2007 the Best Year Yet For PSP & DS

ElFozzie writes "From a handheld perspective, Pocket Gamer has posted a couple of features offering a positive viewpoint on the reasons why both PSP and DS might have a very happy new year. Tellingly, whilst the PSP piece focuses on a range of new potential developments from new peripherals and downloadable video content to price drops and even a new version of the handheld system, the DS article simply highlights 10 top games titles due to hit the streets in the next 12 months. On one level this could be argued as a reflection of the divergent strategies of the two devices and companies, with Sony trying to establish all-singing, all-dancing, all movie-music-and-gaming 'entertainment platforms', whereas Nintendo have focused solidly upon one core area. However a simpler argument would suggest it's merely underlining why Nintendo has raced ahead this year and the lesson Sony are going to have to learn if they are to have any chance of a truly prosperous 2007 — "It's about the games stupid!""

Re:Wii doesn't win. PSP wins.

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you mean that ds isn't very hackeable?

I don't think so, there is a hacked firmware for ds called flashme that allows you to run unsigned code, there are also lots of homebrew developers, those people have released programs such as dsorganize(pda), beup(msn clone) and lots of other different programs, there is a wide variety of flashcarts which allow you to run wathever you want

What?

[Mongoose]

I don't like articles like this when they ignore product releases, because it's not in their region.

You can play Metal Gear: Portable Ops, SEGA's star gazer title, and use the mapping software in Japan for the GPS unit already. Even the US Firmware has had PSP camera support for a long time now. The thing is with PSP you can use hardware from any region with your PSP. I have had several of add-ons for some time on my PSP. Vaporware? My ass. The more 'region-free' game hardware get the more annoying these articles become. Often it's cheaper to import some add-ons than buy them local anyway if you buy bundles with software.

Re:It's interesting

[seebs]

HDMI->DVI does not bypass HDCP; it's just a question of wires. The cables are $20 or so. It's just a bunch of wires. The signal coming out of the PS3 is still HDCP-encoded.

So what I'm prevented from doing is connecting the PS3, via DVI, to ANY device that isn't HDCP, including my console switch, so I can't put the PS3 on the beautiful 24" HDCP-capable monitor I use for everything else. Since I am not about to buy another monitor just for the PS3, or spend extra money to replace a perfectly functional DVI switch with a DVI switch that also does HDCP, just for one stupid games machine, it means the PS3 gets dumped on a lower res display.

More generally, it means I can't just hook the PS3's DVI output up to a generic PC monitor; it has to have extra features, and the list of warnings about failure modes in my monitor's manual was beautiful. Apparently, if you interrupt the signal for a while, you may have to reboot to recover it, because the negotiation may need to be restarted. All this extra hardware just to try to keep people from copying movies.

1080p vs. 1080i is a pretty big difference. HDMI allows 1080p. It also, under Linux, allows 1920x1200.

FWIW, I have successfully set my component cable to 1080p output, and it was even possible to see the screen, but it looked like crap.

Re:I picked up a DS for my little one this Christm

[reybrujo]

Some friends are trying to port Allegro, an amateur gaming library, to DS. I should be helping them as soon as I get the homebrew tools. You can use libnds (see general instructions for installing here [tobw.net]). Unfortunately, Nintendo does not sell their SDK to single users, only to companies with a determined profile. You can learn more at Nintendo Software Development Support Group [warioworld.com].

Re:it's certainly ironic

[SethraLavode]

"Most profitable" means exactly that -- the one who makes the most money, after accounting for expenses. Software is more profitable than hardware because the company keeps a greater percentage of the gross revenues.

Certainly, a larger company like Sony has higher overall revenues and they sold more PS2s than Nintendo sold Gamecubes, but a significantly larger percentage of their revenue comes from hardware. Nintendo is the #1 video game publisher and I'm not sure that Sony's studios are even in the top ten. Sony makes some money from third-party publishers, but not as much as they do on their own games.

You are right in that you have to have a good profit margin to make a lot of money, but you're drawing the wrong conclusions. Sony is the one who has to sell a lot more product because they make less money for each sale. They don't make as much money (if any) on the hardware, and they don't sell as many software titles. Nintendo makes more money per sale, so they don't have to move as many units. Sony has to "shoot for the big pie", because they can't be successful otherwise.

As a final note, regarding your "who will win this round", it's always said that Sony won the last round hands-down. That's true if you're only looking at the raw number of home (non-handheld) consoles sold, but the big picture is that over the lifetime of the PS2, Nintendo has been more profitable than Sony. Roughly converted from yen (at today's rates, which isn't exactly accurate), Nintendo made $4.2bil to Sony's $3.9bil. (Rather than post the raw numbers, I'll link to a previous post [slashdot.org].