PSP minis lack network features for fast approval time

by Kevin Kelly on Sep 17th 2009 2:20PM

Speaking at Austin GDC, Justin Cooney from Sony Computer Entertainment spoke about the upcoming PSP minis program to a crowd of developers eager to start creating games and applications for the system. They promise an extremely fast process to get onto the PlayStation Network: no stage one or two approvals, and very light Q&A. They're hoping to average three to five days for approvals, which contrasts with up to two weeks for normal-sized PSP games.

The minis program is also fairly limited. You can't develop network or online features for it (goodbye multiplayer), it doesn't support DLC, and you can't use it to work with peripherals. Developers will also have to have their game approved by the ESRB, which costs money. You can also release your titles in all three territories, but you need to sign agreements with each territory (North America, Japan, Europe) in order to do so.

Sony is definitely taking an iPhone App Store approach to this process, and Cooney himself dropped the iPhone name a few times. We're wondering if they've considered that there are over 20k games now on the App Store, and if they've prepared themselves for the onslaught and how they'll be devoting a lot of time to minis approvals. So, look for PSPFart to be available for download sometime soon.

PSP and PS3 at Austin GDC

Tags: AGDC, Austin-GDC, austin-gdc-2009, Justin-Cooney, minis, PlayStation-Store, PSN, PSP, psp-minis, Sony

Reader Comments (36)

Makes sense, I mean if it had online play it wouldn't really be a "mini" anyways.

exactly. the only thing that you could want the PSN support for would be leaderboards but thats about it.

Yea friends leader boards will be about the only thing ill miss for game with hi scores. Over all this does not seem like bad idea for any hand held to have, I just hope the price of any Sony released titles stay as the call it "Minis". I would hate see the better games way to much. Day I get my own PSP go ill try this out most likely not any soon tho. EDIT: No "sigs" with links to your site. That IS spamming.

Gameshow dude...cut the shit out...there are NO "Sigs" on Joystiq...that shit can be seen as spam...wanna get your site noticed? simply post on FORUMS with that as your sig!! that way Google spiders will see it and it will get listed on search engines....posting it on here in EVERY post will simple cause you to get BANNED and in turn ALL your post with said link being ERASED...

One thing I've noticed that isn't mentioned here, is that the same save file rules that apply to PSN and UMD games could apply here.

Meaning that a PlayStation Minis game could still have leaderboards by uploading a save file to the internet, I mean it's certainly slower and more difficult to do (for both the developer and the user) but at least the option exists.

And plus PSP Minis devs could also make sequels to their games that can use the previous games save file, which doesn't really make up for DLC but could make a nice work around.

This also means that PSP Minis titles could in the future transition to full fledged PSN titles through this save file trick.

"This also means that PSP Minis titles could in the future transition to full fledged PSN titles through this save file trick." sound this work a lot like how some great move from microsoft indie games to full published downloadable games.

EDIT: While people shouldn't be attacking other people for ANYTHING in the comments section, it is absolutely spamming to do what you're doing. I'll contact you by email.

So approval times are faster because developers aren't allowed to have network features? -or- Developers would want to leave network features out if they want the approval time to be faster?

Well considering that the minis are supposed to be snack-sized, quick and easy appetizers, I guess Sony figures nobody would want multiplayer. If they want multiplayer they go for the larger and more fulfilling, dinner-sized portions.

In other words, a quicky instead of a full blow.

Only two downsides - the lack of approval outside of QA (really if they want to keep the quality high they should have SOME concept approval), and the inability to add more content like extra stages.

All makes sense to me. Devs can still make $10-40 full featured Digital Distro games for the platform.

