PSOne Classic

20 games on a smaller version of the original PlayStation (so, not the PSOne). £90. December 3rd.

I'll get one, I expect. Mainly in the hope it'll be hackable and I can put all the games on it. :)

At the rate they're releasing these things, the whole "raspberry pi + emulators" smugboy approach is starting to seem like the much cheaper option.

Here's a link to the official blog post.

Today, we are excited to announce that we are bringing back the original PlayStation experience in a new miniaturized version – PlayStation Classic! The console will come pre-loaded with 20 classic titles, including fan-favorites such as Final Fantasy VII, Jumping Flash, Ridge Racer Type 4, Tekken 3, and Wild Arms.

the whole "raspberry pi + emulators" smugboy approach is starting to seem like the much cheaper option

For everything up to the PS1 era, maybe N64, sure - but I don't know if the current Pi hardware could tackle PS2 games. There's still a lot to be said for the plug-and-play ease of these dedicated boxes, and they're much stronger nostalgia draws than a little credit card circuit board.

Let's be honest - how many people are going to buy this and finish Final Fantasy VII again? I'm pretty sure the main target audience for these things aren't the people who actually want to play the games for any length of time (those people have already bought all the re-releases of these games on PSP, Vita, PS3 and/or PS4, or already emulate them), it's people who go, "Oh, I remember having good times at Uni with Tekken 3, I'd love to play that again", boot it up three times and then put it in a box.

Or am I a cynic..?

Looks like it comes with the original controllers rather than DualShock ones, which will limit things slightly

Cost, innit. DS controllers need more materials, cost more to make, would increase the price.

Plug and play is attractive. I wouldn't have bought one of those awful Sensible Soccer Mega Drive things if it wasn't. :)

There are probably just about 20 PS1 games that haven’t aged horrifically, so it will depend on the line-up really. I don’t know how likely some of them are. Vagrant Story, Bishi Bashi Special and Symphony of the Night might be enough to tip me over the edge.

Slightly undermined by the fact that these have been perfectly playable on every generation of PlayStation apart from the PS4, though. The key draw would have to be the chance to get full speed NTSC versions of all these games. If they load it up with PAL versions they can fuck right off.

I hope they don't. 50hz would be a killer.

I have to hold off pre-ordering, since I had card fraud last weekend and am waiting on a new card - it'll fail if I use my current one. Plus, I don't even know where I'm going to be, so should hold off ordering anything really (not just this).

Metal Gear Solid has to be a dead cert.

It's Konami. Bet it's not. :)

I'd be more interested if it looked like the slim PSone.

the lack of analogue sticks is real bad because it basically means no ape escape

Would love one of these but don't have the money for it for a while (got to buy a bunch of school books for my eldest, which are all different to the ones on eBay due to them changing the marking system for GCSE), interested to know what the remaining 15 games are though. Not fussed on whether it's hackable or not as I already have a PS3 that's running custom firmware.

The other negative is that I bought both the NES and SNES minis and they're in their boxes in a cupboard (they have been played, just not lots).

Apparently, the EU/US and JP versions will have different games. So, that's interesting.

Was Densha De GO ever on PSOne?

EDIT: HOLY SHIT, IT WAS.

People everywhere are making lists of what they want to see on it, problem is alot of them have some oddities, cult hits or highly sought after collectables on them and I personally can't see Sony doing anything but sticking with really games that were really popular (although Wild Arms and Jumping Flash fit in as oddities/cult hits I suppose, but they were published by Sony). Although (and as much as I love the game) it's a surprise to see Ridge 4 on there and not Ridge Racer. Gran Turismo and Wipeout would be obvious choices could have some serious licensing issues for their soundtracks. Spyro is getting a remake but Crash Bandicoot is likely. Tomb Raider is an icon of the era as is the first Resident Evil. But this is going to require alot of work from Sony as there was such a huge amount of really popular releases from pretty much every third party and the only confirmed publishers involved outside of Sony are Namco and Squaresoft

Tomb Raider is an icon of the era

How likely are they to go for multi-platform stuff? Although it's associated with PlayStation, Tomb Raider was released on the Saturn first. I can see them wanting to stick with exclusives - it might make negotiations with third-parties easier, and also looks better from a "remember how much better PlayStation was" point.

