Latest Articles (Page 3303)

Film director Robert Rodriguez (and, in fact, editor, musician, etc, since he does pretty much everything) is reportedly interested in developing Johnny Depp's character from Once Upon A Time In Mexico into a multimedia property - with a PlayStation Portable game amongst his aspirations.

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has told investors that he doesn't believe that the PSP will launch in North America until Q2 2005, prompting fresh fears that the arrival of Sony's forthcoming handheld console will slip once again.

Earlier this week, Sony announced the signing of an exclusive publishing deal with World Rally Championship developer Evolution Studios, however there was another snippet in that announcement that lacked clarity - Evolution's satellite studio, Bigbig, was reported to be working on a game for the PlayStation Portable.

The PlayStation Portable will be well supported at next week's Tokyo Game Show, judging by various announcements from key publishers who plan to either show off their games or let the public loose on playable demonstration versions.

Sony has finished work on PlayStation Portable hardware and still intends to ship the console this year, Sony COO Ken Kutaragi told a press briefing in Japan yesterday, although the company has yet to announce pricing or release date details and Kutaragi declined to say whether or not the unit would cost more than the Nintendo DS ($149).

Of all the question marks loitering around Sony's PlayStation Portable - which should be playable at the Tokyo Game Show for the very first time today - the one parked on the end of a sentence about battery life is perhaps the most hotly debated.

EA's Tiger Woods PGA Tour and Need For Speed Underground titles for PlayStation Portable will make up part of the system's launch line-up, EA chief financial officer Warren Jenson revealed at an investor conference in the US yesterday.

Sony's forthcoming handheld console, the PlayStation Portable, will support MP3 audio files in its music player, it has emerged at the Tokyo Game Show, following on from a company U-turn on the format earlier this week.

The PSP is a beautiful thing. At this year's Tokyo Game Show we had the chance to spend some considerable time with the hardware and many of the games in progress. We were overwhelmed. Here's why.

Developers working on PlayStation Portable titles will have to ensure that their games don't over-tax the battery on the device or risk falling foul of Sony's technical guidelines, according to sources working on games for the system.

PlayStation Portable is very much on course for release in 2004, according to Sony Computer Entertainment chief technology officer Masa Chatani. Speaking to Famitsu this week, Chatani said that PSP would be out in Japan before the end of the year, with a worldwide launch in Q1 2005 - and reminded people that even the original PlayStation launch wasn't announced until a month prior to its December 94 ship-out.

Activision has confirmed that it plans to release PlayStation Portable versions of Spider-Man 2 and Tony Hawk's Underground 2 alongside the hardware when it launches in the USA.

The first suggestion that Sony may be forced to delay the launch of PSP has come from Sony Computer Entertainment network systems boss Izumi Kawanishi, who told a Japanese publication that the schedule depends on game publishers.

EA is planning to have as many as six titles available for the PlayStation Portable's American and European launches in 2005 according to Warren Wall, producer at the publisher's PSP-focused development studio Team Fusion.

Electronic Arts boss Larry Probst has revealed in an investor conference call that FIFA Football and MVP Baseball are the two previously unannounced games that make up the publisher's six-strong PlayStation Portable line-up for the USA.

SEGA has added four more titles to its list of games in development for the Sony PlayStation Portable handheld, although the Japanese publisher has yet to reveal anything other than short descriptions of the games on its PSP website.

After months of speculation, Sony has announced that the PlayStation Portable will launch in Japan on December 12th 2004 priced 19,800 yen excluding tax (around €145), with 21 games due out before the end of the year.

Having hinted that mobile title Final Fantasy VII Before Crisis could make its way to Nintendo DS earlier this month, Square Enix has revealed that another of its "Compilation of Final Fantasy VII" titles will definitely appear on the PlayStation Portable.

Sony Japan's on a PSP roll, confirming yesterday that the machine itself will launch in Japan on December 12 for 19,800 yen and today announcing that Gran Turismo 4 will release for the handheld next spring.

Obviously buoyed by Sony's Japanese pricing and release date confirmation of PSP yesterday, THQ chief Brian Farrell has admitted the American publisher has four games in the works for the machine.

Japanese firm Level 5, developer of the Dark Cloud games, Dragon Quest VIII and aborted Microsoft MMORPG True Fantasy Live Online, is working on an original role-playing game for the PlayStation Portable.

Sony has confirmed that anybody buying a PlayStation Portable in Japan this December 12th will be able to choose from two golf games, as it confirms that Hot Shots Golf will join Electronic Arts' Tiger Woods PGA Tour in the launch line-up.

Ridge Racers for PlayStation Portable, due to launch alongside the system hardware in Japan on December 12th, will feature 24 courses, some of which will draw upon popular tracks from elsewhere in the series. That's just one of the things we've learnt about the game in the past week, which also saw developer Namco release a slew of screenshots from the handheld racer. You can find those here.

When it comes to the PlayStation Portable, Ridge Racers and Wipeout Pure are understandably high on our list of priorities. Neither series has put in a particularly memorable turn since the original PlayStation console was the box of choice, but as much as it's tempting to scold Namco and friends for plundering the franchises further, there is still the possibility that they could rediscover that magical something that compelled us to sit up with each until our thumbs were raw and the banging from the neighbours had deteriorated into little sobbing rhythmic yelps of "I kiiiill you".

Senior executives from Microsoft's Xbox division have commented on Sony's plans for the PlayStation Portable, with Peter Moore dismissing the console's launch as being similar to a company trying to challenge the Windows operating system.

Of all the games due out with the Japanese PlayStation Portable on December 12th, we sensed Ridge Racers could well be the one to tip us over the edge and have us throw down insane amounts of money. And so it seems to be. That's not to say the three trailers streaming off Namco's promotional website this week are particularly revolutionary - it's just that we've had visions of quietly tearing round Crimsonrock Pass in the corner of a fire-lit drawing room whilst siblings row over which Christmas Special to watch and carol-singers hurl eggs at passing cars as the snow falls. It looks like Ridge Racer ought to look in our mind's eye. It could make our Christmas.

Codemasters has declared its support for the PlayStation Portable this afternoon, promising to release versions of both Colin McRae Rally 2005 and TOCA Race Driver 2: The Ultimate Racing Simulator on the Sony handheld in spring 2005.

The software line-up for the launch of the PlayStation Portable in Japan next month is beginning to take shape, with six titles now confirmed to arrive on day one, a further four arriving four days later, and at least 12 more launching by the end of December.

AIM-listed British developer Kuju Entertainment has announced that it is moving into full production on its first game for Sony's forthcoming PlayStation Portable system, with the working title of Project Interceptor.

It's probably a bit obscure for most of your tastes, but we're going to mention it anyway in the hope that it'll limit the amount of "rite mor abat PSP thx" emails we receive this morning. What are we talking about? Well, Sony's making a 3D, cel-shaded fighter for the PlayStation Portable based on a manga strip that appears in Japanese magazine Shonen Jump. See, told you it was obscure.