I've bought $10 iPhone games that didn't have network features, DLC or support for peripherals.

most impressive pieces of info from the slides

"Pixel Junk Eden turned profit with in 24 hours of release."
-nice

"full lengthen movies, tv shows.." on the topic of home.
-cant wait to see what titles they play in HOME

"every SCEA item to date is profitable with in 2 months" on topic of HOME items
-apparently someone is buying thing in HOME, so HOME is doing what it needs to do(7.5 million people used it, 88% of those people came back, and made 1,000,000 in the 1st month)

"my daughter loves her Hannah Montana PSP"
- got to love they can have fun with their own bundles

Home made $1 Million in the first month I'm wondering how much its made going on a year later....if its made more than $5-7 million I'd say Sony KNOWS they have a cash cow on their hands

Get it together Joystiq...its 21,000+ "ENTERTAINMENT" titles...NOT GAMES...i.e. the farting apps and the iGun apps, etc...

Just like M&M's Minis, this seems like a bad idea.

Is it just me or is two weeks fast for approval? I mean, if they are allowed to put multiplayer and such in there, but only have to wait longer, that's one thing. But if Sony is denying it altogether, that's where it becomes a bad idea.

obviously trying for the iphone "quantity over quality" concept. 1000 bad games for a buck = $1000. 10 good games for five bucks = $50.

The shotgun approach has always been Sony's style.

epic fail for Sony on this. No network games? WTF. Just single player games. Plus I'm sure none of these games will go for .99 cent like the iphone. Sony will over charge for the same games on the iphone and loose out. I understand they want to get games out fast, but at what cost to the game.

umm they will be .99-$5...why is it a fail to not allow cheap games small games network support?? I mean they ARE just testing the waters out with this format....who's to say that future version wont allow for it? Beside how many people are going to make games under 100MBs that would use network support for anything other than leaderboards....

well, some of the older XBLA games were under 100mb and had network support. Take Cloning Clyde for instance, it was only 25mb and offered for player multiplayer online.....It has been done.

sorry meant four player....

I guess multiplayer would take more time to test so they just want to skip it all together just to get games out the door. I hope Sony knows what they are doing here by not allowing it.

james grayson says "no"

speaking of Iphone, I just bought one, good by psp.... because you just never delivered on the promises of the psp and I could not wait to dead with what I would assume would be psp go's slow A** browser.... Iphone here I come.

Trust me, the magic will wear off after the first month or so.

I guess you can consider Gran Turismo a PSP mini because it lacked so much but that GTPSP game is over priced.

Forcing developers to adhere to some arbitrary rules is not a smart move, I'll laugh at them when it fails.

You just can't help it, you HAVE to troll every single Playstation article you see, don't you, x-bot4life?

(side note: Joystiq, if censor x-bot [without the - ] you might as well start to censor other words, no?)

Some iphone apps have network support. Plus from a devs point it seems like if you have a hit you'd want to be able to make DLC for the game to get as much out of it as you can which the iphone does. Sony isnt letting them do DLC. Who knows like you said maybe a update later will allow this so you're right and I agree with that since its new to Sony. I want my cake and eat it to lol!

they have that because the iphone is always connected to the at&t network so it makes sense.

The PSP minis are dumb. However, I don't think the lack of network play for minis is a letdown. For the most part, online multiplayer functionality is overrated especially for handheld games. There are tons of handheld titles with multiplayer built-in and very little to no one playing online (and I'm not just talking about the ones no one wants to play). Kudos to Sony on that front for keeping things simple.

Agreed. The only PSP games that have a strong online presence are games that are associated to already established franchises like SOCOM, Killzone, and Resistance.

And honestly, I pretty rarely play PSP games online anymore. I only play PSP games in quick bursts.

Who cares if they dont come with online play honestly half the poeple you play online with are hacking thier way to a win on the psp. I think it should ad least support 2 player via local lan.

Sony PSP Mini's Product Lead: Alright folks! I need shovelware, and I need it now! And here how I'm gonna get it:

i love my psp and i love my iPhone. both have their pluses and minues. to me the iPhone is a great on the crapper gaming device, but if i am on a trip or just want to play a good game i will pull out my PSP

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PSP minis lack network features for fast approval time

PSP and PS3 at Austin GDC

Reader Comments (36)

Posted: Sep 17th 2009 2:22PM (Unverified) said

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