I think not announcing the full line-up immediately was a mistake. Now, all they've done is encourage speculation and wild enthusiasm for things that'll never happen, meaning the final range of 20 is likely to be disappointing to a lot of people. Mainly those who like to complain about everything.

GT would be a good shout, except there's already a racing game on there (RRT4). I'm not shocked RR isn't on there, given Type 4 is definitely the better game (though I'd have to say it's close between that and Revolution). WipEout would be ace, but that licensing would stop it dead considering this is clearly a cheap and cheerful release for Sony (hence no DS controllers). Tomb Raider would be an excellent shout, the original is still brilliant… and wasn't it PS exclusive initially? I know there was a Saturn version, because I had it, but I swear that was later…

Crash can get to fuck, but it'll probably be on there. RE would be brilliant, RE2 even better… but really unlikely given the re-release. Regardless though, it's going to be stuff that sold well, not the stuff people necessarily want. Oh well.

EDIT: aniki's corrected me on Tomb Raider already. :D

Yeah I'm aware Tomb Raider was on Saturn first (and there's a view it's the better version, I was never a fan tbh) but it really was iconic on the PlayStation. I'm chuffed R4 is on there though, absolutely loved that game. Parappa is another I suspect will be on there (although Um Jammy Lammy was better). Marts argument regarding racing games is valid but so many of the consoles key titles were racing games (Gran Turismo, Porsche Challenge, V-Rally, all the Ridge Racers, Wipeout all received Platinum versions). They've gone with the best standard Tekken too (TTT2 is the best of all the Tekkens)

I'm not convinced WipEout is comparable to 'regular' racing games though. If ever there was an option to double up on the genre, it'd be that and RR. Though, they're both arcade racers as opposed to realistic ones… so there's that.

Tekken 3 rules. Hasn't been bested yet by the rest of the series (TTs notwithstanding). I wouldn't mind seeing Parappa, but then it's broken… it never really worked as a rhythm action game anyway, but in the days of modern TVs and lag between audio/video, it's damn near unplayable.*

Shame its core component relied on using your own music CDs, otherwise I'd have said Vib Ribbon was in with a shot of being in the mix for inclusion.

• Thank you for accepting my gross over-exaggeration in true internet gamer comment style.

Vib Ribbon 😍 too much of a niche/cult favourite title too. There's no chance of the European version getting something like Final Fantasy Tactics either I wouldn't think

You never know. The SNES Classic has a couple of games that never got an EU release originally. No reason why the PS1 version couldn’t do the same (I’d like Xenogears for instance).

JRPGs would be nice because they wouldn't suffer for the lack of analogue. Sony made some excellent JRPGs of their own that basically vanished like Legend of Dragoon, something like that would be perfect. Other than that Chrono Cross, or Grandia or Alundra would be good too.

It's going to have MediEvil and Legacy of Kain instead isn't it?

MediEvil's a pretty sure bet - use it as a means of gauging a potential reboot.

Alundra is awesome. Can't remember who published it though… I suspect they might be dead. But the PSOne version is available for Vita on PSN, so who knows?

Legacy of Kain still plays pretty well now. Would love a new game in that world.

Which Legacy of Kain are we talking about though? The original or Soul Reaver? Very different games. Both great though!

I seem to remember reviewing Shadow Man on N64 (or possibly Dreamcast, I can't remember which I reviewed) while someone in our office also reviewed it on PSOne… and we were astounded that the PSOne version was missing huge chunks of the world because the console couldn't handle that much open geometry. Madness.

Sorry, I meant Soul Reaver, not played enough of Blood Omen to comment but really should rectify that.

Blood Omen is very old now. Still playable, but only just.

Shadow Man on PS one sounds like the GBA Doom. The first episode was fine but the second and third were barely there.

Excited by this. Being a Saturn fan I got. A PS1 late (or whenever ff8 came out) as had previously used my bros up to then but he'd virtually moved all his stuff to his girlfriends by then. And didn't have anything other than ff7 and ff8, gtas, pes and then a smattering of football management titles. So doubt I even owned 20 games originally.

The ps2 is one of the few consoles I have sold during its actual life.

Tried to dabble with both in the last few years but seem to be unlucky with none of them now working properly. Especially those crappy ps2 slims. So well up for a new machine.

