There's always room for innovation, and that's why maxthebest decided to come out with his own version of Conway's law's Game of Life. His version has a cool added featuer: sound. Do check out more details over at the full article.


Download: The Game of Life: Sound of Life
Discuss: QJ.NET's PSP Development Forums

If you still have dreams of becoming a respectable homebrew developer you have to start somewhere. Fortunately, PSP homebrew developer Raphael, Tomaz, and InsertWittyName has come up with a very flexible game writing engine for the PSP named triEngine.

Check out the features of this versitile game engine after the jump!

First of all, we're letting the guys know that Mr305 has renamed Phyalgeom Aid v1.0 into Academic Aid. As its name implies, this app is an aid for helping students find answers for difficult question in the fields of physics, algebra, and geometry.

Second, we're letting you know that alongside this name change, the dev is also releasing the app's latest build, dubbed Academic Aid v2.1. This new release is a contender in the ongoing Neo Summer Coding Competition, and is reported to carry these updates:

• Extreme changes to GUI & look.
1. Changed the Fatigue-reducerpaper to a more overall bright & colorful one.
2. Tweaked Color-Scheme for better look.
3. The scrolling is now very very smooth & silky; it almost "slides". VERY ADDICTIVELY smooth.
4. In the intro screen; the selection of category is no longer bland. They glide.
• Enhancements to Rapid InpSP*
1. The buttons go in & out as if pressed in real-life.
2. The Cursor now blinks.
3. The buttons glow & glow out like in the XMB's input system.
• Added "Pseudo-Matrix" Credits screen with fade effects and such.
• Added a lot more info's/formulas to quadratic formula screen; the scrollbar is usable.
• Now the graph is shown at the top. [Bug to be resolved]
• Added two variants of Projectile formulas [refer to pic/video]
• Added a bunch more of formulas to Geometrig.
• Many many Bug fixes + lot more things changed that can't be said.
  

Further information can be found over at Mr305's thread at QJ's PSP development forums, and in the file bundle's readme. As requested by the author, we'll be offering two download links: The primary leads to the NeoFlash site, with an alternative for QJ's DL site. Be sure to vote for this app if you enjoyed it.

Download: Academic Aid v2.1 (Primary download link)
Download: Academic Aid v2.1 (Alternate download link)
Visit: QJ's PSP Development Forums

Amazon UK is giving out quite a deal for those who enjoy watching movies on their PSPs. They're having a sale which nets you 3 UMD movies for the price of GBP 10 (US$ 20). Now you're probably thinking that the movies must not be really good, but you'd be surprised at the classics they are offering in their promo.

They have quite a few gems in their list such as Superman Returns, The Matrix, The Matrix Revolutions, Constantine, Corpse Bride, and the first Batman. Now these are movies that we've enjoyed watching in the cinemas and would provide a nice break from playing whatever game you've been spending your time on.

If you're a movie buff and carry your PSP wherever you go (who doesn't?), then this is an offer that may be too good to pass up. Just click on our read link to send you straight to the Amazon UK site where you can order. Be sure to keep checking back here for more deals for your PSP.

Just how spicy do you want your chili? Chili con Carnage just slathers on the hot sauce in this new gameplay trailer.

It's a game that's way too absurd to be true, considering it has all the movie cliches down to Desperado's guitar case guns plus the muscle bound bikini clad men. (Admit it, you had no idea whether to head to the bathroom to puke or roll on the carpet laughing.) Anyway, Deadline Games' Chili con Carnage takes us on an adventure with Ramiro Cruz as he goes against carpet chested druglord Cesar Morales.

Loco moves are just as the name suggests. Insane moves at their finest. El Toro will have you blindly charging at enemies like an enraged bull. El Gimpo, El Mariachi, Golden Gun (helps shooting blondes), and the Matrix move Tornado are among the other stunts players will be able to pull off.

Chili con Carnage will hit the shelves in three days - February 13. Easy on the chili and check out the video.

