So, for those who held out til the UK release, the initial buzz of PSP ownership is probably over. Two weeks after the launch and you've no doubt played Lumines and Ridge Racer to death, watched the demo UMD a few hundred times, bought a movie and stuffed a few MP3s onto your 64MB memory Stick. So what next? What will PSP become to you?
It's an interesting time. The machine is now available globally with plenty of support from publishers and movie studios, as well as a sizeable audience of both hardcore and casual gamers. There it is in our hands – a console that can play games, movies and music, that can surf the web, that may one day take pictures and act as a GPS device. Will mainstream users get the most out of it? And what does 'getting the most out of it' actually mean?
This is the thing about convergence – humans aren't very good at it. At least not yet. Most consumers like to have a music player, a phone and a handheld games console, with only a fraction willing or able to mix it up a little. But now convergence is really being pushed on us, with iTunes phones, and photo iPods and, at the zenith of the contemporary convergence experience, PSP. It'll be really fascinating to see how daily use of Sony's portable entertainment centre evolves. Will people really start ad hoc network games with strangers? Will they really spend hours every week converting their DVDs to MPEG4s?
I wanted to find out how experienced users, those who've had Japanese machines for months, were using theirs. I also wanted to see if they had any advice for those of us still marveling at that lovely big screen. So I sent a few emails to industry people – classic early adopters. And this is some of what came back…
Ben Cousins at Sony Computer Entertainment weighs in with a very simple suggestion. "With the prices of Memory Sticks dropping dramatically, now couldn't be a better time to load up your PSP with your favourite tracks. The PSP's sound hardware is excellent, and the standard headphones are fantastic quality." And, at the risk of annoying Ben, I'd add that it may be worth checking out third-party memory options. Lexar, for example, has a range of three Gamer Edition sticks that come with the Xploder Media Centre Lite software which makes it easier to organise and navigate your music and video files.
"It sounds really dull, perhaps, but I've been catching up on TV with mine," admits David Braben of Frontier developments. "I watched the first couple of episodes of 'Lost' on the plane. If you have a DVD recorder, it is trivial to copy programmes across using a PC - though I think you'll want a GB or more memory stick to be worthwhile." And to make the process even more straightforward, Sony has just launched the RDR-AX75 DVD burner in Japan, which encodes directly into MPEG4. As Japanese tech site Akihabaranews.com explains:
"Once the video is stored onto the HDD, you just need to stick your MS Duo in the slot and transfer the video onto the memory card. Depending on the type of encoding you use, you can put between 1h10 and 4h10 of cideo onto a 1Gb card. In order to play back the Mpeg-4 AVC content, you need to have the 2.0 firmware on your PSP."
Back to Braben though, and the programming legend feels that the multiplayer side of PSP is not quite matching expectations just yet. "the wireless thing gives a new slant to multiplayer gaming, and works very well - if everyone has a copy of the game you want to play. Unfortunately, more often than not people don't have the same game UMD with them, and currently it is a real pain to get a multiplayer game working off a single UMD. So much so that it's not worth the bother. This is a real shame."
Elsewhere, I've been amused at how many developers are using their PSPs to show off. "I can out-do any iPod user, when I show them I have MP4s and not MP3s - it's clear one-upmanship," says Andrew Oliver, co-founder of Blitz games and veteran handheld coder (What, you've never played Fantastic Dizzy on Game Gear?!). Oliver also highlights another interesting by-product of the machine's download and share capabilities, "you'll be able to get demos of movies and games which everyone loves, and this serves both the marketing departments and the consumer." It's something I hadn't really thought of before, but PSP is going to be the perfect medium for film trailers – they download quickly and they draw a crowd, the ultimate combination of convenience and kudos.
In some ways (putting aside the games again), this is the exciting part, the way that new forms of entertainment will come about, through the merger of web access, ad hoc networking and the natural human instinct to share and show off. Possibly, when email was first invented, none of the clever people responsible realised that, one day, a massive percentage of traffic would be porn clips, amusing adverts and videos of people having serious accidents. A similar evolution may occur with PSP. As for viral marketing - with Sony's hardware it is finally going airborne. Where will this lead?
Finally, Simon Byron, director of veteran videogame PR agency Barrington Harvey has one piece of advice for new PSP owners, and he's extremely adamant about it. "Buy a screen protector," he shouts. "No, really. Put it down now, head back to the shops and buy one. We all have this grand ambition of keeping the hardware in pristine condition; of playing it only in a sealed hyperbaric oxygen chamber, wearing soft, lint gloves. But the reality is harsher; leave your beautiful PSP anywhere for a second and all manner of natural disasters can befall it, and the tiniest scratch - visible only by tilting the screen and shining a light on it - will be on the back of your mind whenever you play. Genuinely, go out and buy one. Now."
So, PSP, after the initial rush of actually, you know, playing the games, is all about showing off, and watching TV, and storing piccies of your kids. Hmmm, that doesn't seem right. One thing's for sure, like any gadget with a hard drive, PSP will become an extension of individuality.
So what does your Memory Stick Duo say about you?'
As for games… Here are a couple of hidden gems from the launch line-up, as recommended by two interviewees…
"World Snooker Championship is not the most obvious PSP launch title, but it's the one I've been playing the most. Maybe it's a sign of my age - Jimmy White's Whirlwind Snooker was a game I almost failed my GCSEs for - but the virtual green baize provides an enormous amount of depth. It's missing a free look mode, but aside from that it's pretty perfect, providing constant challenge. Mastering the potting is relatively easy, but the positional play required to establish significant breaks and keep your opponent from the table puts it on a par with the most in-depth strategy games, of which there are none currently on the PSP. Plus, you can play pool, billiards and do trick shots. And unlock stuff, like videos. Sadly, there doesn't appear to be that one of Peter Ebdon going mental at Stephen Lee from a few years back. I'll keep trying, mind." Simon Byron
"The hidden gem is Fired Up by Sony London. It's a vehicle combat game where your jeep has massive guns mounted on it. Not amazing graphics but, wow, does it play well. The handling is excellent and it feels great. It's really a multiplayer blast-'em-up, but is good in single-player too. You can download extra maps and also Game Share a demo to your mates so you can have multiplayer battles even if they don't own the game..." Simon Smith, Business Development Manager, Blitz Games
