The scouts of QJ have kept their watchful eye open and thus have come up with the news of a possible emulator for PSP that plays arcade style MAME-like ROMs from Capcom. The reason we say "a possible emulator" is because, at the current time, NJ - the person who is working on the project, has decided to stop because of speed issues that he thinks are insurmountable or at least not worth the effort.

Speed is always the issue with emulators, and with the limited memory of the PSP, this is even more so the case. NJ explains that the PSP has but 20MB to give to game data out of 32MB, with 4MB for the emulator and 8MB for the OS.

Because of this, developers are forced to make their code fit into an ever tighter space; avoiding excess in order to gain and maintain the speed necessary for a good playable game. The bottom line is that NJ tried several different approaches in an attempt to get the emulator to run smoothly and at normal speed but, he always seems to end up with sound problems and or speed issues that ruined gameplay.

It was these recurring problems that eventually caused the original developer, NJ, to stop working on it completely. There were hopes that the source of the project would be released so that it could be taken up by a new team of developers, but it has not happened yet. Fortunately though, the test version of the emulator has been released (just now, hence the delay of this post) so that you can at least try and see how far it has progressed.

UPDATE: The mark of a phenomenal homebrew developer is resilience. Well, the name NJ has became synonymous with that word, and why did we say that? The guy just released the CAPCOM CPS2 Emulator for PSP Test Version 3. According to the good developer, several bugs in large textures were corrected, he also renewed the rominfo.dat. and sound and background issues were somewhat fixed as well. He remains realistic about the challenges of creating a CPS2 Emulator for the PSP. But as far as we can see, the guy seem to not want to give up on the project just yet.


Download: [CPS2 Emulator Test Version 3]

CWCheat was originally being developed to work with the 1.5FW and UMDs, but when devhook came out, weltall moved it to work with devhook. It now has support for all games available. CWCheat is basically the first general purpose cheat device for devhook. Now an update has been released for this multi-function cheat utility with a how lotta new features and bugfixes. Thanks go out to weltall for the hard work! The changes include, but are certainly not limited to, the following:

• multiple dumps
• usb mass support
• cheat searcher is finally in English
• searching for 16bit/32bit values was fixed

This multi-functional utility is to be used with Devhook and allows you to have full control over PSP games by creating and of course using cheats in every game! We can only imagine the whippings we could hand out with God mode in Fight Night! You are only limited by your own creativity with this application.

There's also an enhanced search feature that makes the large amounts of data that tend to be used more manageable. With the addition of USB mass support you can now access the memory stick from the PC while playing your favorite game. The improvements have made CW Cheat an even more useful tool that can be configured to accomplish many tasks; it is also well supported, promising an interesting future.

Download: [CW Cheat 0.1.1]

The detailed list of changelog awaits after the jump!

The rapid succession of releases coming from winnydows continues with the release of XVID4PSP Version 4.015. I think a record of some sort has definitely been broken here! A group of indispensable video processing applications are combined into one giving you all you need to complete your conversion and resizing jobs.

I have like ten million movies formatted in .AVI so this application allows me to convert and resize the .AVI movies that I like into a format that I can watch on my PSP regardless of size or quality. This highly customizable program gives you a lot of options when formatting video, and it is certainly worth considering the next time you need something to watch on your PSP.

Minimal requirements to system:
AviSynth 2.5.6a
Framework 2.0

Most interesting futures of the program:
01. The greatest possible quality of PMP or AVI  files, and full automation.
02. Aspect corrected automatically.
03. Imposing of subtitles (Only for AVI). The file of subtitles should name as well as film, also should be in a format SRT.
04. Combine of several AVI to one PMP or AVI.
05. Coding towards the size.
06. Addition of tasks. It is possible to add some tasks, for example a AVI and one DVD to choose End Do: Hibernate and to press button Start. Consistently encoded all tasks and after end of process the computer will leave in sleep mode.
07. Automatically repair all corrupted icons on your Sony PSP. (Tools - Hide Corrupted Icons)

Options:
Quality Mode  - coding is carried out through Mencoder, filters are applied through AviSynth.
Speed Mode - fast , but low quality coding mode. If you prefer speed, this your choice.
Norm - increase of loudness. Value 200% is best choice.
DeNoise - smoothing of noise, deblocking and improvement compressibility. A useful option for the noisy and strongly compressed sources. Promotes improvement of quality.
UnSharp - increase of clearness. Very useful and necessary option. Values by default are optimum.

Download: [XVID4PSP Version 4.015]

Dragged down by the inevitable costs of launching a new console, Sony's first quarter profits suffered to the tune of about $230 million. Fortunately for Sony this setback came as no surprise, as a slump in sales had been widely predicted.

With game sales down 30% for the year, the burden has been shifted to other more profitable divisions within the company. Sony is deeply diversified, very large and more than capable of dealing with market fluctuations.

While Sony's game division has been a poor performer of late, as a whole the company reported that sales were up 11%, bolstered by strong growth in sales of notebook computers, televisions and cameras.

Analysts were surprised by the extent of Sony's growth in net income over the previous year. After cutting nearly 10,000 jobs and receiving a boost from the arrival of HDTV, Sony has raised its operating profit forecast by 30%, pointing to a strong future for the company in the near term.

Thanks go out to winnydows for updating this wonderfully useful program once again. Keep up the good work! For those of you who have been living on the Moon or somewhere else far from civilization, XVID4PSP is a program that you can use to convert video files back and forth between formats on your computer so that you can later view the videos on your PSP.

This program requires the Microsoft .NET framework and AviSynth 2.5.6a, framework 2.0. This application contains the functionality of many programs, making it compatible to complete a number of encoding and converting jobs.

