Sony's Next Generation Portable unveiling - PSP2 in disguise

Farid

Artist formely known as Vysez
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Since, the platform has been officially announced, we can now move from the pure speculation thread into a more grounded in reality thread with the official announcement of the -still nameless- platform by Sony today. That NeoGeo Portable (NGP) thing seem to be a codename only, the actual name should be revealed at a later date. And knowing Sony, it should be something groundbreaking like PlayStation Portable 2!

The Facts

So, here's the current information of the portable itself:

Press Release

SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT ANNOUNCES ITS NEXT GENERATION PORTABLE ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM

Ultimate Portable Entertainment System Makes Its Debut This Year,
Further Expanding the PlayStation® Business in the Portable Gaming Market

Tokyo, January 27, 2011– Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCE) today announced its next generation portable entertainment system (codename: NGP), which delivers the ultimate portable entertainment experience. NGP will make its debut at the end of the year 2011.

NGP is designed to offer unparalleled interactive entertainment that is only possible on PlayStation®. This new system offers a revolutionary combination of rich gaming and social connectivity within a real world context, made possible by leveraging SCE’s experience from both PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) and PlayStation®3 (PS3®) entertainment systems.

Deep and immersive gaming is at the core of PlayStation’s DNA, and NGP is the latest embodiment of this vision. By having both Wi-Fi and 3G network connectivity, together with various applications, NGP will enable infinite possibilities for users to “encounter,” “connect,” “discover,” “share” and “play” with friends wherever they are. Within the device are a range of features that provide a genuinely cutting-edge, next generation ultimate portable entertainment experience.
・Stunning OLED and Revolutionary User Interface

NGP incorporates a beautiful multi-touch 5-inch organic light emitting display (OLED) as the front display. A high-performance CPU / GPU combined with OLED enables rich, visually striking graphics never seen before on a portable entertainment system, for both games and other digital entertainment content. The new system also incorporates a unique multi-touch pad on the rear, and together with the front touch display, NGP offers new game play allowing users to interact directly with games in three dimension-like motion, through “touch, grab, trace, push and pull” moves of the fingers.
・Super Oval Design and Dual Analog Sticks


While succeeding the basic design philosophy of PSP, NGP adopts the Super Oval Design form factor, created to fit comfortably in users’ hands. For the first time, a portable entertainment system will feature two analog sticks, which enable a wider range of game genres to be brought into the portable experience.
・LiveArea™

Every game title for NGP will be provided with a space called “LiveArea™” where users can share the fun and excitement with other players. Users will have access to the latest information of games provided from SCE and 3rd party developers and publishers through PlayStation®Network. Additionally, NGP users will be able to view an “Activity” log that is constantly updated with accomplishments from users who are playing the same game, which in turn can trigger active real-time communication among users.
・Near

SCE will also provide location-based services on NGP as part of the basic features utilizing PlayStation Network. The new application called “Near,” developed specifically for this service and the network, will be pre-installed in the system to let users find out what their friends in the vicinity are playing now or what they were playing recently. Users can meet their friends and new players virtually, regardless of what games they are playing, simply by sharing their game information across different dimensions of time and distance.
・New Game Medium

NGP adopts a new game medium, a small flash memory based card, dedicated for NGP software titles. Taking advantage of the flash memory feature, this innovative card can store the full software titles plus add-on game content or the game save data directly on to the card. By adopting flash memory based card, SCE will be able to provide game cards with higher capacity in the future, allowing developers to store more game data to deliver rich and immersive games.

NGP will also come equipped with two cameras on its front and rear, as well as three motion sensors, gyroscope, accelerometer and electronic compass, all of which are designed to enable users to enjoy the world of entertainment that is linked with real life experiences.

PlayStation®Suite (PS Suite), announced today, will also closely coordinate with NGP. The newly developed and released game content for Android™ based portable devices can also be enjoyed on NGP. As a result, users will have access to not only the most leading-edge content, but also some of the more casual experiences that typify the mobile market place.

SCE will vigorously promote NGP towards the launch as the next generation portable entertainment platform and deploy various measures to further expand the portable gaming market.


Known Specs

CPU
ARM® CortexTM-A9 core (4 core)

GPU
IMGTech SGX543MP4+

External Dimensions
Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection)

Screen
(Touch screen) 5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED
Multi touch screen (capacitive type)

Rear touch pad
Multi touch pad (capacitive type)

Cameras
Front camera, Rear camera

Sound
Built-in stereo speakers
Built-in microphone

Sensors
Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), Three-axis electronic compass

Location
Built-in GPS
Wi-Fi location service support

Keys / Switches
PS button
Power button
Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left)
Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square)
Shoulder buttons (Right/Left)
Right stick, Left stick
START button, SELECT button
Volume buttons (+/-)

Wireless communications
Mobile network connectivity (3G)
IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1x1)(Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode)
Bluetooth® 2.1+EDR ?A2DP/AVRCP/HSP?


