Homebrew developer CrazyC has updated his old-school DOS emulator for the PSP with the latest version of DOSBox version 0.71 Build 29.01.2008. Updates in the newest build of the app include fixes to the bugs found in the previous version of DOSBox, as well as adding more memory allocation to the app's complementary conf file. For more information, read the full article.

Download: DOSBox v0.71 Build 29.01.2008

OpenBOR is a homebrew application for the PlayStation Portable from coder SamuraiX. It allows users to come up with their own game so in short, it's a sweet program that brings out your creative talents.

Long-time users will be happy to know that the owner has just rolled out a new version over at the QJ.NET PSP Development Forum. Know the things that were changed after the jump!


Download: OpenBOR v2.1313
Visit: QJ PSP Development Forum

Impressed with the previous LocoRoco Motion Plug-in? If so, then you may want to check out the latest release, with several audio fixes and the Jump function. Finally, we get to experience LocoRoco the way it should be. Details and change log in the Full Article!


Download: LocoRoco Motion Plug-in v0.99
Visit: QJ PSP Development Forums

We recently posted an article reporting the release of Cpasjuste's Custom Firmware Extender 1.4. Our report showed off the new video capturing feature of the said PSP homebrew. Now we bring you another coverage this time dealing with the actual release of the program to the public.

In case you missed our previous coverage, this software allows users to capture screenshots, record in-game videos, start and stop an ftpd server from the PSP menu, reset the PSP with a button while under the VSH, and more. Here are the other things that this program can do:

• Power off the PSP with a button while under the VSH (PSP Menu) or in-game (UMD/ISO).
• Change the speed of the PSP CPU/FSB while under the VSH (PSP Menu) or in-game (UMD/ISO).
• Start and stop Usb Mass Storage under the VSH (PSP Menu) while browsing.
• Set a default CPU/BUS speed at startup.
• Set Usb Mass Storage at startup.
• Configure your buttons mapping (combo button + your selected button).
• Enable brightness button to go to the max level

If you're using an older release and are thinking to upgrade, here's the changelog for the program:

• Tested on M33 52-4 custom firmware.
• Fixed some bugs and probably added some.
• Capture folder for screenshots can now be set in the config file.
• Use the code from remotejoy by TyRaNiD @ ps2dev.org to record some in-game videos. All remotejoy functions are still available.

So go download this program and try it out. Be sure to go over the Read Me document included with the compressed file. It has instructions on installation, a bug report, and making video captures.

Download: Custom Firmware Extender 1.4
Visit: QJ.NET PSP Development Forums

Yeah, it's a LuaPlayer, and this one's from Shine at the PS2Dev forums. What's different about this one is that it's been re-written with the SCons build management and is based on OpenGL for all graphics output. Check Wiki, OpenGL "is a standard specification defining a cross-language cross-platform API" for computer graphics, which leads to the other thing that's different. It's been released for the PSP, the PS3 (Linux), and Windows.

We shall henceforth and heretofore call this the One LuaPlayer to Rule Them All/And In The Darkness Bind Them. Until Sauron Shine comes up with the next version, or someone else comes up with something else like it. Here are the details for each LuaPlayer platform:

• PSP: uses PSPGL (old hat, old friend), tested on 1.0 and 1.5, but doesn't run on kernel, so theoretically should work with other versions, too (that's unconfirmed, though). 3D rendering on the PSP is slow, though - Shine's hoping someone would step up with an idea to fix it.
• PS3: should work on every 64-bit PS3 Linux. Screenshot is from the PS3 version.
• Windows: compiled with VisualStudio.Net, so it won't need Cygwin or any other library apart from the system and OpenGL libs

Weirdly enough, there's a folder for "Mac OS X", but neither the forum post nor anything in the text files in the package indicate anything about Mac functionality. Looks like a work in progress since Shine and another member of the forum are talking about the Mac OS X "port." Anyway, the download link below contains both the application/s and the source codes for LuaPlayer OpenGL. Instructions are provided in build.txt, while actual apps are in the "release" folder.

Thank you, Bronx, for the tip!

Download: [LuaPlayer OpenGL]

Here's something interesting: PSOne, after being around for so long, just got its own PSP emulation program - and it's far from being 100% playable. How about PSP homebrew games emulated on a PS2? Now, that got your attention.

Even though the PS3 just got out, we're pretty sure nobody would be throwing away their current-gen consoles. And with the number of actual units that are available for now, we know that not everyone was able to get one. You can't see for yourself how the much talked about PSP-PS3 connection works, why not play around with a PSP-PS2 tie-up?

This program is called LuaPlayer PS2 and was coded by PS2DEV's Evilo. As the name implies, "the player is almost compatible will all available Lua games." The file can be loaded to the PS2 via USB connection. Also, as far as we understand, the file also allows for lua games creation in the PS2 itself.

This is a great development for the dying PS2 homebrew scene. It also gives our Lua coders around the opportunity to make Lua games compatible with PS2. At any rate, we're including the file for download below as well as a link to a game compatible with it. Kindly gives all of us a feedback on what you think about the program.

Download: [LuaPlayer PS2]

[UPDATE]

Well, it seems that some brilliant member of our comments section (Visigotico) took it upon himself to re-compile the emulator with this one-line fix. He has also taken the liberty as to compile a separate version with frame skip set at 1. StrmnNrmn has stated that adding frame skip will not show a drastic increase, but Visigotico compiled it anyways (maybe to hush those complainers of frame skip). According to StrmnNrmn, frame skipping will only add about 0.5 fps to the overall rate - nothing noticeable.

