I felt weird/guilty using mine in public, like staring down at a little rectangle was unsocial or bad for you or something…

Turns out, it’s more like digital detox! It would be cool these days.

Ugh, where is it!? I know I still have mine.

Last year I bought a PS Vita and I'd highly recommend that instead if you can find one for cheap! The Vita can natively run PSP games via Adrenaline, and you get the advantage of Vita games and homebrew (and a better screen).

That said, I'm a long time PSP Go lover. It's basically the PSP in a smaller, pocketable form factor. I would absolutely get that if you can get your hands on one.

The Vita also rips (arguably more) ass, as it does everything the PSP does and more, it’s also the easiest console to hack there has ever been. I picked up a Japanese one for like 90 bucks and it’s one of the best all around devices there is.

This inspired me to go dig out my old PSP only to discover that I have no battery… I threw it out when it pillowed years ago and forgot about it. I’ll have to play on Retrodeck for now!

I love my old psp! I still enjoy playing it. I feel like, in a time where things aren't made to last, things that do hold up, really deserve reverence. So even though I've never stopped loving my psp, I gain more respect for it over time.

I still got my original 1001 model from 2005 that still works some how. It was built like a goddamn tank because I abused the absolute shit out of it.

Hacked my Vita somewhat recently and wondered why I hadn’t done so sooner. It was really the easiest thing ever and now I can just download basically everything directly onto the thing, it’s great! It doesn’t actually have everything but most of it and it’s easy enough to get whatever else onto it.

Some thoughts on why i might like a vita but have not:

i like emulating older consoles, but i can do so on my phone. i just have to make sure the phone and the old controller are charged, which can be a small hassle.

i guess that's just one thought. i liked the article!

Designers Republic art detected.

I don't want to be that guy, but I always felt that any PlayStation controls were clunky, and only PS5 controller is comforotable to me. I much prefer Nintendo consoles for this reason, including 3DS, heck I even played Minecraft on 3DS and even though it is objectively the worst version, controls were fine to me. But playing Minecraft on Vita? Just horrible experience.

PSP is such a cool console but had the worst lineup of games.

Touching on the burnout section of the article, it's not quite as cool as the PSP but I've been playing a lot on my Switch 2 as a form of digital detox as well. I put limits on all the addictive apps on my phone, and downright uninstalled most of them, so when I'm itching for dopamine my phone can't give me it's nice to turn to a game console. The switch 2 also doesn't have notifications or egregious game updates. Currently playing through factorio and having a blast just kinda ... ignoring the state of the world.

Yeah I have a psp. It's an impressive little console that's almost like a ps2 on the go. Plus it's very easy to jailbreak. The funniest thing about the psp is the marketing video with one guy singing about wanting a psp for Christmas.

I was looking for a handheld and seriously looked at the PSP. looked at all the mods for it. even found one where you could stick a RP4 compute board inside for the guts.

finally settled on a retroid pocket 5 and honestly couldn't be happier. it does everything I want and then some.

I should really get replacement batteries for my two PSPs.

Man, I gotta check how the battery for my PSP3000 is, and the microSD card on it. The internals work perfectly, those two things are the only ones that seem likely to give out anytime soon. My little buddy is 14yo now. I don't think I ever played any of the 3 UMD games that came with it, I immediately jailbroke it after purchase

It’s not “retro” in the same way a much older console is. It’s closer, more relatable, and maybe more importantly, more usable. It still fits into modern life without needing to be explained.

I think this is something extremely important. Looking at stuff from 20 years ago was much different when the current year was 2006 - we'd be looking at the mid 80s. Computers of the 80s and even the early 90s became obsolete fast, whatever you had in 2006, even if it was 4 years old at the time, felt light years ahead of anything from 1986 and would be internet capable.

Games from the 80s were also comparably "archaic", as the hardware limitations were much more significant and several then current games could never happen in that old hardware (NES, C64, ZX Spectrum, Amiga 500), and that's ignoring graphical complexity. Meanwhile, a number of current day games could exist in 2006, so long as the graphics were appropriately scaled down (Total War games being a perfect example).