[NGP] Sony Officially Reveals PSP Successor

[NGP] Sony Officially Reveals PSP Successor
That's right, folks. Today was the day. At the long-awaited PlayStation Meeting in Tokyo today, Sony officially threw back the curtain on their newest handheld. Known simply as NGP (Next Generation Portable) at this point in time, we finally got to stare at the new piece of hardware and hear all about its specs.

Sony talked up all the new features that would be included in the NGP, such as dual analog sticks, 5-inc OLED display (with a 960x544 resolution, which is 4x the original PSP's), 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS. The handheld will also include front touch screen and rear touch pads. It will also come packed with the same Six Axis that powers the PlayStation Move controller plus a three-axis compass as well as front and rear cameras. The other big change is the abolishment of UMD, instead games will run off of flash-memory cards.

Full specs are listed in the drop box, courtesy of Sony themselves

"Next Generation Portable Entertainment System" Hardware Specs

CPU: ARM Cortex-A9 core (4 core)

GPU: SGX543MP4+

External Dimensions: Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection)

Screen: 5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED

Touchscreen: Multi-touch screen (capacitive type)

Rear touchpad: Multi-touch pad (capacitive type)

Cameras: Front camera; rear camera

Sound: Built-in stereo speakers; built-in microphone

Sensors: Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer); three-axis electronic compass

Location: Built-in GPS; Wi-Fi location service support

Keys/Switches: PS button; power button; directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left); action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square); shoulder buttons (Right/Left); right and left sticks; Start button; Select button; volume buttons (+/-)

Wireless communications: Mobile network connectivity (3G); IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1x1) (Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode); Bluetooth 2.1+EDR (A2DP/AVRCP/HSP)

The handheld targets five core features: Revolutionary User Interface (the new UI, they will not be using the XMB by the looks of things); Social Connectivity; Location-based Entertainment; Converging Real and Virtual; and PlayStation Suite (PlayStation Suite was also announced at the event, and you will find details about right here) Compatibility.

Is that still not enough? How about if we tell you that it is due this holiday season, though it is unclear if that is Japan only. Games currently in development include: Uncharted, Killzone, WipEout, LittleBigPlanet, Call of Duty, Resistance and many more.

Expect more details at E3, stage demoes also included a few PS3 titles being shown in real-time on Sony's newest baby (including Yakuza and Metal Gear Solid 4) so this is going to help the next generation of handhelds have an even more interesting contest.

The killer question, how much do you think this will cost? And how much are you willing to pay for Sony's new toy?

Written by: Kyran Morrison

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