Android gets busy with the PSP, breeds the Playstation Phone

From engadget

The device is described as cross between the Samsung Captivate and the PSP Go -- in other words, it's a landscape slider with game controls in place of the typical QWERTY keyboard. The D-pad is here, but instead of the small joystick, the device will have what was described as a "long touch pad" for analog controls, along with standard PSP buttons and shoulder buttons. The phone has a large display, described as being between 3.7 and 4.1 inches with WVGA or better resolution, a 5 megapixel camera that we're told might not be final, and it'll likely have a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU on board. The phone is mostly black with some silver highlights, and the gamepad area is white / silver in color. Apparently it's currently branded as a Xperia device, but it looks like it will carry PlayStation branding as well.

On the software side, it looks like the device will be running Gingerbread (Android 3.0) with a phone-specific skin, and there will be a new area of the Android Market specifically for the games. That content will be initially accessible only by the halo device, but from the sounds of things, these titles might be made available to other Android phones if their specs and button layouts meet requirements. Games will be graphically in the range of PSX or PSP games, meaning true 3D gaming is headed to Android. Titles currently being shown off seem to be focused around some older PSX as well as new PSP offerings, with God of War, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and LittleBigPlanet possibly on tap, and future plans for titles which incorporate augmented reality features.


Why sony collaborates with google, bringing tons of knowledge to whats basically a open standard that many of her rivals (Samsung, LG, etc...) can and will have access too, I've no idea.

 

After what I'm going through with my Xperia X2, I don't think I will buy another sony phone again (and I loved my old P900, X2 hw is nice but OS is sooo buggy a fake Chinese phone would function better).

Also for the story in general, I still think this is a SE or Sony Eletronics & SE inititive then a Sony Comp Ent (Playstation division).

 

I'm still trying to figure out why sony lets google get anywhere near their IP.

 

Well it depends, the rumor it self is all over the place in terms of what actually would be on tap.

I'd say as a base rule the phone will run PS1 games from the PSN store as Stinger has expressed expanding PSN to all sony devices. For actual PSP games, I don't fully see that. Maybe a few specially made ports will happen but not all psp software (unless this thing has a PSP on a chip in the unit, and some beefy security to reduce piracy). :shrug:

I also know for a fact this has no bearing on a potential PSP2.

 

Yeah the hardware has nothing to do with the MIPS on the PSP, but they explicitly say it would get PSP games, not PSN/PSX titles, and thats what makes no sense since in theory those games could run on any android device with similar specs (think anything from the Nexus and up) which you can get for the same cost of a PSP unit (with a contract).

Is like sony is just giving away stuff...

 

sony ericsson != sony computer entertainment

 

I KNOW, but Sony still owns 50% of SE, they can't act in complete disregard of one of its owners.

 

It be a nice way to salvage psp game sales, but honestly I don't see this selling this well. I wouldn't be surprised if sony adopted the android operating system since they did adopt linux.

Plus I would imagine that since apple has taken there music playing and phone business, they want get back in the game again.

 

AFAIK Jobs always hated gaming, even back when he worked at atari.

Plus the allure of iOS/android games is its simplicity, porting the PS2-esque catalog of the PSP might be overdoing it.

 

So? Like every company executive he loves money.
I definitely could see this as an SE project to be sold alongside the PSP whatevermodelthey'reuptothisweek.

 

That's not true. Twice it makes references to PS1 software.

"Titles currently being shown off seem to be focused around some older PSX"

Most likely there will be something to lock the software to this phone device, so it won't just run on all other android phones (unless there is a way to hack around it).

I'm not sure how beefy a simular spec droid is but the PSP GPU is still pretty beefy (a large portion of iphone stuff still don't surpass the polygon numbers pushed in psp software).

I believe you got it backwards. There has long been word of SE wanting to do a PS branded phone device but SCE being the obstructionist.

 

What will be interesting will be if their collaboration includes the PS3/PS4.

It makes sense on several levels. Google wants Sony for their games library and hardware. Also they will provide added ability for Google to compete vs. Apple and Microsoft.

Sony wants access to Google's image and content. Also, the Android OS is the closest competition to the IOS and the most popular phone OS available presently.

 

EDIT: taking a second look at it, it does mentions the PSX, with some games being near that graphical range (lots of android games are) but they do emphasize valuable PSP IP like GoW and LBP

The only way to properly lock it would be using propietary hardware, but they already mention a Snapdragon which is common among android phones.

I can't get specs for the AMD GPU on the snapdragon, but the PowerVR SGX on iphones, ipads and some android phones can push 14 MPolys/s, 1Gpx/s@200MHz, with another version pushing as much as 40MPolys/s.

Theres already a 133M poly/s version in the works.

No wonder why: what SE seems to do here is take google's OS and SCE Playstation brand&games, smash it together and call it a day, lazy ass bastards...

Half-assing a gamephone is not gonna work, nokia already proved that with the taco-console AKA Ngage

Google is already planning a games division and buying social gaming companies. Whats this going to do is give them very valuable information about the market, at sony's expense.

 

This sort of reminds me of the Nintendo Playstation..

Allow a potential rival to "work" with you all while allowing them access to valuable information that they can someday use to form their own competing branch.

 

Damn straight

 

Wait, wait wait. Since when did Android = Google? Yeah, G designed it...

but choosing to use Android on your device isn't the same as working with Google.

I don't think speculation is necessary at this point.

 

Google is not going to enter the gaming industry in any major way beyond browser games. Just like they are not going to enter the movie industry because of Youtube. It's just a means to push advertising, like all of their ventures.

Google will benefit as much as Sony, but no one is going to lose from the deal.

 

I'm really not too sure I understand why they're trying to shoehorn the PSP into Android OS?

Surely it would make more sense to add the phone side of things into the PSP's existing OS? The current hardware already supports a camera, and everything else required for a phone other than a SIM card and touchscreen. You'd also still have full access to the PS Store for PSP, PSone and Minis software.

 

Browser games are HUGE right now, and getting bigger, I used to be skeptic about it but now I wonder if they will surpass "normal" gaming in the future.

Yeah just ask Nintendo how these deals go...

Me neither, I think they are trying to jump on the bandwagon with something different, but what they dont get is that the point of android is that all phones are more or less the same and compatible.

If I wanted something different, I'll buy an iPhone or a Pre.

On PSP as a phone, yeah sony could just had released the PSP with a GSM/UMTS chip, a touchscreen for phone input and BOOM: the Playstation Phone.

Considering the cost of the device compared to smartphones they could give it away for free with a contract.