While some brewers concentrate on making productivity killers for the PSP, others concentrate on producing productivity tools instead ("We put the "P" in PSP"). One such guy, who chooses to go by the name of Impatient - though at times, he goes by "Not logged in (Unregistered)" (hmm...), submitted these two Lua programs to us, PspDraw and PspNotepad. "Kinda nifty," one of the writers here said while hogging the PSP.

Pretty basic tools, really. PspDraw ain't exactly MSPaint, but it does combine some very familiar tools: pen, line, solid rectangle, eraser, and color picker. You could even save images onto the Memory Stick. You can't resize the brush, so it can be a bit tedious to work with. On the plus side, this program incorporates a built-in Zoom window for a closer look at your doodles, at the pixel level. Meanwhile, PspNotepad uses the grid-matrix text input system using the analog stick and the face buttons, while the D-pad is used to move the cursor around.

Basic tools; but good ideas - once people get the hang of the text-input matrix (browse enough on the PSP and one would, indeed), this will make the PSP a very useful note-jotting tool, and thus put the P (for productivity) in the PSP. (You will note, if you look very carefully at the screenshot for the PspNotepad, that this writer has his own opinion on how to improve the program jotted in).

Download: [PspDraw and PspNotepad]

One of the commentors on our frontpage once said, "If the PSP is the Matrix, then Dark_AleX is Neo." And going by the latest developments, it wouldn't be very far from the truth. A few months ago, the PSP scene was "dying". Although homebrew development had been going strong, it still felt like we were going nowhere. New firmwares, blocked homebrew...It had become a regular game. Then came some cracking times (pun intended ;), with the wave of exploits from people like Hitchhikr and NOPX86, and many many more.

The "scene" was resurrected within a few days, and look where we are today! And keeping it going strong is none other than Dark_AleX. If you've found it difficult to use the downgrader, with all the messing around with dumps, or if you've been left out because you couldn't find a dump, Dark_AleX has just made all of it a piece of cake. Now no messing around with dumps, checking to see if it's the correct one. The latest downgrader by Dark_AleX allows you to downgrade your 2.71 PSP to any version upto 1.5.

For the TA-082 owners, the lowest you can go is 2.50. Do not try to downgrade below that, your PSP will brick 100%. Please make sure that you're not running a TA-082 before trying to downgrade below 2.50.

So how does it work? Well, all you need is Dark_AleX's 2.71 Homebrew Enabler Rev.C, and the EBOOT.PBP file of the firmware you want to downgrade to. So you can downgrade from a 2.71 to just about every other firmware including 1.50,2.0,2.01,2.50 and 2.60. And luckily for everyone here, those files can be shared legally. Plus, you can simply download them off our server here. Just select the update file of the firmware you want to downgrade to, and slap the files on your PSP's memory stick. Below is a list of firmwares which we recommend in case you're downgrading. Just click on the respective version to download it.

Firmware Versions

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1.50 - 2.0 - 2.01 - 2.50 - 2.60

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Instructions:

• Download Homebrew Enabler for FW 2.71 using the Link below.
• Follow the instructions here to first flash the Homebrew Enabler on your 2.71 FW
• Once done, reboot your PSP and run the Homebrew Enabler using the Photo Menu.
• Now simply extract the files in the downgrader archive below to your PSP and paste the EBOOT.PBP file of the updater into the PSP/GAME/UPDATE folder.
• Now just run the updater using the Game menu!

Here's what Dark_AleX had to say:

"This downgrader lets a psp running firmware 2.71 and HEN C to downgrade to any version from 1.50-2.60, or even reflash the 2.71 version. This downgrader is safer, faster, and a lot easier to use than the previous downgraders. It also makes a clean firmware install, since this time there is a format of flash0 (just like sce updaters do). A firmware dump is not needed, only the eboot.pbp of an update.

Ta-082 users can downgrade to 2.70/2.60/2.50. TA-082 users, DO NOT downgrade below 2.50.