Current Publisher/Developer support list

Japan
ACQUIRE Corp. ALVION Inc. AQ INTERACTIVE INC. ARC SYSTEM WORKS Co.,Ltd. ARIKA CO.,LTD. ARTDINK CORPORATION ASCII MEDIA WORKS Inc. CAPCOM CO., LTD. CHUN SOFT CO., Ltd Codemasters Software Company Limited Crafts & Meister Co.,Ltd. CyberConnect2 Co.,Ltd. D3 PUBLISHER Inc. Dimps Corporation Edia Co., Ltd. ENTERBRAIN, INC. FromSoftware, Inc Gameloft K.K. Genki Co.,Ltd. Grasshopper Manufacture Inc. GungHo Online Entertainment,Inc GUST CO.,LTD. HAMSTER Corporation HUDSON SOFT CO., LTD. IDEA FACTORY CO., LTD. Index Corporation(Atlus) IREM SOFTWARE ENGINEERING INC. KADOKAWA GAMES,LTD. Kadokawa Shoten Publishing Co., Ltd. Konami Digital Entertainment Co., Ltd. LEVEL-5 Inc. Marvelous Entertainment Inc. media5 Corporation NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc. Nihon Falcom Corporation Nippon Ichi Software, Inc. NOWPRODUCTION, CO.,LTD Q Entertainment Inc. SEGA CORPORATION SNK PLAYMORE CORPORATION Spike Co.,Ltd SQUARE ENIX Co., Ltd. SystemSoft Alpha Corp. TECMO KOEI GAMES CO., LTD. TOMY Company,Ltd. TOSE CO., LTD. Ubisoft K.K. YUKE’S Co., Ltd.

North America
Activision, Inc. Capybara Games Demiurge Studios Epic Games Inc. Far Sight Studios Frima High Voltage Software Kung Fu Factory Paramount Digital Entertainment PopCap Games Powerhead Games Trendy Entertainment Ubisoft® Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment 2K Games 2K Sports

Europe
Avalanche Studios Climax Studios Ltd Codemasters Software Company Ltd Eurocom Developments Ltd Eutechnyx Ltd Exient Ltd Firemint PTY Ltd Gameloft SA Gusto Games Ltd Home Entertainment Suppliers PTY Ltd Impromptu Software Ltd Rebellion® Rockstar Games Sidhe Interactive Sumo Digital Ltd Team 17 Software Ltd Ubisoft Entertainment SA Zen Studios Ltd


Pictures (shamelessly stolen from various sites and then hosted on IMGur):

gFICF.jpg


As you can see, the SGX543MP4+ can render photorealistic Diego Maradonas. Up to 4 Diego Maradona per cycle, I heard from a source close to IMGtech.

5HkC0.jpg



The solid-state based media (UMDs not so universal anymore, it seems):
zpDK6.jpg



The beauty shots, a.k.a. "If this was yours it will be full of fingerprint smudges and dust particles" shots:

1Jh7c.jpg

2r0HO.jpg



And finally, I have to commend SCE for letting a 14 year old who famously made skins for Winamp, Winzip and jailbroken iPhones design the interface of the NGP:

qayo5.jpg


The Speculation™, a B3D Tradition

So, let's not those silly and overrated 'facts' get in the way of what we do best here on B3D forums, speculate. There are still many technical variables left to be unveiled:
- RAM: VRAM, or Unified architecture? eDRAM? And more importantly, how much of it?
- CPU: Does the Cortex CPU embark the powerful NEON VFPU/SIMD engine?
- GPU: How is SGX543MP4+ setup on the physical die?
- Clock speeds: That holds true for the whole thing (CPU, GPU, RAM). And should we expect a PSP like scenario where the console is down clocked at launch?
- ROM: What technology these solid state cart use and in what size will they be available to publishers at launch? Will it be pricey for publishers?
- OS: What can we expect from the OS? Android related?

I can answer some of these questions already, but where would be the fun in that? It's speculation time... again, B3D!
 
Will they have a decent system for online downloads this time from people who understand how encryption works?

This is how it SHOULD work IMO :

- You make an account -> this creates a secret key associated with an account.

- You buy and download games to your PC -> these are encrypted with the secret key, completely and utterly useless without a PSP with the key stored in it.

