I gotta be honest, the PSP has a serious lack of good games. HOWEVER, the ones it does have are pretty sweet. Here’s a few:

Dissidia final Fantasy

Remember how I keep saying I hate SquareEnix? Well, they keep giving me shit, then throwing me a bone. This was one hell of a bone. Dissidia isn’t out in America, yet. I’ve been playing it on my custom firmware PSP in Japanese. It took me a while to be able to navigate the menus, but now that I can…

Oh damn am I glad. This is a fighting game with characters from Final Fantasy 1-11. Each game has two characters from each game, a hero and a villain. The battles in Dissidia are NOTHING like previous Final Fantasy games. You take control of your favorite hero/villian and go to town. Jumping, dodging, attacking, magic, summons, you name it, it’s in there. The system for dealing damage is a little interesting and takes a little getting used to, but once you’ve got it down you’ll be a pro in no time. If you ever wanted to beat the ever loving shit out of Sephiroth or Cloud, this game is for you.  What’s even better, is it’s fun, and has AWESOME multiplayer. Get this game when it comes out later this year. Or, get it now if you have custom firmware.
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It’s fairly common knowledge that Gamestop loves to squeeze every last dime they can out of their customers. However, in many places of the world, being bombarded by the constant steam of “DID YOU BRING US ANY TRADE-INS TODAY!?” is far more tolerable than the 400 pounds of 55-year-old Hispanic woman wearing a tube top that is so common a sight at Wal-Mart, that most of us just grit our teeth and politely say, “No, no trade-ins today…”

It is also a well documented fact that Gamestop offers absurdly low prices to buy games from you. Want to trade that $60 game you just bought and beat in a week (I’m looking at you Mirror’s Edge)? Gamestop throws maybe, MAYBE 20 bucks your way. In store credit nonetheless. That’s less than half of what you actually paid for it. Then, they stick it on their shelves with a “Used” sticker for $54.99, damn near full retail. You my friend, just got fucked.
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I’ve had a PC in some sort or another my entire life. I’ve played games on it since I was able to press a button. I thought I would give you a lowdown on what I’ve found to be some of the most amazing, fun and best times I’ve had with my custom made systems, and here they are.

First up: Theme Hospital

This game is hilarious. This game is fun, and this is coming from someone who has never really likes simulation/tycoon games like Theme Hospital… But for some reason, this game opened up to me. You’ve got to build a hospital and treat patients with weird diseases like “The Uncommon Cold” and “Slack Tongue”. Just seeing the people with bizarre conditions walk in is worth your money, but then when you cure them(Or fail to), some of them can be quite entertaining as well. This game is for anyone with a decent sense of humor. 100% awesome, get this game.
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You know that addictive as sin medival warfare/life simulator released by that indie group founded by a husband and wife team? It just got better. They’ve announced a new expansion.The main focus of it is going to be not a campaign, but multiplayer battles.

Yes children, you read right. Multiplayer battles in Mount & Blade. The main thing everyone has ever wanted, to joust with their friends and couch a spear right into <insert friends username>’s crowned jewels will be available as soon as summer, as late as autumn.

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What’s that? More RPGs? Alright, alright… I’ve got more RPGs for yah. Sit back, relax and prepare for some good ones!

Etrian Odyssey 1 & 2

I’m not gonna lie to you. If you want a challenge, if you want a serious RPG, then this is the game for you. There aren’t flashy graphics, there are only stats, items, monsters and a very cool map-making system. You and your party of adventurers goes down into a dungeon few go into to find the treasure. You can pick classes, have as many members as you want. but can only carry a few around. The monsters get viciously difficult to kill very quickly. The battle system is your standard turns based on speed/surprise factor. Lots of fun, but I’m warning you now: Almost as addictive as an MMO(but so much cheaper!). I thoroughly enjoyed them, even if the god damn F.O.E.s obliterated me for days.
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The magic of beat/rhythm/music games is strong. Nothing makes you feel good like playing your favorite song, rocking out and getting the highest score you can. Well, not everyone knows what good music games there are out there, so here’s something that might point you in the right direction. Get ready to boogie!

