While the psp was quite good (in comparison to other non-game boy portables) and it was nice to see a competitor to nintendo's near monopoly on the market do well; I don't think many people will be upset with this. | |
I will say that there is somewhat of a drought on killer apps for the PSP. A fact that saddens me greatly. | |
I'm surprised they have no plans to make a new one, but I haven't heard any plans for a new Nintendo hand-held so I guess they wouldn't NEED to make a new one. | |
Keep in mind this is the president of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe, not the electronics company. SCEE produces and/or develops software. Who in the Japanese electronics manufacturing company would have authorized him to make an official announcement about there not being a PSP 2? No one. In short, he's speaking out of turn. Any official reliable word will come out of Japan - from the hardware manufacturer. | |
Nintendo said their next handheld won't have touch screen support, so a new one is coming...and will probably shock the world with something ridiculous that shouldn't work but probably will. Tbh what could they do in a PSP 2 besides upgrade the graphical flair? there is nothing else they could do, its already basically a portable multimedia system (which DS is also, but with the aid of a bit of pirated hardware). | |
Most people would yell for a second nub on the PSP, but there isn't enough demand for a PSP nor do Sony really want to make a brand new PSP anyway. It's doing well enough for them I suppose, and there's no real reason to come out with a completely new product just yet. | |
Apparently Sony are going through some financial trouble as of recent, so i doubt that anything risky like a new product is going to be happening any time now. | |
oh what a shame, however will i cope! im being fascec...fase...fashe...bitchy. i dont have a psp or plan on getting one but yeah, go lukies | |
Really gotta say that i can't really see them doing anything "advanced" with a wholly new PSP anyway I mean they can't even figure out how to get long battery life after 3 iterations, best stick to just trying to make the "best" PSP1 they can. | |
Five hours isn't enough battery life? Anyway, hopefully the PSP2 will have PS2 emulator functionality. Given that there are already a couple of working amateur PS2 emulators out there I don't think it's too outlandish. Packing the processor power into such a small space might be a problem though... | |
The only way that Sony could sort out battery life is to scrap the PSP and start again. You see, their entire battery life problem can be attributed to the processor that they used. The PSP uses a processor based on the MIPS R4000, similar to the processors used in the PlayStation, PlayStation 2 and Nintendo 64. The Nintendo DS, on the other hand, used a variant of the ARM9 processor, a processor architecture used in the majority of portable embedded devices, including most mobile phones, most mobile gaming systems since the Game Boy Advance and almost all music players. The MIPS architecture may have worked well when Silicon Graphics were putting them into their workstations, but that was a desktop application, and anyway, SGI aren't even using MIPS processors any more. They're using Intel Xeons, AMD Opterons and Intel Itaniums. The MIPS architecture is strictly obsolete, and never made sense in a portable context anyway. Compare that to the ARM architecture. It proved its worth in power saving applications early on, as ARM7TDMIs powered the Game Boy Advance, Psion Series 5 and later the iPod. Where the MIPS architecture of a PSP might need watts of power in order to run (and a comparable Pentium processor more than a dozen watts), the ARM architecture generally works on less than a watt, and I'm not just talking about the puny ARM7 and ARM9 processors here either - the Intel XScale, ARM11 and ARM Cortex processors, which would be just as powerful as the MIPS processor in the PSP, would still need less than a watt in order to run. Sony shot themselves in the foot when they chose to keep on using the MIPS architecture. Now, there's no easy path to replacing that hot, power-hungry processor with a far nicer ARM equivalent. | |
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Sony Not Planning PSP 2
Given the current issues facing the PSP, Sony execs say don't hold your breath for a successor - at least not yet.
Though the PSP continues to enjoy healthy hardware sales, SCEE president David Reeves recently acknowledged the system's biggest weakness is its dearth of new software - something gamers have been painfully aware of for quite some time now. Reeves told MCV there are "currently no plans for a PSP 2," since Sony already has its hands full.
Sony has explored different ways to jumpstart the PSP, including launching the slightly redesigned PSP-3000 and offering downloadable games for the PSP through the PlayStation Store. Reeves said the company is still focused on the current generation PSP and has chosen to tweak and improve the device instead of working on its follow-up.
"The PSP is as successful in numbers as PS2 - it tracks its numbers in a cumulative basis. Its weakness, however, is its software," acknowledged Reeves. "And that's because developers, when it comes to placing their bets, have to choose PS3 and 360, then Wii, then DS, maybe even PS2 before PSP. It's the same at our internal studios, where the focus has been on PS3. They've also focused a lot on PS2 as well because we have to get the SingStars out for that format. So PSP games will come - they just take a while longer."
It certainly makes sense to deal with the problem on-hand before making new ones, but Sony seems to be sending some mixed signals. Seeking to regain third-party support on the platform is going to be a tad difficult, when Sony's own internal development studios aren't even focusing on making new games for the device.
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