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UMD-Less PSP In the Works?
Acclaim's David Perry says there's a new PSP in the works, one that ditches the UMD drive.
A somewhat unlikely source for such a rumor, Perry is chief creative officer for Acclaim, which focuses on free-to-play online PC games. But, he told Kotaku, he has insider knowledge. "I spoke to a developer who is working on [a UMD-less PSP] right now. I know this developer is already working on it, so that means they have a prototype. That would sound like a fall release to me."
A PSP with no disc drive would mean that the handheld would get its content through digital downloads and connectivity with a PC, Perry speculated, giving Sony a venue to sell content directly to consumers and snuffing out the secondhand UMD market in one fell swoop.
Sony did not return a late evening request for comment. Speculation about a new PSP has been swirling for months.
Perry said he has criticized Sony for letting "Apple stroll away with the portable game market" with the iPhone and iPod Touch, adding, "Why are so many investors investing in Apple game development? Trying to pitch a PSP game to investors right now is brutal."
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Subscribe To Edge Magazine / Corrections / Terms & Conditions / Privacy Policy
Copyright 2006 - 2009 Future Publishing Limited, Beauford Court 30 Monmouth Street Bath, UK BA1 2BW
England and Wales company registration number 2008885
The UMD was always a bad choice for a handheld. Moving parts use up battery life. It's as simple as that.
My takeaway from this story: David Perry craves attention.
I think it is about time they dropped the UMD format. It was always worthless.
I hope this brings new life to the PSP. We need a cheaper alternative to the iPhone.
I wonder how this would do up against the new DSi though. That one is focusing on DD as well, but still has support for DS games.
UMD was a goofy choice to go with from the start. I'd love to see this be true, even better is if in place of the UMD drive was 16gb of internal memory plus the MS slot.
Brian
www.brianwoods.com
http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/2009/0226/kaigai492.htm
PS4 & PSP2.
My PSP basically is UMDless at the moment the only games I play on it are downloadable (read Jean D'arc). If this is true it's perfect for consumers as we now don't have to leave the house and better for Sony/Publishers/Developers as there is less overhead in creating a PSP game. And since Developers need as much encouragement as possible to do PSP games, more money in their pocket is a bloody good one. This would be a win for everyone.
Jeanne D'Arc is my favorite PSP game ever. Yeah, the nature of handheld games makes it a perfect match for downloading content directly onto the device (or link from PC or PS3 as a worst case). This would lower the over-head for smaller developers/publishers and allow more PSN/XBLA type titles to flesh out the release calendar.
That UMD drive sucks up batteries and slows load times anyway.