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The People Still Keeping the PSP Alive: PSPunk (gardinerbryant.com)
submitted 1 week ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 47 points 1 week ago (6 children)

I don't quite get it. I love my psps, I rocked my hacked psps for years, the but the pocket sized Linux handhelds have gotten so good and cheap. Way smaller, more powerful, and a better screen can be had for like $150.

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  • [–] [S] 32 points 1 week ago (2 children)

    Oh absolutely. This was exactly me for the longest time. I review retro handhelds, so I've had everything from the entry-level to the high power ones (like the Odin 3 Max). I thought you couldn't get better than upscaled graphics and save states, but when I got a re-obsession semi-recently with the PSP:

    https://gardinerbryant.com/tag/psp/

    ...I've realized that native hardware just has magic to it. The handheld is slim, the design is retro futuristic in the best way (in my eyes), the jailbreak and add-ons are invaluable and the experience is just fun. I've just reviewed the Retroid Pocket Nova, am reviewing the Anbernic RG SP, and have a couple more on the way, but that isn't stopping me absolutely loving WipEout on my PSPs :)

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  • [–] 13 points 1 week ago (3 children)

    You're so right about the "magic." The way you jailbroke the PSP was just the coolest. You hacked the battery! I remember doing that for the first time and I felt like a hacker—my friends looked at me like I was one too—even though I was just following simple instructions.

    20 ish years later, I wanna get my hands on some more consoles but wanna try hardware modding to learn how to solder too.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    The battery? Was that the first discovered jailbreak hack? Because by the time I got a PSP (~2012), the jailbreak was "copy this program to your card and run it on the psp", which was about as idiot-proof as a jailbreak can get.

    On the other hand, I did jailbreak my nintendo switch with the shorting on the right joycon using a bent paperclip. Lucky I didn't brick it, though until it booted back into life, I was sweating!

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago

    I can't remember when exactly I did mine, but I think we called it the Pandora Battery method. I'm our right now but I need to look it up when I get home. It'll be an awesome trip down memory lane.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago (2 children)

    I'd highly recommend modding an xbox 360 if you've never done so. Very achievable if you're somewhat technical, and you get to feel all the hackerman vibes because it requires soldering some wire leads to the motherboard and using a raspberry pi pico to read and write the nand. Most original xbox games also work if you install the compatibility files. So many incredible games from the 360 generation, and the consoles can still be found for around $50. Just make sure you get a "slim" model console because the phats don't live as long. This site has basically everything you need to know. It's an extremely good resource.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    I'm currently looking into hacking my 360 - why did you go with RGH and not A Bad Avatar/Bad Update?

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    RGH was the first mod I learned. Back then, you needed to use an ace v3 mod chip. Now with RGH 3, you only need a resistor and a diode for most models. I still prefer RGH because it persists between boots. Mod once and have a cracked console forever.

    Honestly I mostly forgot that bad update was a thing while typing that comment. Back when I was still paying attention, you needed a specific game to make it work. Naturally, that game instantly became way more expensive on the resell market. Also the exploit used to take a few minutes to run, but I'm pretty sure that's much shorter now.

    If you have the game you need or it no longer requires a specific game, then I guess there's no major reason to hard mod as long as you don't mind running the exploit each time you power up the console. I haven't done a mod in a few years now, but was planning to do another soon. I'll probably look into bad update just to familiarize myself, but I imagine I'll still do RGH 3 because it lets me set everything up, install all the games I want, customize the dashboard, make the menus pretty by getting all the full box art for every game, and then the console just stays that way forever and cleanly boots directly into the custom dashboard with virtually 100% success. I also prefer Freestyle Dash over Aurora which makes makes me somewhat unusual, but I very much prefer having separate categories for 360 games, original xbox games, xbla games, homebrew apps, and emulators (I could only ever find SNES so that's all I have). Also I just really like customizing the look and feel with the Dream Theme installed on Freestyle. Scrub through that video to get an idea how crazy customizable Dream Theme is. Aurora has one look and one category with all games as far as I know, but most people go with it over Freestyle Dash.

