When the pc or internet first became available, no one pictured all the things that would be possible thru these things or just how common place they will become.
If sony plays its cards right, I can picture a very similar fate for the psp, an extremely popular handheld that will have a ton of functionality beyond just gaming and will make life easier for a lot of people. And the massive installed base this will result in could easily supercede Nintendo's dominance of the handheld market and result in a surge of games, even more than currently, for the psp.
The psp is already headed in that direction. It already packs an mp3 player, a movie player, and wireless internet access.
Sony has pretty much confirmed a web browser, hopefully one packing most of the functionality of a pc web browser such as the ability to find and watch videos and music videos online, listen to radio online, get driving directions, and the ability to call people for free internationally thru certain websites with a mic accesory. Sony already confirmed that the psp will be able to make phone calls over wifi. Hopefully, this feature will feature additional phone functionality like the ability to store phone number lists, store voice mails, and such.
Sony confirmed that we will be able to watch news clips over wifi. So if Sony just goes one step further, we maybe to watch tv shows off of sony's servers thru wifi (possibly thru a media player that doesn't let you fast forward thru commercials so sony can collect ad revenue and use it finance the servers). Even if no ad revenue is collected, it may still be worthwhile for sony to host tv signals and shows on their servers for people to watch just to sell psps like crazy. And there is always the possibilty that if you have a tivo connected to online, that you will be able to watch clips from it from your psp on the go.
There's also talk of a GPS addon to the psp that lets you find your current location. What's stopping sony from releasing a umd disk with a map of the entire US to go along with this so that you can get directions to any place you need to go if you're lost. It would work essentially like the navigation systems that so many people pay thousands for but at a fraction of the cost and a ton more portability.
Sony confirmed that eyetoy will be made available for the psp. This opens up a huge number of possibilities. First the eyetoy can function as a video camera, free international video phone calls anyone? And the eyetoy opens up a huge number of gaming possibilities. For those of you that don't know what eye toy is, it's a video camera that records your body's movements and uses that into the game. For example, if you are playing a snowboarding game, based on how it sees you leaning, it changes how the character moves etc. But unless sony released free software so that anyone can find news ways to implement it, it will remain limited to a few niche of game genres only. Eyetoy can also be the next step to full blown virtually reality in games, it can already detect your body's movements, all that's missing is a pair of virtual glasses that immerse you into a truly 3d world some more. And there is already talk of an eyetoy 2 with dramatically improved sensitivity. Who knows where that can lead, the ability to read your finger movements so that you essentially add touchpad functionality without a touchpad? The ability to read finger and hand movements over the psp's screen so you add keyboard and possibly mouse functionality without an actual keyboard and mouse, technology that reads your lip movements perhaps to determine what you're saying, like an enhanced type of voice recognition. They could combine it with traditional voice recognition via a mic to exponentially increase the accuracy of recognition. There are virtually an endless number of possibilities opened up by the eyetoy 2 and I really hope that sony has a large group of developers figuring out new innovative ways to use it to bring gaming to a whole new level.
And going back to the super senstive voice recognition by simultanous both reading in inputs into the mic and studying lip movements that the eyetoy 2 may make possible, we finally have a way to implement essentially complete pc functionality into the psp. Sony already stated that it's considering an instant messenging program (possibly a video instant messenging program too using eyetoy) in addition to the psp's web browser, email viewer and word processing functionality. Think of how much easier this would be, if you didn't have to type everything, if the eyetoy 2 and a mic can recognize what you're saying and type it for you. You wouldn't even need to get one of those fancy new keyboard accesories that straps onto your hand and projects a keyboard image onto any flat surface. They also have a mouse out now that works on the same principle. You strap a little thing on your finger and it detects how you're moving it. Essentially a touch screen, without needing a touch screen. I would make a version of that for the psp too. This would be even easier and more portable.
With this voice recognition software, as you talk, it types up stuff and can even translate it to different languages. Imagine AIM but instead of having to type your stuff, you speak into a mike and it types it for you. There is no reason why voice recognition can't be done cheaply and easily on the psp, with or without utilizing the eyetoy 2 for enhanced recognition. Voice recognition is a lot simpler now. There are ton of programs that can do it well. Sony could buy out one of them, or just build their own. Heck, even my cell phone has it. You say the name of the person you want to call, and it calls them. Sure you have to first program it by repeating all the different syllables out there (about 50 or so) and having it store them to your voice, but if my cell phone can do it, why can't the psp? And it's not new to gaming either. Rainbow Six 3 for the Xbox uses voice recognition to command your allied units. There was no firmware update to the Xbox to enable this. This was something on the game disc itself. Nothing had to be installed to the hdd even. So it wouldn't even require a firmware update to the psp. It could just be stored on the memory stick. It might take up a lot of room. But if you have a 512 mb stick, you'll still have plenty left over to play around with.