Elite Beat Agents/Ouendan

If you haven’t heard of EBA, you probably need to come out of your cave. This game is totally amazing. The song selection is a bit… Odd, yes, but solid. Every second of this game is hilarious. The EBA go around the world and cheer on people who are in tough situations. How this would help someone steal back plans for their business or help a cat save a baby from a construction zone is beyond me, but I won’t complain. The game gives you numbered circles, and you have to tap them in sequence and rhythm with the playing song. Easy, right? For a while, sure, but you’ll be crying when you fail at the last stretch of “Without a Fight”. This game is on the DS only, has an American version(EBA) and two Japanese versions with different characters, scenarios, music, but that same awesome gameplay. There’s even a custom song game with gameplay very much like it on the PC called “Osu!”, but unless you have a touch screen PC you’re gonna be mousin’ it.
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It is 2006. Several years of inconsistent announcements, numerous delays and a growing association with Duke Nukem Forever indicates that an actual release of Team Fortress 2 is extremely unlikely. Then from out of the blue Gabe Newell (managing director of Valve) thrusts a teaser trailer into our faces confirming that TF2 is indeed on its way. Sporting a venturesome art style with what appeared to be innovative game play, the new look TF2 quickly soared to the top of many “most anticipated” lists. Launching in October of 2007, it became an instant favourite among reviewers, achieving a plethora of awards alongside its partner in success The Orange Box.

As an avid PC gamer, the desire for a new class based multiplayer game was immense. I desperately needed to escape the grenade spamming insta-prone aids festivity that was Battlefield 2. To my delight, and many other likeminded gamers, TF2 delivered just that. Besides the attractive stylized graphics and often comical game play, it shipped with a secret weapon, one which would inevitably be the key to TF2’s ongoing success and development.

Steam, the popular content delivery service functions as the core of TF2, supplying speedy updates and flawless content delivery. Gamer profiles and statistic pages are accessible through a simple yet faultless social network. Hell, you can even browse the web in-game using the Steam overlay. It is undoubtable TF2 would not be as popular as it is on PC today, if it was not for Steam. This is clear when we examine the unfortunate situation our console brethren currently face, which I’ll touch on a little later.

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Two years ago, development studio n-Space (Call of Duty DS, Geist) showed the world its developing Wii exclusive horror game, Winter. The title, which can be compared in its style to Silent Hill, was something that stood out over the mountains of shovelware. It was an actual mature Wii title, dealing with mature subject matter and a darker storyline. It also actually LOOKED good, actually using the hardware of the Wii to a standard most developers don’t even bother with. Even though it wasn’t completed, it still looks better than a lot of Wii games (however this isn’t saying all too much).

However, due to lazy marketing teams, Winter was never meant to be. It wasn’t due to the game being poorly developed or that it didn’t have promise, it had an abundance of both. The problem was being brought in the marketing area. The idea of an “adult” game on a “kid” console was too much for them. Eventually, this led to the project being scrapped.

Now, what does this mean for the Wii? Will this just be an isolated case? Or is this just a small example of the overlying problem of the Wii. Publishers don’t want to take a chance anymore. Yes it’s all about money, but it stops quality titles coming out. Will the Wii just always be riddled with shovelware and “kid” titles?

Yes we have our No More Heroes, and we have Mad World. That’s it though. Nothing else. The rest are titles that are akin to “Barbie Horse Adventures”.

Here is to hoping there will be one day that the Wii puts out quality titles. Instead of just shovelware and “Mario Goes To The Corner Store”.

I was never really into the shooter scene until recently. I’ve taken notice to the fair number of them coming out of the last two or three years. Yeah, there are a lot of shooters before now, but it just feels like we’re overwhelmed with them, huh? No worries, I’ll give you the low-down on what to get from now and then.

Duke Nukem 3D

If you’ve ever played a Duke Nukem game, you’d know why I’m recommending it. The games are pretty damn good. You play as the lovable Duke, who returns from fighting aliens to find his lovable planet turned into a not so lovable wasteland. You gotta shoot the aliens up, saves the babes, watch the porn, drink the brews. The game has an amazing sense of humor, quoting movies like Dirty Harry and Duke’s phrases. If anything, pick this one up for the laughs. It’s originally on the PC where it has a ton of expansions, and it was on the PS1, N64 and a few other consoles under different names.
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Apparently, Snack Strong Productions (a thinly-veiled group of people at Frito-Lay) want to scare the pants off of you with a game called Hotel 626.

And from the reactions that the browser-game community (if you can call it that), it seems like the chip makers did a pretty damn good job. I haven’t got too far in myself, with a lot worse things on my plate than horror games, but I can tell there’s a lot of effort put into this, and it’s worth your time.

You can only play the game from 6PM to 6AM, but if you’re really bored, you can fudge it by changing the clock on your computer.

As far as I can tell, there’s no mention of any kind of product placement other than the name of the “developers.” This might be the least-effective viral marketing game ever made.

Something that should be noted is the game’s use of microphone and webcam (which creates one of the most frightening player-photo collages ever made at the end), which doesn’t happen all too often. If you happen to live in the US, you can also give a phone number for extra layers of immersion.

Go on, give it a try. But if you scare yourself to death, I’m taking your doritos.