PSP Hackers Go Retro

ByteWoopy writes "Hello World!' That's the traditional phrase that programmers display when they create their first piece of software for an unfamiliar operating system. Owners of Sony's handheld PSP game system were delighted to hear May 5 that a hacker had managed to write a small program that displayed those words on a PSP. They wondered what would be next. As it turned out, it only took hackers five days to go from 'Hello World' to Mario World. On May 10, sites like PSP Hacker reported that a Japanese hacker known only by the name Mr. Mirakichi had developed a program called RIN that let the PSP play software written for the original black-and-white Nintendo Game Boy system.'"

Comments

Getting started

[Anonymous Coward]

The PS2DEV forums is currently the best resource to get started hacking your PSP with 1.0 firmware. There's even the beginnings of a PSP GCC toolchain: http://www.oopo.net/consoledev/files/psptoolchain- 20050603.tgz.

Re:But can everyone benefit from this?

[alvinrod]

If it's anything like the Xbox, you'll more than likely need a certain model or firmware version in order for any mods or hacks to work properly. Early versions of the Xbox were fairly easy to mod, but Microsoft changed a few things in later versions that made it harder or less desirable to do.

I'm sure someone will eventually figure out how to hack the newer firmwares so you can play Gameboy ROMs as well. But no, not everyone benefits from this, especially Nintendo.

Anyone else annoyed...

[Tickenest]

by the fact that the author writes "from Hello World to Mario World" when the Game Boy version was called "Super Mario Land" (note: I'm fine with leaving out the "Super", but changing "Land" to "World" just to get a cute line is cause for making a declaration of shennanigans.) Still, the ingenuity of those who manage to hack the PSP and similar systems never ceases to amaze.

Re:But can everyone benefit from this?

[pthor1231]

Yeah, it is limited to a certain version of firmware, 1.0 as indicated in TFA. But this doesn't stop you from hacking. I have a friend who has downgraded his 1.5 firmware version to 1.0, and now can run all that fancy hacking schtuff.

Re:Why is this being posted now?

[TheRealJFM]

the early "hacks" were really just finding clever ways to use the web browser built into wipeout. they weren't actually running any proper code on the PSP itself, and you had to stay near a proper PC or laptop to use them

these hacks are *actualy pieces of code* being run *directly on the firmwire*...

i'll be really impressed when I see linux boot, but i'm waiting for linux on a DS far more

(before anyone says "why the hell.." - the DS is a dual processor, touch screen system - it would make a great cut price PDA)

Here's the current list...

[wheresdrew]

...of emulators that'll run on a J1.0 PSP:

Gameboy/Gameboy Colour - Rin, Rin Unnoficial
GameGear - SMS PSP
Genesis (Megadrive) - Megadrive for PSP, Generator/PSP
MAME (Arcade) - XMame PSP
Master System - SMS PSP
MSX - fMSX, Hitbit
Neo Geo Pocket - NGPSP
Neo Geo CD - NEOGEO CD
Nes - InfoNes, Famicontest, Nes for PSP, Nesterj PSP
PC Engine - PCEP
Snes - UO Snes9x PSP, Snes9x PSP, Snes9x Optimised
Wonderswan - Oswan PSP

They're not all running at full speed, but some of them are great pieces of work. Rin, for instance, is damned near perfect (and getting better with each release). I use it to play the Zelda GBC games and they look (and sound, and play) great.

The work on them is continuing at a rapid pace - a lot of the emulators are getting updated several times a week - and they're just going to get better.

The one I'm waiting for (that hasn't shown up yet) is a GBA emulator. I think that's the one that's really going to get people's attention.