In addition to using the mic for voice communication in games, I would implement voice recognition into everything. You say "document" and it opens up a new document. You say stuff and it types it up for you automatically without a keyboard. You say "spell check" and it checks and fixes the spelling, you say "save" and it saves, you then say the name you want to save it under, say new folder, say what you want the folders name to be etc. You say "browser" it opens up the browser. You say yahoomail.com and it launches the website. Then you say "box 1", then say your "login name", and it goes to the first box on the screen and types your login name for you. You say "multiplayer" in a game and it switches to multiplayer, and automatically finds a game for you with people at your same skill level. If you have the umd with the map of the US inserted in, you can say (using voice recog) "Location: Intersection of 3rd and Main, Newfoundland, Virginia, Destination: Nearest gas station" and it gives you directions step by step. If you have the gps add on plugged in, you don't even need to state your current location. And it gives you directions as you progress along the path, like a car would.
A natural extension of this would be to allow you to record sounds to your psp, through the mic. It's not hard, you have, a mic, a processor, an os, and a memory stick to store it on, all you need is a fireware update.
What's left that you can do on a pc that you can't do on a psp? Sony already confirmed that they are working on many of those accesories, a firmware update that includes aspects of all of the above features plus a calculator, a planner/sceduler, and a mini keyboard update for full pda type functionality.
That's about all the funtionality that sony can add to the psp in the future that will make it the portable all in one device that companies have been dreaming about making and dominating the market place forever. Sony can beat every one to the punch and rake itself billions of dollars in software sales and royalty fees in the process.
I already covered the new functionality that can be added to the psp. Below are the things Sony can do to really maximize the gaming aspects of their device to.
1.) Sony should go nuts with the multiplayer online features. I want to be able to pop in twisted metal online, select my favorite level and have it automatically find me a 16 player match up against real people with minimal lag, like how Xbox live does. I would include all the features that Xbox live touts (downloadable content, voice chat etc), but since this would be operating p2p rather than through Microsoft's servers, I would make them all free and mobile. Make it so that if a company is willing to host the servers, they can release MMORPG for the PSP should they desire. Go online and in short bursts, develop your characters rank, levels, weapons etc.
2.) I would allow people to download from online game saves, videos, photos, programs, things like that, and let them share them with others on their online friends list, and let them have as many friends as they want. So if you found a cool new way to beat the last boss, and you stored a clip of it to your memory card as you used it, you can share it with all your friends too.
3.) And naturally I would release free software development kits so that anyone can make software specifically for the psp, like minigames, a photo publisher or a powerpoint type tool and stuff and have it be downloadable onto the memory sticks. If you open up software production, people will come up with extraordinary new ways to use the psp that sony never even though of. I mean truly revolutionary stuff. Features that we haven't even conceived of yet. Think about what it did for Half Life. Counterstrike, made by dedicated gamers on their own, became the most popular online game in history. There are so many brilliant pieces of software made by independent people with development tools, everything from Linux to Bittorrent. Sony and the PSP userbase has so much to gain if Sony releases public development tools. People will be able to download and read ebooks anywhere, in the middle of a park, for free.
Also, by letting third party accesories companies toy around with what the psp firmware can handle, they get to see if they can implent brilliant new innovative features into the psp (eye toy anyone) without having the make the hardware accesory enabling it first, which would cheapen the whole process. Viruses aren't a concern. As long as every thing is kept on the memory stick, you can always pull out the memory stick, delete the stuff on their, and reinsert it into your psp.
4.) I would come out with some new colors for the psp and accesories. So many people commented on how much better the white psp sony originally showcased looks. It would appeal to a lot of people. And it would actually match the accesories the value pack comes with, the trigger buttons and the wrist strap built onto the psp .
