Saints Row: Undercover (Stream on January 28th)

https://twitter.com/ChipCheezum/status/690317694655184896

This game only existed to the public through a leak from a band.

 

Damn, didn't know this was gonna be a PSP game. Looks pretty damn good actually.

 

Thanks for sharing this @Desert Bandit! Really cool to see the guys from Volition sharing our passion of unreleased videogames too! Definitely going to tune in into that live stream, really curious to see what this handheld version of Saints Row has to offer

 

It look really goood for psp standards.
I want to play it so bad.
Love betas of open worlds.

 

Volition has an awesome YouTube presence. I watched through the Punisher video last night. Really cool hearing some of the behinds the scene stuff. I'm going to watch through their videos.

 

I wish DICE would do something like this with Battlefront. As in they'd show FRD's version, Slant Six's, Battlefront Online and Lucasarts' version "two".

That game had a hell of a development cycle, and IMO it should've stayed archived until a developer was really up to the challenge of meeting fans expectations.

 

Saints Row had so much potential. This is sad.

 

Tbh, it was only a handheld game. I don't think it would've sold very well. Probably would've turned into another Elite Squadron :L

 

Wow, Volition has officially released the prototype:

https://www.unseen64.net/saintsrowundercover/

 

Wow, that is unexpected! We'll have to add this to the 2016 release thread.

Very cool of Volition!

 

Just so everyone knows
-PSPs cannot play this title with CFW Older ones work, newer ones will not
-PSP2PS3 repacking does not work (it will lock the console on boot of the game) This is changing as we speak
-Repacking the ISO will also do nothing

PPSSPP (and dev hardware) is likely the only way to make it work unless an experienced modder can change this.

Furthermore - as a CSO file it's very small. 190mb small.

 

Another reason I am very surprised with Volition. I've always liked their games, but now I feel even more inclined to support them. +1, Volition.

 

-Edit- Removed old post, this one is better.

The prototype for Saints Row was found on a DVD-r, since that was one of the ways you could test things on PSP kits. The problem is, PSP kits like to boot a different file, namely the boot.bin file, instead of the eboot.bin of a retail unit.

Some early CFW could change the boot setting from eboot.bin to boot.bin, which would normally allow these sorts of things to boot. Problem is, developers, likely at Sony's instruction, started shipping UMDs with blank boot.bin files, which meant that games wouldn't boot if the setting was changed. Im sure there is something else to do with how early CFW worked too, but in the end, that meant that this option was removed from many, if not all, of the newer CFW.

In the case of this prototype, the EBOOT.BIN is dummied out, so attempting to launch that does nothing. So the simple solution is to rebuild the ISO, deleting the original EBOOT file and instead renaming boot.bin to EBOOT.bin. This allows the game to boot on CFW units.

So for those of you with the game downloaded already, feel free to open UMDgen if you're comfortable and make the changes.

For anyone else, here is a pre-modified file.

Now, this gets the game to boot. But the game still locks up as it is when you try to start a new game. Unfortunately I don't have access to a PSP Test yet, and Im not that familiar with the PSP emulator to know how accurate it is at spitting back useful messages. It could very well be a RAM thing, but I have a limited about of PSP hardware here to confirm that. I doubt it's related to the removal of the unlicensed music from the game, too. But still, it's a start.

Doing it like this allows it to boot on my PSP Go, as well as a PSP2PS3 pkg on CFW.

For those of you on older custom firmware units, you can use the unmodified version of the ISO by changing your settings to Execute BOOT.BIN in the advanced settings of your recovery menu

PS: I tried to get a heads-up over to the fine people over at Volition, but I don't think the message made it there (or simply didn't make it in time). Either way, I truly appreciate what they have done here, Also, the game compresses really well.

PSP2PS3 Screenshot:

 

Hoho very cool indeed thanks for posting info all

 

Hoho very cool indeed thanks for posting info all

 

Thanks Borman for sharing your findings.
About to test it on my PS3 as well (PSP getting a ton of crashes, as expected)

 

That was pretty nice thing from Volition, is a rare case where developers decide to upload an prototype, the last one I recall is an Stalker October 2004 build that GSC uploaded as an gratitude from the fans.

 

Someone commented on the U64 post

jayplast30-01-2016 at 17:51
I actually have it 100% WORKING on a CFW PSP 3000 Brite 6.60 PRO-C2! when youre on the XMB press the select button and change youre UMD ISO mode to M33 Driver and it works like a beauty!

 

Thats one of the first things I tried. Doesnt work on my PSP Go or 1000.

 

Well, at least for his 3000 it worked.

Doesn't Go have 64 MB of Ram?