    All that to say, I mostly just enjoy doing an RGH mod because it's fun. I mentioned how the whole process makes me feel like an actual hacker, and that first time you see the xell screen pop up (meaning the hack was a success), it's worth it for the dopamine hit alone. Also these days if I'm modding a 360, I'm probably doing it for a friend and it's much easier to give them something that requires no special knowledge to use.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago* (1 child)

    Thank you for taking the time to write that out - those are all good reasons to go for a hard mod. I'm intrigued now, I will most likely pick up another 360 locally on the cheap to tinker with and go the easier route of A Bad Avatar with my "main system" until then. Dream Theme does look amazing and just having the console customized and ready to go right after booting (instead of having to run an exploit etc. every time) is a huge plus. It will be glorious.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago

    No problem. I was concerned I went way overboard so I'm glad it's helpful. Just be aware that if you also use Freestyle Dash, basically anyone who's familiar with 360 modding will be like "...why are you using that?" It's over a decade out of support. Aurora is much lighter and up to date, but I'm old school and I'm nostalgic for Dream Theme. The good news is if you want, you can configure Dashlaunch to have both. You just hold some button you choose on the controller while booting and it will boot into FSD, Aurora, or straight into xexmenu if you want. Before I settled into a preference, I put both FSD and Aurora on all the consoles I modded.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    I adore my RG SP. I got it in the GameCube Indigo, for that little extra hit of nostalgia. I tinkered for a bit trying to get dolphin to run before giving up and realizing my steam Deck handles that better anyway. My recent obsession has been Emerald Rogue and Pokemon Unbound, two romhacks that have managed to reawaken that childlike sense of wonder I've yearned for recently with gaming. There's just something magical about playing Gameboy Advance games on an SP, original or not.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 week ago

    Pokemon Unbound is the best Pokemon game I have ever played. It only sucks because now I'm playing through other ROM hacks like Pokemon Prism, Pokemon Brown, Pokemon Glazed (Unofficial patched) and realizing that they will NEVER be as good as Unbound was. That is the only downside to Pokemon Unbound! :-P

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  • [–] 17 points 1 week ago (3 children)

    Link please to theese cheap machines 😅

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  • [–] 14 points 1 week ago

    Aliexpress if you want a good deal, and Amazon if you want fast shipping and easy returns. There are a lot of devices. Solid ones come from companies like Anbernic, Miyoo, Powkiddy, TrimUI, Retroid, Ayn. There's some bad products from some of those companies too so good idea to do some research. Youtube channels that cover their products include Retro Game Corps and Techdweeb.

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  • [–] 12 points 1 week ago (2 children)

    Some people prefer retro gaming on the original hardware.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)

    But half of the appeal of the hacked psps is that it is an emulation machine. These folks aren't so stoked on just psp games.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 week ago (1 child)

    Are there new handhelds in that form factor ? I love my steam deck but the PSPs were quite a bit more compact. Also, having tried both (PSP and vita) for a while, they felt like they had amazing build quality but idk if that's true. I definitely liked using them both anyway which is probably why people are keeping it alive.

    I guess my main problem with them was that they were really expensive, in parts due to their gimmicky tech imo (UMD/back touch surface)

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  • [–] 4 points 1 week ago

    Are there new handhelds in that form factor ?

    Like every other week.

    Well, not really, but there's a constant stream of new consoles from Retroid, Anbernic, AYN, Ayaneo, Miyoo... and a dozen other brands, and it's kinda an in-joke.

    Some are in a PSP-like form factor, Vita too, even PSP Go, some are like a GBA/GBA SP, Game Boy, DS/3DS... and some come in unusual form factors. Some are cheap in components and build, others are really powerful and well made (what is reflected in the price difference). All options/preferences are covered, I think.

    Just have a quick look here (no need to watch the videos, just skim through the thumbnails to see what's going on):

    https://inv.nadeko.net/channel/UCoZQiN0o7f36H7PaW4fVhFw

    You'll find a few interesting PSP-like ones in the second and third page, but going further maybe the models are "too old" or discontinued.

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