Is the PSP teh D00med?

[elkatas]

Doomed? Not really, but situation is pretty bad. Hardware sells very well, but it is quite alarming when your console's attach rate is around 3, and last year it actually went down according to NPD and Media-Create. This is practically unheard on this business, and it means people are buying less software than actual consoles.

Why this happens? I guess it mainly goes down to two factors; PSP is bought as a mediaplayer, and piracy is getting totally out of hand. Here is list how many times few popular, high-quality PSP games have been downloaded from thePirateBay:

God of War: Chains of Olympus - 94,154
Patapon - 112,183
Ratchet & Clank - Size Matters - 197,113
Crush - 48,959
LOCO ROCO - 163,904
Wipeout Pulse - 116,965
Castlevania X Chronicles - 102,354
Metal Gear Solid - Portable Ops (Not Including Plus) - 231,054
Burnout Dominator - 269,486

And imagine these numbers are only for single tracker / site. DS has also rampant piracy, but it is more resistant because of casuals and very big userbase.

[monel]

The best thing I ever did was to buy the JAP Ghouls n Ghosts that came with a D-Pad replacement. After I added that the machine improved 10 fold.

What other games come with this D-pad replacement?



Sounds grrrreatt (Tony teh Tiger, cheapo crunchy nut cornflakes ad-man).

[elkatas]

What other games come with this D-pad replacement?.

None, but I'm pretty sure that one of the 3rd party manufacturers made them too...

[Dogg Thang]

Didn't both sfz3 and Tekken come with one? And, yeah, there's third party ones. Though I find the slim doesn't really need it. Still not a good d-pad by any standards but better and adequate.

[JammyD]

Doomed? Not really, but situation is pretty bad. Hardware sells very well, but it is quite alarming when your console's attach rate is around 3, and last year it actually went down according to NPD and Media-Create. This is practically unheard on this business, and it means people are buying less software than actual consoles.

Why this happens? I guess it mainly goes down to two factors; PSP is bought as a mediaplayer, and piracy is getting totally out of hand. Here is list how many times few popular, high-quality PSP games have been downloaded from thePirateBay:

God of War: Chains of Olympus - 94,154
Patapon - 112,183
Ratchet & Clank - Size Matters - 197,113
Crush - 48,959
LOCO ROCO - 163,904
Wipeout Pulse - 116,965
Castlevania X Chronicles - 102,354
Metal Gear Solid - Portable Ops (Not Including Plus) - 231,054
Burnout Dominator - 269,486

And imagine these numbers are only for single tracker / site. DS has also rampant piracy, but it is more resistant because of casuals and very big userbase.

And yet there's still only 5 PSP games available to buy on the (internet version of the) Playstation Store. For shame, Sony.


Also the site seems to break IE7. It's like they can't be bothered.

[JP]

Also the site seems to break IE7. It's like they can't be bothered.

Off topic...

That usually happens with pages on web sites rather the Internet Explorer sites.

Web sites are supposed to be encoded to comply fully with W3C Standards. Browsers such as Firefox, Opera, Safari and many others are compliant with those standards. Unfortunately IE contains parts which aren't compliant so can cause difficulties when people use it on compliant web sites.

Try using one of these as they can be quicker, safer and more user friendly than IE:

• Firefox
• Opera
• Safari

There are probably quite a few which are fully compliant but I think these are the most commonly used web browsers.

[teddymeow]

Well, I went out and bought a Slim 'n' Lite yesterday and all I can say is "Wow"

Picked it up with God of War, Metal Gear Portable Ops and WipEout Pulse.

Screen is great and it feels much nicer in the hands. I haven't played on a handheld for a while (DS has been untouched since I got back from Japan) so this seems a perfect time to restart.

[importaku]

Nah not really doomed, but dosen't really live up to it's full potential either.

Use mine every day on the way to work as a mp3 player & maybe watch a vid or 2 at lunch break. As a gaming machine mine rarely gets used as theres just so few games for it that interest me.

so far my psp library consists of

loco roco
guitaroo man
baito hell 2000
taiko no tatsujin portable
katamari damashii
lumines

The only ones out there that i haven't picked up yet & i want are taiko 2, patapon & the parodius collection. Why are there so few quirky & interesting games for this system? It tries so hard to be like the ps2 but even the ps2 had a massive library of really unusual & quirky games.

the hardware of the psp is fine it just needs more games, problem is most devs jumped to the ds as thats where the money & most users are, lot's more quirky games seem to come out on ds which is the reason my psp collection is at 6 while my ds collection is at 81.

Still waiting for sony to give me vib ribbon with mp3 support that would make me so happy

[sadat]

What's the deal with UMD movies these days? They were WAY too overpriced when the machine first came out, but I've been picking up a load of movies for £2 - £3 lately off eBay. They're also cheap as microchips in Gamestation, and are playable on a TV now with the component cables now. Cheaper than a rental, no hassle with file conversions or movie formats to watch them on the tube - and they don't seem to be making many any more!

[SUMIRE]

Yeah i picked up a fair few films from Gamestation for about £5 each new.
Recently bought God of War which is simply stunning.

[elkatas]

What's the deal with UMD movies these days?

UMD movies didn't sell at all, and most film companies have stopped supporting the format. Most retailers are just dumping their stock to recoup losses. How many UMD movies were made anyways?

[Thor]

its still selling really well in japan, it was the second best seller the other week after the ds and the game sales are picking up accordingly, although the revival was obviously spearheaded by monster hunter, i doubt crisis core hurt it. hopefully the ps3 connectivity will also help what with that machines fortunes also turning around

[teddymeow]

UMD movies didn't sell at all, and most film companies have stopped supporting the format. Most retailers are just dumping their stock to recoup losses. How many UMD movies were made anyways?

There's still plenty of stuff being released on UMD. Recently there's been stuff like Superbad, Resi Extinction, Sunshine, Family Guy: Blue Harvest to name but 4.

Gamestation do 3 for 2 on UMD at the moment (they seem to be the only retailer really supporting the format) but it doesn't surpise me that sales are low when places like HMV are still trying to knock them out at ?20 a pop !! Then again, they're also asking ?30+ for a Blu-ray so...

[Uli]

can i use my PSP as Wireless Media Player?

i've purchased a 500GB wireless media server and heard of the PSP capabilities to stream media from the PS3. can i somehow exploit what Sony calls "Location free Player"? or is there any homebrew solution which allows WiFi media streaming from a PC or WLAN media server?

sorry for being a little OT, but since PSP threads are rare and i'm new to the scene i couldn't resist.