(PSP-2) Is Real, No UMD Drive

[sega4life]

Rumors: From 2 Articles.

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Perry: PSP 2 is Real, Could Hit This Fall

By Brian Crecente

The a UMD-free Playstation Portable 2 is indeed real and could hit as early as this fall, David Perry, chief creative officer at Acclaim, told Kotaku today.

"I spoke to a developer who is working on it right now," he said. "I know this developer is already working on it, so that means they have a prototype. That would sound like a fall release to me."

Perry said he is excited about the news.

"I've been pounding on Sony for a long time to make the Playstation Portable relevant and not to let Apple stroll away with the portable game market," he said. "Look at what Apple is doing now. Why are so many investors investing in Apple game development? Trying to pitch a PSP game to investors right now is brutal."

The idea of a UMD-free Playstation Portable begs the question of how games will be loaded onto the device.

Perry believe it will be done through digital downloads and direct connect to a computer.

The ultimate goal, he says, is for the Playstation Portabel to go 100 percent digital. Not only would that allow Sony to have a more direct connection with their customers and get a larger piece of the sales pie, it would essentially kill the used game sales market.

As a stop gap to keep retailers like GameStop interested in selling the Playstation Portable 2, which they make little to no money on, Perry thinks that Sony would at least initially sell games for the device on Memory Sticks, as they currently do with some movies, or with pre-paid cards.

As for backwards compatibility, it stands to reason, Perry says, that all current PSP titles would show up on Playstation's online store.

While Perry insists that the PSP2 is real, and already been developed for, a lot of the details about distribution and release are more speculative on his part.

It does make sense that games will one day go digital only, it seems inevitable. But is now too soon for something like the PSP?

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Rumor: PSP 2 Won't Have UMD Drive

By Brian Crecente

The new Playstation Portable won't feature a UMD disc drive, according to Acclaim developer David Perry.

"I hear Sony FINALLY has the PSP 2. And thank goodness, they've removed the stupid battery-sucking UMD disc drive. I'm excited!" Perry wrote on both his Twitter and Facebook accounts.

It is unclear if he has seen the rumored new Playstation Portable himself or is just hearing rumors through the development community.

This rumor is the latest in a series of rumors to hit the net in the past month or so, including one from IGN and another from VG247.

If it's true that the Playstation Portable 2 won't feature a UMD disc drive, than I'd say it's likely it will instead rely on Memory Sticks and downloads through the Playstation Network Store. The bigger question is whether such a device could be backwards compatible, and if so how it would work.

There has been an awful lot of news about the PSP coming out lately, so I think it's a safe bet to say that we can expect something from Sony about the next iteration of the Playstation Portable at E3.