Sony PSP US Edition Impressions

The official North American release date for the Sony PSP may be March 24, but we managed to get our hands on a US Sony PSP a week early. We looked at the Spider-Man 2 movie and sampler universal media disc, tested out how the region locking worked for movies and games, and we also checked out the new networking features enabled in the US version.

Here's the deal on the US launch in case you've been hiding under a rock for the past two months: The Sony PSP will be available in a $249 Value Pack when it hits store shelves next week. The Value Pack will include the PSP, battery pack, charger, carrying case, wrist strap, headphones with wired remote, 32MB Memory Stick Duo, cleaning cloth, and a UMD sampler disc, which contains movie clips, music videos, and sample game footage. You won't be able to buy the PSP without the bundled accessories at launch, but we wouldn't be surprised if Sony released a basic pack at a future date.

The first million Value Pack units shipped in the US will also include a full-length Spider-Man 2 movie UMD. Our retail box had a sticker that stated our "limited edition package" included the Spider-Man 2 movie and a "game/music/movie video sampler disc." We found both UMDs in the box in small cardboard sleeves. It was disappointing not to get full plastic cases for the discs, but, as with other hardware products, bundled software most often comes in no-frills packaging.

The sampler disc includes new movie trailers for: Stealth, XXX: State of the Union, The Longest Yard, Lords of Dogtown, Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo, King Fu Hustle, and Are We There Yet? Unfortunately, the game demos only consist of nonplayable gameplay videos. The disc includes demo clips for: Wipeout Pure, Ape Escape, World Soccer Tour, NBA, Twisted Metal: Head-On, Gretzky NHL, Hot Shots Golf Fore!, ATV Offroad Fury: Blazin' Trails, Lumines, Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade, and Ridge Racer.

We were particularly interested in the Spider-Man 2 movie because we wanted to see how the region encoding worked between our Japanese and US PSP units. Sony had stated in the past that games would not be region locked, but other media, such as movies and music, would be. It appears that Sony was true to its word--we were able to play Japanese PSP games on our US unit and vice versa; we weren't able to play the Region 1-encoded Spider-Man 2 UMD on our Region 2 Japanese PSP. The region-free gaming also applied to multiplayer game modes. We were able to set up and play a multiplayer game between a Japanese and US unit without a problem.

Sony launched the PSP in Japan last December without the "infrastructure" wireless networking enabled for games. All PSPs can connect to each other wirelessly in a local, "ad hoc" network, but the infrastructure mode is the wireless mode that allows the PSP to connect to the Internet through a wireless router connection. Both the Japanese and US units have the wireless networking hardware and software, but the online capable games won't be ready until the official US launch.

We were able to configure our network settings and immediately log onto our internal wireless network. The network-configuration options are fairly robust. Anyone who has configured a PC with a wireless card will recognize all of the available options. The unit also offers an "easy" configuration mode that allows the PSP to automatically detect and connect to an open wireless network. Our CNET office building offers free wireless connectivity, but as with most public hot spots, you first have to click through a terms and conditions HTML page before getting Internet access. Using the PSP, we were able to reach the page and click on the "I agree" button.

We were able to get onto the Web, but it appears that Sony doesn't yet have its servers up for online PSP play. We couldn't find any game-matchup servers ready for PSP traffic, but we were able to reach a "coming soon" splash page when we tried accessing the downloads area for Wipeout Pure. Overall, the PSP's online capabilities look very promising, and we can't wait to see how the service fills out as we get closer to launch day.

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