Recently I had an interview with games developer Vince Valenti of JVgames. Vince's company is the creator of the Towers saga an rpg adventure game which was released on several platforms including the Game Boy Color, Atari Falcon and the Atari Jaguar. Other games they made are James Bond 007: Nightfire and Backtrack both for the Gameboy Advance.
Currently they are working on a new game for the Playstation Portable. PSPImages was very curious about this and got an exclusive interview.
pspimages: Hello Vince Valenti thanks for taking the time to answer my questions!
pspimages: Since June 23, 2005 your company has obtained the status of Official PSP Developer, what made you decide to create games for this system?
V. Valenti: We are under contract to do a PSP game. We are in beta/final and will be finished very soon, I hope. :)
pspimages: Can you tell us anything about the game which is in development? Will it be in the line of the Towers series?
V. Valenti: I can't talk about it yet, but by E3, I know it will be announced. I can tell you as soon as I am allowed.
pspimages: While traditional games are made in the 4x3 format the PSP allows 16x9 graphics, what do you think of this widescreen?
V. Valenti: I really enjoy the widescreen. The game we are currently making has a wide format, and having the widescreen to accommodate it has been very helpful.
pspimages: While UMD VIDEO sales are low at the moment games are doing quite well, do you think it will be as big as Nintendo's DS?
V. Valenti: I have always felt that UMD VIDEO would be a difficult sale. It is hard to convince people who have already bought the DVD to pony up more money to buy the same video for the PSP.
Game sales though, I see the PSP as a far stronger system than the DS. The DS is attracting a younger audience here in the US. The PSP allows more flexibility with game creation. For instance, for the game we are making, we are using "pre-rendered" video as a backdrop with 3D elements in the foreground. Something you could not do with a good frame rate on the DS.
pspimages: You have made some games for Nintendo's Gameboy console like James Bond 007: Nightfire and Backtrack, is programming for the PSP much more challenging?
V. Valenti: In some ways. The GBA was challenging because we had to fit a lot of things in a small space, and work with a slow processor. The PSP has much more power, and the challenge becomes trying to create all the detail you can fit into the system.
Some challenges on the PSP system were elegantly merging Video with 3D, and including a robust wireless communications system.
pspimages: When will the first title for PSP be released?
V. Valenti: I don't know quite when. This year sometime. :)
pspimages: Are there plans for more titles?
V. Valenti: Yes, we have many plans.
pspimages: Thanks for this interview!
V. Valenti: Sure.
Atri Nightingale is the owner of a popular website containing news about Sony's Playstation Portable. You can find his site at http://www.pspimages.net
