS2 platformer, or Syphon Filter, which has all the complexity and flash of the series, or Burnout Legends which I could easily mistake for Burnout 3 Takedown on the PS2 if I weren't paying close attention. Here's hoping that more games of that nature come to the platform.

I'm thinking of trying some homebrew if I can do it without downgrading my firmware. I heard there's some new hax out. I'd like to run an SNES emu on here, that would own.

Comments:
I just bought my PSP too a month ago. I have only 1 game, Blade Dancer.
When I'm not playing the game I'm using my PSP to watch PSP formatted movies or I just listen to mp3 I've uploaded onto my memory disk. I bought a PSP that has a 2.6 firmware and it can't be downgraded but I'm cool with that because I think the PSP is a killer portable device. I also surf and download video feeds using my PSP. Totally cool.
 
2.6 can be downgraded. I haven't tried this but this is what I read. You can upgrade to 2.71 by playing the locoroco demo, then you use the new downgrader from 2.71 to go to 1.5. It only works on earlier model PSPs before a certain motherboard revision. Check the hax sites for details. I'm thinking about doing this but honestly there's nothing on homebrew i really want.
 
Like I said on my first post about my PSP, I wouldn't really wanna play any homebrew games too just like you. I've already upgraded my PSP to 2.80 and I have the LocoRoco demo, Tama Run and the Soccer demo. Besides, I really can't downgrade my PSP because it's mainframe motherboard is the new version - not downgradable. :)
 
yeah a friend of mine had a 1.5 psp and he ran emus on it and such but he said they ran like ass and I was maining wanting to run SNES emu but he said it's just too choppy to be playable so that's kind of useless for me. I'll just buy the games that are available for the GBA that were SNES ones and hope that Nintendo releases some of the better ones via Wii WiFi that can transfer to the DS.
 
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