The Lone Gamer

I’ll just throw this one into the air. Pure speculation on my part.

Sega will announce Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown for Sony’s Next Generation Portable.

Sega is a third party dev for the system, and NGP needs solid fighters to make up the lineup of games, like how the 3DS already has SSFIV, DOA and Blazblue off the bat. One of the titles in the NGP’s lineup of launch titles is something called ‘Reality Fighters’, but that’s certainly not to the level of any big fighting game.

One more guess. Namco-Bandai will port a Tekken title on the Next Gen Portable as well. I’d be happy with an arcade-or-console-perfect port of Tekken 6, but perhaps going further maybe it’ll be a port of the upcoming Tekken Tag Tournament 2. Or maybe even Tekken X Streetfighter. Either it’ll be an actual version specific to the NGP, or the PS3 titles will be compatible on the portable system.

These are just guesses/wishes/hopes on my part. I just really, really, really want a home verson of VF5FS already. And my Tekken fix as well. If these do happen, remember, you read about them first HERE.

Moving on…

NGP?? Neo Geo Pocket? Ninja Gaiden Perfect? Not Gonna Pan (Out)?

Right at this very moment, Sony is holding it’s Playstation 2011 Meeting in Tokyo, and presenting to the world it’s new portable gaming device- referred to right now simply as the Next Generation Portable (and not the PSP2, as many have been calling it). Well, it still certainly looks like the PSP, or at least, the PSP Go. But the similarities are only skin-deep, as supposedly this new portable is as powerful as a PS3. WHAAAT? When I read that, my mind began running images of an pixel-and-framerate-perfect, feature-complete Tekken 6, in my hands, on a taxi, coming home from work. Is that possible?

Anyway, this new toy comes with rear panel touch controls, rear cameras, gyroscope/accelerometer, dual analog sticks, a 5-inch OLED screen, built-in 3G and more. The NGP’s community will congregate through the game’s new interface/portal, called LiveArea, where you will be able to chat with friends live. Sony franchise games such as Uncharted, Resistance, Killzone and Little Big Planet are confirmed to be coming to the NGP. It’s not known yet if these titles will be PS3 ports, or all-new versions of these games. It’s also known that digital downloads of existing PSP games will also be compatible with the NGP- backwards compatibility ROCKS!

What about third-party games? The list of supporting third parties for NGP includes Q Entertainment, Ubi Soft, Rockstar Games, Activision, Capcom, Konami, Namco-Bandai, Sega, Square Enix, Level 5 and so on. At this point anything can happen, but at the very least, the event had Hideo Kojima show off a cutscene from Metal Gear Solid 4 playing on the NGP. MGS Next on the NGP? Who knows. We should be finding out more soon as the new device is set for release in Japan by the 2011 Holidays. Looks like Sony’s set to take on the 3DS head-on.

Check out images and spec info for the NGP/PSP2 over at Engadget.