Today Sega has released some new screens for Sonic the Hedgehog's PSP outing, Sonic Rivals. The story starts off as a friendly competition between Sonic and Knuckles quickly gets intense as other rivals jump into the action. In the game players will be able to utilize boost moves and power-ups as Sonic's rivals try to trip, shove, and vault over Sonic while hurtling towards the finish line at breakneck speed. Negotiate wildly twisting 3D tracks, avoid hazardous traps and hazards, and watch out for the insidious Dr. Eggman and his myriad of contraptions. So go ahead and check out the screenshots by clicking on the thumbnails below.

     
    

Hardhat and the rest of his team from PSPSMM have released version 1.2 of Hardhat's amazing homebrew game Jump Gunnar, Jump! The game was originally made for the PS2Dev programming competition, but after not meeting the deadlines with a complete version Hardhat has continued to update his game with new levels and better graphics.

Here's whats new for this release:

- 30 levels included now
- Added doors; red, blue, green, yellow. keys are needed to open these doors.
- Added teleporters (activate with square)
- Updated enemy: Climber is replaced by a new Red bug (only graphics, behaviour stays the same)
- New terrain: slippery ground
- Added slippery slopes to engine, graphics and level editor.
- Fixed chests: open with bombs and fruit will pop out
- New sound effects for doors, teleporters and keys
- Updated level editor with new terrain types.
- Added icon to the EBOOT.PBP file.
- Added horizontal sliding (momentum)
- Animated evil duck (Anders)
- Shield now works.
- Almost a complete rewrite of the engine
- General improvements on the sprite sheet
- quicker stops on regular ground

You're all spoilt with choices, because not only does Jump Gunnar, Jump! come with all the above updates, but you can choose to use a Windows version or a PSP version - or even better both! Both releases include the source code and a level editor so feel free to create as many new maps or mods for this game as you can!

Visit: [PSPSMM]
Download: [Jump Gunnar, Jump! v1.2 for PSP]
Download: [Jump Gunnar, Jump! v1.2 for Windows]

The Podcast Network has yet again produced another entertaining show for us. The PSP Show #16 will be offering its devoted listeners its usual amount of news, views and humor.

This week's podcast will be featuring news about the PSP's PSOne Launch Titles, the Downgraders that became the talk of the PSP community, DevHook, the porting of Gunpey-R, Tunneling with the PSP, and some quick notes on the announced UMD games.

There will also be a review of Codemaster's Micromachines V4, and an announcement about PSP Show's first competition where you'll be able to win a copy of Micromachines.

The PSP Show #16 is all of 17 minutes and 38 seconds long. Enjoy!

Listen: [PSP Show #16]  [PSP Feed]

PS2Dev have posted the results of their Fourth Creation Game competition today. In case you haven't been following this competition, the nominees for the PSP part of this competition were:

• Jump Gunnar, Jump from PSPSMM
  
• Meeku's Quest - Beyond the Gateway for PSP by illfoundedmind Production Studio
• Break-IN by OmegaGames
• PSPTris by Sandberg
• Droplets from Drakonite/Makeshift Development

More information on the competition entries can be found here. There were three judges for the PS2Dev PSP competition, and the outcome was very close between the 5 homebrew games entered. PS2Dev would like say that both Break-In and Jump Gunnar, Jump had no sound, and if they had sound, it would have considerably increased their score.

However, the overall winner was Droplets by Drakonite - Well done to him! He is now the proud owner of the console of his choice - a PS2 or a PSP! Here's the results for each of the entries, scored in points:

• Droplets for PSP: 34.6
• PSPTris: 31.5
• Meeku's Quest: 25.6
• Break-In: 23.5
• Jump Gunnar, Jump!: 19.6

For the poor souls that have missed out on the PS2Dev competition, why not enter into the QJ.net Summer Homebrew Competition. There's still time to submit your entries, and a helluva lot of prizes to be won!

TeamOverload from our forums has started a 2.70 Flash Competition (for the Playstation Portable). This is much like Hardrive's competition earlier this month, but the reward has been improved, and hopefully more contestants will enter. I, as FrozenIpaq, am fully supporting this competition and hope that you will all enter who have knowledge of flash producing. We will be grateful for all entries received.

 

So, I'm proud to announce our forums first "official" flash competition. This competition will not only include applications and games, but also flash portals. Although, these will be split into two categories of Flash Portals and Flash Games/Applications. The contest was originally for portals, but we have extended it for all flash applications, but separated portals from games/apps to ensure a "fair" fight. So, now that you know there are two flash categories, you are probably wondering what the prizes are.

 

There are small prizes for each category which include -

 

Flash Portals -

1st Place - 25,000 forum points + Free Premium Membership + Free Custom User Title

2nd Place - 10,000 forum points + Free Custom User Title

3rd - 5,000 forum points OR Free Custom User Title.

 

Flash Applications/Games

1st Place - 25,000 forum points + Free Premium Membership + Free Custom User Title

2nd Place - 10,000 forum points + Free Custom User Title

3rd - 5,000 forum points OR Free Custom User Title.

 

Now, you are probably wondering how the voting/choosing is operated. This of course, will be where you come in. At the end of the competition we will have a forum poll that will allow all of our users to vote for who they think should win. So, the winners of the competition are not chosen by us, but you!

 

If you are interested in this contest, all of the requirements are listed after the jump or in the forum thread. Feel free to ask any questions in the comments or the thread, I will do my best to answer them.

[UPDATE] The deadline is now July 29th, this should be enough to make some good flash applications/games.