I picked one up last year after being mostly a console gamer up until the Wii and then *poof* not owning a console again until the Switch, which blew up my love of handhelds. I sold it impulsively because i wasn't focusing on my art more (curse you Subnautica), and then something happened, i missed handheld gaming, a lot. It just felt right, the screen size never bothered me and i never found myself missing giant modern day AAA games.
I'm also a big advocate of handheld technology. But the DS and 3DS just never clicked for me. I love Metroid, Gamecube and the Wii were such fun consoles that for me captured the weirdness and fun of banding together with friends. But the handheld Nintendos never made me feel like I was missing anything or gaining anything else by picking up one. I was always until that point mostly a Playstation kid, they felt different back then compared to Nintendo. I also hated proprietary media like carts (even though Sony had memory cards *cough*)
Growing up with early Playstation consoles were amazing, there was so much choice, so many explosive games that propelled early 3D forward, it was violent, it was weird, it was surreal, it was cinematic. And, as a kid who's parents weren't rich, it introduced me to piracy. At the crux of that era was a future and eventual problem Sony helped usher in. Burning discs. Phwoar! I still remember as a kid my dad took me to some rando's house that was known in town for selling burnt Playstation games and doing modchips, flipping through the book of title names and prices and having read every gaming magazine at news stores while mom was grocery shopping gave me ideas on what was interesting or fun or hot at the time. Or my uncle getting a cease and desist letter for downloading too much.
I still believe Sony in it's PS1 and PS2 years were really rolling with this weird, surreal, the future is now vibe in it's ads and it's designs and it's willingness to host countless different games. It's console and handheld designs scream retro future now as hard as it screamed it then.
I bought a DS briefly and had a gameboy just as briefly and they never clicked. The PSP was too expensive and seemed too luxurious to me, and i was right. Owning one now in 2025 this thing is *m*a*g*i*c*a*l*. It works so effortlessly when modded, it feels so good to use, the modding scene is continuing to breathe life into it. This thing has style, and it's unbelievably small for what it does.
Sure, my phone is more powerful, but nothing beats the simplicity of a device designed purely for the experience of gaming and media like the PSP. They wanted you to feel the WHAMP of the power they brought to you with the orchestral intros or quirky chimes or CD quality DTS cinema experience styled intros of the 90's and early 00's.
It's weird to hold something that feels both as relevant and fresh as it does retro in your hands, and the PSP nails that aesthetic. It feels like Sony back in their purest and most Japanese self, it was about entertainment, sounds, graphics, cinema! Japan in the 90's and early 2000's felt like the future. Friends would come back from Tokyo and be like "that's us in 50 years".
Only the Nintendo Switch has made me feel like that, this feeling of wow! This is the future, this is something truly special. This is something we can never go back from. And the PSP as a Sony fan, from a time now gone, is really such a fun piece of hardware, something I enjoy for what it offers, and a gateway into handheld gaming that reinvigorated my love of gaming in general. I feel like they were close to the future in some way already, but the rest of us weren't. Well that, and the whole expensive proprietary media issue Sony buried themselves alive with.
It also is from a time where they still made games just for handheld devices, and the PSP felt like a closer bridge between these worlds, but still in it's own lane. It feels like a portable Playstation. And that feeling is everything. I'm grateful to have found a device that i enjoy, one I think i'll keep this time for good, something I can come back to and still find joy in it's quirks and offerings. Still be able to marvel at the engineering it took to make something this small this powerful.
It's a shame that we live in a speculative alternate-post-covid-reality, in which feeling has some arbitrary hyped up value attached to it now, full of "collectors" or "resellers", instead of being available to enjoy, share and maybe pass on to someone else willing to experience that as well. For me, i'm happy i've landed and to enjoy the time on the sofa or the tram or at the airport with this little thing tucked away to keep me entertained, and oddly inspired.
