SCEA’s Eric Lempel on the PlayStation Store PC plans for the PSP

Eric Lempel, PlayStation Network Operations Director for Sony Computer Entertainment America, was recently interviewed by the MTV Multiplayer blog about the future of the PC-based PlayStation Store in relation to the PlayStation Portable.

Lempel said that the main reason for putting up the PlayStation Store is to deliver releases that are not necessarily in UMD form which includes games from small independent companies. More details after the jump!

Eric Lempel, PlayStation Network Operations Director for Sony Computer Entertainment America, was recently interviewed by the MTV Multiplayer blog about the future of the PC-based PlayStation Store in relation to the PlayStation Portable.

Lempel said that the main reason for putting up the PlayStation Store is to deliver releases that are not necessarily in UMD form which includes games from small independent companies. He further explained:

WeÂ’ve got a lot of interest from the developer community and our internal teams about doing games for the PSP that wouldnÂ’t be available on UMD so thatÂ’s one of the main reasons why we did it.

The other piece of it is to get those PSOne classic titles to PSP owners that donÂ’t have a PS3 at this time. Clearly we donÂ’t want to ignore the giant base of PSP owners.

Speaking of releases, it was revealed during the course of the interview that the original UMD versions of SOCOM: Fireteam Bravo and Twisted Metal: Head-On will be available to gamers before the year ends. Pricing, however, is yet to be determined.

Aside from the already mentioned, Eric Lempel assured PSP owners in North America that they will soon be getting Beats which was first released in Europe a few weeks ago. Quite interestingly, the director shared that they have plans to modify existing PSN games to make them compatible with the Sony PSP:

But what a lot of those developers are asking about are ways to modify the titles, go back and do some work to get them available on the PSP. Like you said, I think Everyday Shooter and flOw would be great on the PSP. ThatÂ’s something weÂ’re looking at.

Eric Lempel also added that their team in Tokyo is currently looking at ways to make the PlayStation Store compatible with Mac users as well. The feature is not yet available, the director explained, due to the PlayStation Network downloader application.

That’s pretty much it for the meatiest part of the interview. For those who want to see the full version of the discussion, you can refer to our “Via” link below.

QJ.NET would like to thank Databoy2k for the heads up!

Via MTV Multiplayer