Friday, April 15, 2005


The PSP


The PSP rocks like Elvis. Seriously sweet device. It made my most recent business trip far more enjoyable than such things have a right to be. Nice bit of symmetry — the original Wipeout was the game that made me pick the Sony Playstation over the Sega Saturn back in 1995. I was a console gamer during the Atari 2600 / Odyssey II / Intellivision era, and continued on through the Colecovision, then college and the Crash happened and I lost interest. I completely opted out of the era of Nintendo’s dominance, missing out entirely on the NES and SNES, so the sentimental attachment gamers of that era have to properties like Mario, Zelda, StreetFighter, and all that other stuff is completely absent in me. My touchstones are the old Activision, Odyssey II, Midway, and Atari games of the 80s. And Wipeout. Oh yes, Wipeout, and how it warms my heart to see the old gal as one of the launch kingpin titles on the new PSP.

I even watched Spiderman 2 in my hotel room, on the PSP’s remarkably bright, clear screen. I’d somehow managed to miss it in theatres, so it was nice to have it in the PSP bundle.


:: Dave Walker 12:52 (EST/EDT) [+] ::

:: [/entertainment/games]
:: tags:

:: Comments (4)

Comments:

Randy Charles Morin wrote:

Title: PSP

Date: 4/15/2005 13:44:31

Response:
The PSP does look awesome. Any thoughts on the angle I should take to let my wife buy me one ;)
gummi wrote:

Title:

Date: 4/15/2005 15:28:20

Response:
Well, I went and got myself a Nintendo DS, mainly because the PSP isn't out here yet. I was, and now I'm once again, hooked on SuperMario64. I must say that taking this kind of gaming experience on the road is pretty amazing. It's impressive to play a game that's better than the version I played 8-9 years ago, in such a small package. I'm not too sure about the PSP specs, but if the DS had a decent TCP/IP stack it would be an excellent way to keep connected on the road, too -- with the built-in Wi-Fi and Pictochat.
ssp wrote:

Title:

Date: 4/15/2005 18:27:29

Response:
Hmm, I've never owned any game console in my life. Neither a home-use one nor a portable one. Not even a tamagotchi or a mobile phone. (Just an iPod, but its games hardly count... at least I've only played them very few times. The closest I ever got to playing games was nagging my mum I lot, so I could set up the Atari (ST) in the living room at the TV as I only had a b/w screen on which the games wouldn't run... that kind of addicted my mum to playing Giana Sisters and Rick Dangerous.) Reading all the excited people who write about these new portable game consoles is quite hard to understand for me...
d.w. wrote:

Title:

Date: 4/16/2005 10:16:58

Response:
Randy: It's got WiFi, and can find open access points. There's your utility! :) Gummi: believe it or not, I've never played SM64. I have that whole "missed the Nintendo" era thing going on... Sven: The appeal of a device to tune out the world while, for example, waiting for my girlfriend to get her nails done (which happened yesterday) cannot be underestimated. Besides, I know all it would take would be a PSP or DS port of Snood to draw you over to the dark side. :)



The world is a comedy to those who think, and a tragedy to those who feel. -- Horace Walpole