Also, Sony should either get rid of the wrist strap thing on the left side, or add one like it on the right side. Many studies have shown that people are subconciously drawn to things that look symettric, and find those that aren't to be less pleasing. Look it up, symmetry makes a huge difference psychologically as to how much people like a product. It's just stupid on sony's part to not have a wrist strap built onto the console on the right side too. It's a cosmetic change that costs very little to do. But silver colors and symmetry will help elevate the psp to an ipod type status symbol.
11.) If I could have anything... I would also want a analog stick to the other side, so you can play FPS the way they are meant to be played etc. But it doesn't seem like that's feasible from the engineering side so that's probably not going to happen. Maybe the eyetoy can add some additional control functionality that makes FPS control better than ever before even.
If sony releases a firmware update with these features. The PSP wouldn't just be for videogamers anymore. Everyone would want one, my parents and even my grandparents who love to read in parks but hate having to carry around a thick bulky book with them everywhere they go. I would buy one and hard wire it into my car for the navigation capabilties alone. Sony could literally sell a billion units. It would be bigger than the imac, or the walkman, or even tv. But more importantly, these changes would revolutionize how people play games. There is so much untapped potential here, both in terms of how people game (Mobile Eyetoy) and in terms of everything else they do.
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Now you're probably wondering why? What do I, as a gamer/psp developer get out of the PSP becoming bigger than the walkman?
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Think about what a massive installed base means to you as a gamers. 100 million people have the PSP. Every single game company, each trying to find innovative new ways to game and make games so polished that they truly tap into the user base, will be making games for it, of all the different genres from MMORPGS to Real Time Strategy games ala Age of Empires using the wrist strap mouse accessory (already coming out for the DS). And there would be so much competition, that the best way to make money would be to buckle down, take as long as neccesary, and make a quality polished game that blows people away (Half Life 2, Halo 2) etc.
I really want sony to hear these firmware update suggestions. They can all be implemented. Is there anyone here, that works for sony or can get in touch with them. Even if you don't. Spread the word. Link other people to this thread.
The psp can be the universal all in 1 that sells millions if
Re: The psp can be the universal all in 1 that sells million
... Or dare I even say "THE WORLD!!!!!!!!!" (you know "overseas")cyprus7 wrote:What's stopping sony from releasing a umd disk with a map of the entire US to go along with this so that you can get directions to any place you need to go if you're lost.
lol - rsi from typing i rekon.
I agree with Mawsley - no hope of SDK. PSP contains waaaay too much prioprietry gear to let people 'muck' with it. Even linux on PS2 was in a sandbox, so I'd expect that will probably the best you'll ever get from them - and plus the devkits are inexpensive - so doesnt make any sense to even open it up. As for lots more games because of it - erg, have a little think about that, while there might be 1 or 2 great games (or comparible to commercial quailty) how many utterly crap and shocking games are there on PC.. yeah... _lots_. Maintaining software quality on a handheld would definitely be a priority.
The rest of it sounds nice - although alot is already happening (UK devvers have a GPS with mapping system and such nearly ready for it), there already are many keyboards in the works and many other devices annouced and already under development. And remember a device like this isnt knocked up over a weekend and a couple of beers - Sony have a very distinct plan and have been making ready for this for over 5 years, it is closely coupled with the cell too (expect a Cell in the PSP in the years to come).. Along with their association with Ericson (mobile phones) and IBM (server/pc market) and Toshiba (electronis goods) - expect a broad range of market inroads for related hardware (this is really why the Cell is made the way it is).
I agree with Mawsley - no hope of SDK. PSP contains waaaay too much prioprietry gear to let people 'muck' with it. Even linux on PS2 was in a sandbox, so I'd expect that will probably the best you'll ever get from them - and plus the devkits are inexpensive - so doesnt make any sense to even open it up. As for lots more games because of it - erg, have a little think about that, while there might be 1 or 2 great games (or comparible to commercial quailty) how many utterly crap and shocking games are there on PC.. yeah... _lots_. Maintaining software quality on a handheld would definitely be a priority.
The rest of it sounds nice - although alot is already happening (UK devvers have a GPS with mapping system and such nearly ready for it), there already are many keyboards in the works and many other devices annouced and already under development. And remember a device like this isnt knocked up over a weekend and a couple of beers - Sony have a very distinct plan and have been making ready for this for over 5 years, it is closely coupled with the cell too (expect a Cell in the PSP in the years to come).. Along with their association with Ericson (mobile phones) and IBM (server/pc market) and Toshiba (electronis goods) - expect a broad range of market inroads for related hardware (this is really why the Cell is made the way it is).
Bye.