- You associate a PSP with your account -> this requires an active connection with the PSP, you would probably use "P"KI to make hacking a little more cumbersome (the PSP communicates it's device ID so the server can find it's half of the key). The server then hands over the secret key to the PSP and it can play the games.

- You download the games you want from your on PC library to flash and bung it in.

To disassociate a PSP with your account so you could associate a different PSP with the account you would either require an active connection with the original PSP, or if it's broken you'd have to send it in ... if it got stolen or lost you would probably have to add some hoop jumping checks where you send in an insurance/police report. To diminish the impact of this they can allow multiple PSPs to be tied to an account at once, like they are doing already.
 
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What do they mean by IMGTech SGX543MP4+? Have they not decided on MP4 or MP8 yet or is this a custom version of the SGX543 while distinct from say a SGX544?
 
What do they mean by IMGTech SGX543MP4+? Have they not decided on MP4 or MP8 yet or is this a custom version of the SGX543 while distinct from say a SGX544?

I believe the '+' in SGX543MP4+ refers to integrated 128MB RAM - presumably for improved performance over unified memory.
 
I'm equally impressed by the specifications and the learning resistance at Sony HQ.
 
What is the PSP2 supposed to use to connect to the TV then? :?:

HDMI? The power pins are different than data pins, they're all there in the same connector.
Only problem seems to be that HDMI spec only provides for 55mA current over the connector, although many HDMI devices provide far more than that, it still won't be guaranteed to charge.

Plan B: Sell a wireless HDMI adapter accessory to plug in to the TV and connect like that. For those who have a PS3, the PS3 can be that "wireless HDMI accessory".
 
End of the year? So is this gonna be the first quad core (CPU+GPU) SoC to be available in a mass market consumer device?
 
Wow interesting. This would seem to strengthen the legitimacy (in my mind) of Nvidia's Tegra going quad core and be out on devices this Fall.
 
I'm equally impressed by the specifications and the learning resistance at Sony HQ.

Learning what? The fabled and non-written rule of law that the hardware in an handheld should be highly profitable garbage?

There is a market for high-end handheld. The PSP was an high-end handheld, with limited input functionality (no touchscreen) and mobility (wifi only), it was release at the beginning (if not before) of the whole mobile internet mainstream era, and it yet was a successful product for Sony.

Was it a different product than the Nintendo DS? Yes, and that's good! The last thing I'd want is to see another PS360 situation where two machines are stupidly redundant of one another.

I'll get a NGP for my high-end portable gaming, media consumption and internet browsing (in conjunction with my smartphones, netbooks and tablets. It's not one or another when it could be any) and a 3DS for the 3DS exclusives.

But I seriously won't let the idea of thinking that Sony might not have as much market share as Nintendo in the handheld space affect my purchase decisions.

Save for the potentially stupidly low battery life of the thing, I'm positively surprised by the quality of the product. It's like it addressed all my personal issues with handheld gaming. Save for that disgusting interface, it's almost the perfect gaming handheld to me. Now, if they allowed some sort of homebrew on it, so we can get emulators running on it, it would be the perfect gaming handheld.
 
Farid, I prepared a detailed response but after a few sentences decided I don't really want to get into an argument over this. It's all fair points you mentioned. I just notice Sony is repeating many mistakes, not only with the hardware, but also how this device is positioned (which is probably a consequence of the former).

However, if Ubisoft Paris puts the promised sequel to XIII on NGP, I will consider it :D
 
reasons why the psp2 could already be dead

It was interesting to see the dearth of support from western publisher. The psp w/ all it's piracy problems left a bad taste in people's mouth. I'm sure the recent hacks don't give many publishers much confidence in Sony's security for the psp2(also, I think all arm cortex based devices have all been rooted anyways.)

This device will be priced high. I don't believe sony will take a loss, there is very little cost savings they can leverage with future die shrinks. aren't we at the limit now anyways? 22nm is the limit before quantum mechanical effects are problematic?

Lastly, psp2 games are still going to be expensive. How are psp minis supposed to compete with $0.99 iOS games? iOS don't need any certification from the esrb or from the platform holder whereas all psp2 games will still need this certification. (ESRB charges llike $800 for psp minis.)

priced high + lack of western support + high barrier of entry for smaller developers due to certification = possibly dead psp2.
 
I've heard of Jumping to Conclusions but...

priced high + lack of western support + high barrier of entry for smaller developers due to certification = possibly dead psp2.

All speculation by yourself and none of rooted in current verifiable reality.

Why would western publishers not support the PSP2?

I'm having a terribly difficult time understanding the logic of people that make these kinds of comments.
 
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