(TTT2 is the best of all the Tekkens)

I love you, also, correct. (Tekken 7 is really good though too ;))

Full list of games now announced:

Battle Arena Toshinden
Cool Boarders 2
Destruction Derby
Final Fantasy VII
Grand Theft Auto
Intelligent Qube
Jumping Flash!
Metal Gear Solid
Mr. Driller
Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee
Rayman
Resident Evil Director's Cut
Revelations: Persona
Ridge Racer Type 4
Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo
Syphon Filter
Tekken 3
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six
Twisted Metal
Wild Arms

Not even remotely what I'd have chosen as the 20 best games on the PS1, but it'll keep some people happy I'm sure. Problem is they've excluded a lot of stuff that's got recent remakes (Crash and Spyro spring to mind) or new instalments this gen (Tomb Raider and Wipeout) so you end up with a list of games that - a few exceptions aside - aren't really what come to mind when you think of the PS1. A missed opportunity for sure.

Stuff like Wipeout and Tony Hawk would never have made the cut because of music licensing. Remake fodder as noted also hurts it… I'm not sure 'new installments' is a thing though, given Tekken is on there. The original Tomb Raider is easily the best one though, despite being massively janky these days, so it's unlikely they'd put that on there. Unless other issues come into play - CORE Design doesn't exist any more, so maybe that's a problem?

Not even remotely what I'd have chosen as the 20 best games on the PS1

FFVII, GTA, MGS, Resident Evil, Abe's Odyssey and Tekken 3 might not be the best (that's too subjective a criteria, let's be honest), but there's no doubt that they were some of the biggest games on the PlayStation. I don't think anybody really expected Sony to bring this out with a bunch of obscure cult titles that never got the attention they deserved - it was always going to be a nostalgia trip to the glory days, although there are some big omissions from that collection. Tomb Raider does seems like a weird thing to cut.

Unless other issues come into play - CORE Design doesn't exist any more, so maybe that's a problem?

I can't imagine so, unless they're doing something special with the source code that relies on some lost hard drive - this is almost certainly just going to be an emulator with some baked-in ROMs and a user interface.

I suppose there could be some rights issues, but SquEnix own the franchise enough to still be selling the original Tomb Raider on Steam, GoG and PSN (as a PSP/Vita/PS3 download). Maybe they just didn't like the revenue split that comes with being 1/20th of the content.

Not sure what I would want as an ideal list, but as someone who only had like 5-8 games for the ps1, I am looking at that list and weighing up if I want to bin my preorder. FF and GTA I'd be up for replaying but then I still own both.

Actually went ahead and cancelled my preorder. Wouldn't be comfortable trying to get it on the hopes of scalping it straight away. Will keep my eye on how they do, if they sell out it won't trouble me but if they ever have a price drop to £65ish I'd be a lot more interested.

I'm not bothering yet, as I have enough emulated stuff to be going on with. If, at some point, the hackers get it busted open and allow for all manner of games to be put on it as they did with the SNES Mini, then it'll go onto my shopping list. But right now, I really don't need one.

"Oh, I remember having good times at Uni with Tekken 3, I'd love to play that again", boot it up three times and then put it in a box.

Or am I a cynic..?

I've got a pal with the mini NES + mini SNES in his attic after buying one of those preloaded Pi's to play NeoGeo titles. Once. Probably on its way to the attic with the others.

I've got my NES mini (and spare pad) and SNES mini sat in a cupboard in the hall, I've not even modded them (thought about it with both, Digger T Rock for the NES and Rock n Roll Racing for the SNES, but decided to leave them as they were)

I'm not bothering yet, as I have enough emulated stuff to be going on with. If, at some point, the hackers get it busted open and allow for all manner of games to be put on it as they did with the SNES Mini, then it'll go onto my shopping list. But right now, I really don't need one.

Did I see you had ordered the Picade on twitter? Let me know how you get on with that.

Yep, I did. They had a sale (ends today), so I couldn't resist. Not building it until I know where I'm going to be though. And no idea if I'll be able to get the damn thing running to any real standard. But we'll see!

So, apparently, half the games on this thing are the PAL versions. That means 50hz, which is nonsense. And yes, this applies to the US release of the device too (!) which is just crazy.

Someone wake me up when it's been hacked and I can put whatever the hell I want on it.

That’s appalling.