Here is the changelog:

ChangeFPS() replaced to higher quality ConvertFPS().
Fixed missing ConvertToYV12() line. Fixed MP4 PSP output. Now sure.
Fixed work on PCs never starting VirtualDub or VirtualDubMod before.

Most interesting features of the program:

01. The greatest possible quality of PMP or AVI  files, and full automation.
02. Aspect corrected automatically.
03. Imposing of subtitles (Only for AVI). The file of subtitles should name as well as film, also should be in a format SRT.
04. Combine of several AVI to one PMP or AVI.
05. Coding towards the size.
06. Addition of tasks. It is possible to add some tasks, for example a AVI and one DVD to choose End Do: Hibernate and to press button Start. Consistently encoded all tasks and after end of process the computer will leave in sleep mode.
07. Automatically repair all corrupted icons on your Sony PSP. (Tools - Hide Corrupted Icons)

Download: [XVID4PSP Version 4.014]

For those pioneering souls that have already made the switch to the newest firmware, Sony has released a demo for their upcoming World Tour Soccer release. The first version of this line of soccer titles left something to be desired by some. However, by all accounts (warts and all) the original World Tour Soccer was a playable title and the follow up title should be another step in the right direction.

The challenge of bringing a game like soccer to such a small screen has been met many ways in the past. The main idea is to give the player a wide enough field of view so that he can see where his passes are going without overwhelming him with too much information.
as ion
At least this time you'll get to try before you buy! Most football fans cannot live without a version of their favorite game on their home console and since the PSP offers the opportunity to play on the go, this game should be even more of a must-have for football (soccer) fans.

Download: [World Tour Soccer Demo]

I really want to go to Kmart now and buy two batteries for my ailing PSP's! Both of my PSPs are currently experiencing old age syndrome, with dying batteries, loose analog stick components and so many nicks and smudges they look like antiques.

Every PSP owner knows that a happy PSP is a clean one with a fully charged, brand new battery. This sale is the perfect opportunity for me to show my PSP some love. I hope they are not sold out by the time I get there!

Thanks to Fat Wallet forums, a place to go if you're looking for deals, for being the skinflints they are and finding this unbelievable deal! Apparently, official Sony batteries are going for a mere $4 (that's right four dollars!) and other PSP accessories (car chargers ect.) are going for similar insanely low prices too.

I hate to sound like a Kmart commercial but this really is something. Some people have actually begun to speculate that the sale, in conjunction with other negative factors (like the failure of the UMD format) are signs pointing to a slow, but inevitable divestment of all things PSP in retaildom.

I hope the speculation asserting that stores like Kmart are slowly eliminating their stock of PSP related products due to slow sales, is absolutely wrong. Whatever the future may bring for the PSP in the retail market, this is a deal that cannot be missed.

I am going to my local Kmart so that I can see this for myself, and buy some batteries of course! I will report back on what I find. Tell us what happened when you went to your local Kmart.

Thanks go to wekilledbambi03 for enlightening us about Sony's desire to get our opinion in this new survey. The survey covers Sony's line of time shifting products, including the Location Free TV Base Station.

The PSP, PS3 and other devices that you can stream content to using a Sony Location Free Base Station are also covered in the survey. The pace proceeds based on your answers to the questions so the length of the survey will vary accordingly. There are also questions about how we use products like TIVO and how much we are willing to pay for the service. I know sometimes it all seems pointless, but the least we can do is try to tell them what we want!

It doesn't take more than five minutes to complete the survey and overall it doesn't seem to be too biased. Here is a sample of the survey questions you will find from Sony.

More survey questions can be seen in the Full Article!

The Gran Turismo series is the one racing simulator that holds a special place in the hearts of millions of gamers everywhere. The upcoming version of Gran Turismo that is planned for the PS3 will be a groundbreaking step in the evolution of this genre.

Unfortunately, we can only hope that  this game will be released any time soon! Many of us are still bitterly awaiting the promised release of a version of Gran Turismo for the PSP, but I for one am willing to believe again.

For those who can't bare to place their trust in the gaming industry again, maybe you won't have to. According to Canadian online retailer Future Shop, not only can we expect to be treated to a next generation version of Gran Turismo on the PS3 in a timely manner, we can expect to see "exclusive use of the PSP and Eyetoy brings the realism you expect from a GT game" as well.

Although, the $74.99 CAD (~$65 US) price tag was expected, I was still startled to see such daunting prices staring back at me. While this is obviously one of those topics that should be taken with several grains of salt, here is a retailer that is planning to start selling this game in Canada on November 30 for about 75 dollars.

Thanks goes out to Rashy A for the tip!

The Federal Trade Commission decided against imposing fines or taking other punitive actions against Take Two Interactive and Rockstar games after an exhaustive investigation into the "hot coffee" mod led to a settlement agreement between the FTC and Take Two instead of further charges.

The new agreement requires the two companies to "establish, implement and maintain a comprehensive system reasonably designed to ensure that all content in an electronic game is considered and reviewed in preparing submissions to a rating authority."

The agreement also states that Rockstar and Take Two must clearly disclose all pertinent ratings information about a game on the outside of the game's packaging. In the event that Rockstar or Take Two fails to meet the conditions they agreed to in the settlement with the FTC, they will be fined $11,000 per incident.

Maybe this situation has something to do with Rockstar Games' decision to release a ping- pong (or table tennis) game instead of yet another mega-popular violent shoot 'em up! All jokes aside, both sides seem to want to claim victory in the case and both sides seem ready to move on with their lives.

The ruling was followed by a 30 day period where politicians and the public alike voiced their disapproval about the agreement. Now that the debate is over and the settlement has been ratified, it is unlikely that Rockstar or Take Two will ever face any further prosecution over the hot coffee issue.