PSP Prediction #1: New limited edition PSP bundles with high-profile games and peripherals.
SCEA will release a special gold PSP-2000 system that includes God of War: Chains of Olympus and a Memory Stick for $200. Maybe it'll look something like the fan-made system? We hope so. Also, we're hopeful that Square Enix will release a limited edition bundle with Crisis Core, just as they did in Japan. Finally, Sony will release a PSP system bundled with GPS in the US.
PSP Prediction #2: The PSP Store will debut a huge franchise exclusively for download.
The PSP Store will get a major game exclusively for download. Don't be surprised if we see either a new LocoRoco or Metal Gear Solid game that'll be available on the Store only. We expect announcements at GDC and E3 later this year.
PSP Prediction #3: Square Enix will bring tons of PS1 love to PSP.
PSP fans will find that Square Enix will resurrect many of its long-forgotten PS1 franchises back to the PSP. They will finally allow PSP owners to download PS1 classics (at a premium cost) and will resurrect yet another classic PS1 game for a remake on PSP.
PSP Prediction #4: Sony will release tools to program widgets for PSP.
This is probably our most ambitious prediction. Sony will finally go after the homebrew crowd by creating a way of creating widgets and applications for the PSP. They will load from Memory Stick in a separate section of the XMB. Users will need the most recent official firmware to continue using their applications. Sony will release a few example widgets, such as a calculator and weather tool.
PSP Prediction #5: Video playback will be enhanced in future fimrware revisions.
The slightly broken limitations of PSP's video playback will be removed. Gamers will be able to watch videos of any size up to 720x480 pixels -- including 640x480, so often used in podcasts. Other codecs will be added to PSP, such as MPEG-2 and DivX.
Will we be as lucky with our predictions as we were in the last two years? We hope so! We'd love to all of these predictions come true. Heck, we'd be happy with just one of them. Let's hope someone at Sony is reading this post and is making this happen.
