This PlayStation Portal Mod Turns Sony’s Streaming Device Into a Real Gaming Handheld
It's not just an extension of your PS5 anymore.
It’s still not quite the PlayStation handheld we want, but we’re getting warmer.
A pair of Google engineers jailbroke the PlayStation Portal to run PlayStation Portable games natively with the help of an emulator. This mod makes the Portal more of a standalone gaming handheld, rather than just a remote-play streaming device for your PS5.
It’s not exactly the Sony-made handheld gaming device we expected, but until we get a next-gen PlayStation Portable, this thing looks pretty rad.
No Need to Crack it Open
The duo behind the hacked device, Andy Nguyen and Calle Svensson, shared the results on X and showed off the Portal running Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. Nguyen explains that the Portal is natively running PPSSPP, which is an open-source PSP emulator. The process took more than a month of work, but the two Google engineers were able to keep this mod entirely software-based, meaning no need to make any physical changes to the hardware itself.
Before you get too excited, the Portal was designed to be a streaming device for the PS5 so it doesn’t pack the most impressive specs. In a teardown video, you can see that the Portal runs a Qualcomm SG4150P chipset and a 16.6 Whr battery. That means the hacked Portal should also handle emulating consoles older than the PSP, like Dreamcast, Nintendo 64, or PlayStation 1. You shouldn’t expect performance anywhere near a Steam Deck or any of its many competitors, though.
This mod makes the Portal a little more exciting.
The People Want a Vita 2
Nguyen says in the original post’s replies that there’s “no release planned in the near future, and there’s much more work to be done.” Although given the interest, the modder adds that they may release some demo videos showing off the Portal playing PSP titles over the weekend.
Unless you have the technical know-how to jailbreak the Portal yourself or are patient enough to wait for a software release from the two hackers, you’re likely better off with something from Anbernic or Retroid to emulate PSP games. Of course, we’re all still waiting for Sony to finally release a worthy successor to the PlayStation Vita.
