Quote:Sony Says "No" To Direct Ports
Motto for 2005: O.G., original gaming!
June 14, 2004 - The PSP has, for all intents and purposes, all of the power of the PlayStation 2. That can be a good thing or a bad thing -- while the handheld system has the capabilities to play almost any type of game imaginable (except for, of course, games that rely on a ginchy touch screen for play), it also has the facilities to repurpose almost any console game a publisher may want to quickly cash in on. Fears of rampant porting and retreaded content are concerns apparently weighing in on Sony as well (sure, there are some stiffs in suits over at the corporate office, but you can't run a company without a good share of gamers), as we can confirm that the company is actively staying to its position against direct ports from PlayStation 2 to PSP.

Sony's stance to push developers towards original content for the handheld system is one that it has stated publicly many times before, but a development source actively in production with PSP has confirmed that, in the process of working towards concept approval with Sony (the first stage of getting a game going, where design docs and concept ideas are shot over to Sony for them to approve -- check out this article on Nintendo's game production process to get an idea of how the industry works), the company has been told by Sony that it will not approve direct ports of PS2 titles. How far the term "direct" can be extended is up in the air -- whether that means games without any additional content or PSP exclusive features, or it means no ports of any kind and that any franchise release would have to be a new edition of the series -- but it seems that Sony is standing firm on this issue. Many of the game demos at E3 were from established series, and some were even direct ports of titles in those lines, but E3 was always meant to be a temporary showcase of technology rather than in-game content -- everything we saw at the show could easily change by the time the system actually releases.

Of course, some could point out that Sony has already gone against its own rule. One of the only games actually announced for the system so far is Gran Turismo 4 Mobile -- a port of the upcoming PlayStation 2 racer -- and aside from WiFi online play instead of broadband networked play, the company has stated that GT4 is planned to be indistinguishable from its brother on the two systems. Whether it turns out that, as most other games at the show, GT4 was just a temporary demonstration example of a game that will in actuality end up in a significantly different form (think the difference between the early GT2000 when PS2 was first announced and the final GT3 delivered a year later) or if the company plans to break its own rule this one time just because GT4 is so covert-worthy is still unknown (the PSP version will show up long after the PS2 edition, so additional content may be their deal here.) However, this is a good indication that Sony has no intention of allowing the PSP to be a dumping ground for cash-ins -- they want new gaming experiences for the handheld crowd. And with the main competitor in the handheld space being Nintendo's unique DS system, gamers may well hold them to it.