 

You can view the original article below the line to find out what you can expect from StrmnNrmn in a few days; the speed increases for a few games due to this fix can be found below as well. The download  is not of StrmnNrmn's next version but rather a small user update to R7 with the speed fix.

Download: [Daedauls Pre-R8 Release - Compiled by Visigotico]

---

StrmnNrmn never ceases to amaze us with his optimizations and constant updates to his Daedalus N64 emulator. StrmnNrmn originally ported the Daedalus N64 emulator over the PSP earlier on this year, and since then has been improving the emulator's speed and compatibility non-stop. We've seen several new builds come before us, each one better than the previous with mainly speed increases - something of which everyone loves to hear.

It seems that the man behind the fastest N64 emulator on the PSP has done it again - he has improved the overall speed of Daedalus. After reading a single post by Soatome over at PS2Dev, he realized a crucial part in his code that could be easily improved/modified. This single line was change from sceCtrlReadBufferPositive to sceCtrlPeekBufferPositive. Strmn states that this single adjustment has improved the speed of many games by a few frames due to the stalling for a frame every time the ROM read the status of the pad (controller/buttons). StrmnNrmn has listed a few of the speed increases (very impressive from R7) -

Mario now runs at at steady 15fps in most places, and around 20fps indoors etc (it reaches over 35fps in the main menu, and close to 30 in some scenes.) Zelda now runs at around 8fps in game, and up to 20fps in certain places. The 'nintendo' logo at the start runs at over 90fps :D The MarioKart Nintendo logo now runs at 30fps, and the main menu (with the flag) runs at a solid 15fps. In game it's a comfortable 12fps. Starfox runs at around 15fps - the intro runs at 25-30fps. Quest64 runs at 20fps.

Due to this unexpected speed increase, StrmnNrmn has stated that we may see a release of R8 sooner than later! Although no specific time table was given, we should definetly see a release by the end of the week or early next week.

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!

Well, the PSP homebrew scene is curretly swept away with the tons of updates we've been receiving. The past week has seen loads of news regarding the question mark-filled Modchip, an awesome release of iR Shell, and just hours ago, info about possible exploit on firmware 2.60 (that one's huge!). It's actually easy to overlook this one, but for the folks who make the PSP homebrew scene what it is, this one is definitely a bit of good news.

The 'long-time' developers would distinctly remember downloading a file from www.oopo.net/consoledev.  Popularly known as a toolchain, it was an automated script which you ran in Cygwin or a Linux distribution to  download, compile and set up the C/C++ compiler and the environment.

If you want a bit of a history lesson, it was possible to make applications for the PSP even before the toolchain came  out. But once the whole process of setting up the compiler was handled by the toolchain, it became a lot easier to make applications for the PSP.

So why am I talking about it here and right now? ooPo, the guy who maintained the toolchain, recently revealed that  his bandwidth utilisation had suddenly jumped up. Now I don't know if it was due to the recent 'Want to be a Developer?' article or our announcement of the Summer Homebrew Competition, but suffice to say that ooPo couldn't manage to give out all that extra bandwidth. And he also revealed that it was because of what I'd call bandwidth spamming. A few people downloaded the  toolchain repeatedly, increasing his bandwidth costs. A few guys even downloaded it about 15-20 times.

And ooPo couldn't take it.  Not to worry though, it's still available. The toolchain has been moved/merged with the PS2dev server (www.ps2dev.org). You can download it from its new home, or from the mirror below. But just download it once. ;)


Download: [PSP Toolchain]

Hardhat (thanks for the heads up!) wanted to make it to PS2Dev's Fourth Creation 2006 contest; hence, he went on and submitted his unfinished game, Jump Gunnar, Jump. Yet as he said, he has this "I could do it better after the deadline" attitude and you just have to try out the latest version of the game to know that he is not kidding.

V1.0 and v1.10 are as different as "night and day", says the author and I couldn't agree more. Working sleepless night to make an improved game, hardhat was finally convinced by Wilhel to stop fixing the bugs and start sharing the definitely better version of the game.

Jump Gunnar, Jump v1.10 not only has new levels, the old levels have been improved as well. New graphics and a new physics graphics - which results to less embedding in ground and nicer gravity - are also included in this version. The scrolling in this latest version has been smoothed plus the enemies bug has been fixed so you can already shoot them.

The slew of new things in hardhat's game does not end there. Also in the latest release are new enemies (evil duck and shooting cow), weapon (bomb), terrain (exploding ground, bombable wall, ceiling or floor, new slopes, invisible ground), and chests (opens with bomb).

Other better things to look out for in v1.10 of Jump Gunnar, Jump are:

• Variable height jumping
• Sound effects and music
• SELECT now allow you to replay the current level
• START now quits
• Updated level editor with new ground types, new attributes
• New tips file with advice for new players.
• Cut screens: get ready, level complete, game over
• Updated status bar, with number of rings collected (??? -> OOO), amount of bombs ("Ammo")

Yet the game is far from perfection as there are still issues to deal with; like the occasional hillwalking sinkhole, walls ignoring the fruits from chest, and mess in wordwrapping in cut screens. Hardhat also points out that level 6 is hard (but solveable), plus there are other issues with the level editor as well - can't make bombable wall and invisible wall, doesn't load or save attributes, and buttons are not in the new skin.

Despite these issues, I still recommend that you guys pick up this game from hardhat. It's still loads of fun controlling that running, jumping, gun-trotting sheep Gunnar as he tries to collect as many fruits as he can to escape the evil Shephard's gauntlet.

Download: [Jump Gunnar, Jump v1.10]