The program is finished and working. Only a bit more of testing is done and it will be released in a couple of hours more or less."

So all of you who've been waiting for a simple solution, I don't believe there can be one simpler than this. If you're still on 2.5/6, you can safely update to 2.71 and either wait it out for more homebrew, or downgrade to 1.5...But looking at all these developments, I feel that 2.71 might just just replace 1.50 as the golden firmware soon. Anyways, enough of talk, here's the download link below. Enjoy!

Download Link: [2.71 Generic Downgrader]
Download Link: [Homebrew Enabler for 2.71 Rev.C]

[Digg This!]

Atari's Shiny Entertainment Studio has recently been acquired by Foundation 9 Entertainment, the largest independent game developer in North America.

Shiny Entertainment is best known for its work Earthworm Jim which will remain an Atari property unlike the two games that were based on the hit blockbuster, "The Matrix." They join the incredible F9E studios family which includes The Collective, Backbone Entertainment, Pipeworks, ImaginEngine, and Digital Eclipse. The team will co-locate with The Collective in 2007.

"Shiny Entertainment fits well with the current studios of Foundation 9 Entertainment and aligns with our long-term goals for the future. The studio has tremendous talent and experience working with big Hollywood franchises and will be working with us on a major, as-yet-undisclosed day and date release. The Shiny team will only add to our capabilities and technology base." said Jon Goldman, Chairman and CEO.

The company is currently at work on more than 20 titles including two new editions of its original property, Death, Jr., to be published by Konami; Dirty Harry to be published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment; and, Sonic Rivals to be published by Sega. The company’s Backbone studio recently shipped MechAssault: Phantom War for the Nintendo DS, published by Majesco Entertainment.

 

Briggzy11 has released his first ever mod for a PSP homebrew game today, modding CS-PSP in the theme of the popular film trilogy The Matrix. This modification is based on Nataku92's original CS-PSP v0.5 which was released a few days ago. All credit for the original game and the game engine goes to Nataku92. Here's what Briggzy11, the modder behind this sci-fi shoot 'em up said:

The mod is of the matrix and the level that loads up is very similar to the marble fight room in the first matrix film. All textures have been edited, the players on both sides consist of Agents Vs Good guys (AKA Neo and Posse) and most of the GFX have been changed. Briggzy11 has also changed the music and the eboot of the game to give it that extra professional touch. This mod plays really well, just like the original game did and of course will be popular with the millions of Matrix fans out there!

Download: [CS-PSP v0.5 Matrix Edition Mod]

The most talked-about emulator has received yet another update from its dedicated coder - StrmnNrmn. StrmnNrmn told us previously that we would receive this build with less features and more optimizations, and that is exactly what we got. This coding-machine managed to get the new clipping method working and actually excerpts better results and is more efficient.

We've already seen a few user-created Daedalus R7's with the modified line that would provide a significant increase in speed, and this version has that fix along with many others! This is, as you would expect, the fastest version of Daedalus available and is looking better and better each release. Mario is now fully playable (in my opinion) and has come a long way since the initial release. The following has been changed in this new version (R8) of Daedalus -

• [^] Replaced all uses of sceCtrlReadBufferPositive with sceCtrlPeekBufferPositive.
• [^] Various known value optimisations for the dynamic recompilation engine.
• [^] Various texture cache optimisations and rendering optimisations.
• [+] Implemented a new clipping method which is more efficient and gives better results.
• [-] Removed 'tesselate large triangles' setting.
• [+] Added option to reset emulator to the main menu.
• [^] No longer use index buffers for rendering.
• [^] Implement matrix multiplication using VFPU.
• [^] Implement vertex transform and lighting code using VFPU.
• [^] Implement clipping code using VFPU.
• [^] Minor AddTri optimisations.
• [^] Free background and font textures while emulator is running to free VRAM.
• [!] Fixed bug in default controller config (c-down and dpad-down were broken)

Download: [Daedalus R8]