Sony’s New Handheld Game System

Before we start calling it the PSP2, Sony doesn't have an official name for it - yet. In the meantime, they're calling it the Next Generation Portable (NGP). Call it what you will, it's gonna rock!There have been rumors about what it will or won't have. Here's the official release on 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)

Rear touch pad: 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 stick, Left stick, 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）

Admittedly, I'm not even sure what most of that means. The huge touch screen is nice and the 'touch sensitive back panel should be interesting. I was a little thrown back by the 3G connectivity at first, but could come in handy if you want to go online and don't have wi-fi handy. The two cameras, front and rear, will probably make it skypable, facetimeable and any other reason you may want your face in the games you play. Hopefully the look of shock when you cap someone with a sniper rifle would be worth it enough for me.

Backwards compatible with PSP downloads, but no UMD drive means you need to chuck your old disks. No doubt it'll be compatible with your current PSN so unless you've already used up your alotted 5 downloads per purchase you should easily be able to port them over to this new NGP.

It's slated to come out by Christmas of this year in Japan which means we'll probably see it Spring of next year.

via Kotaku