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By Nelson Schneider - 05/24/11 at 07:49 PM CT
Sony has just announced a new ‘Remaster’ series of PlayStation Portable titles that will be ported to PS3 Blu-Ray with upgraded visuals and controls, while retaining cross-platform save data with their portable origins. Considering Sony’s difficulties in doing anything right this-gen, I am surprised by this incredibly sensible move: It’s time for portable exclusivity to die.
Handheld gaming originated with Nintendo (as so many things do) in their Game & Watch platform. These early handheld titles were pointless little timewasters with incredibly simple gameplay and no goal more complex than achieving a high score. With the advent of the smartphone, handheld gaming has come full-circle, with cheap (typically free or 99¢) little timewasters bringing in players by the droves and providing big profits for developers and publishers alike.
Yet somewhere in the middle of the story, things went awry. As Nintendo continued to push handhelds, they and their third-party supporters weren’t content to put fluff titles like “Tetris” on the hardware, so more and more real games began to find themselves trapped on tiny screens: platformers, racers, fighters, and even long-form RPGs. None of these games really fit the medium, lacking pick-up-and-play, jump-in-jump-out accessibility. No, these were real games that required a real time commitment… something that’s out of the question when the platform has a 2” screen and a 2-hour battery life.
Nintendo remedied the situation, however, by releasing the brilliant “Super Game Boy,” an adapter that allowed gamers to play Game Boy titles on their SNESes; no Game Boy required. This was a brilliant device, as was its successor, the Game Boy Player, that allowed gamers to play all Game Boy and Game Boy Advance titles via Gamecube (again, no handheld required). While I did play a few of my handheld games on long, boring car rides, I played most of them in the comfort of my home, on a big screen with a controller in my hand. This system of cross compatibility between handhelds and consoles maximized the opportunities to enjoy these not-so-portable portable games, with some titles (like the original “Pokemon” games) being specifically engineered for play on the console adapter.
Sadly, up until Sony’s announcement of the Remaster series, this generation has gone down the wrong path. Nintendo hasn’t made a peep about a DS player (nor do I foresee a 3DS player), largely due to the gimmicks crammed into those consoles that would make it difficult/impossible to emulate on a big screen. Sony’s PSP does allow playing on a TV via its AV out port, but this is a cumbersome solution that relies on finding a VERY long composite cable. These two platforms have had their libraries locked-away, trapped in tiny cages that never were a good fit for 40+ hour RPGs or lots of hectic action.
There is not, nor has there ever been, any good reason for good games to be handheld exclusive. If handheld hardware can run it, a full-size console can too – with ease! Every company that makes a handheld and a console should ensure that there is an easy way to play handheld games at home on a big screen… even gaming neophyte Apple does this via AirPlay! This concept is as simple as third-parties publishing games on multiple platforms: the more people who have the opportunity to buy your game, the better. Hopefully Sony finds success with the Remaster series… and hopefully they Remaster titles that actually deserve it.
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