Sony to offer UMD solution for PSPgo

It’s the obvious question to ask – if I upgrade to a PSPgo how am I going to play my old UMD games? Now Sony is saying that it’s putting together some sort of answer, and one that might be free too.

We’re in the midst of putting together a good will program,” SCEA’s hardware marketing boss John Koller told Gizmodo.

We’ll be unveiling that soon. We actually think there’s a significant group that will be upgrading from the 1000. In the past, we’ve seen a 20-25 per cent trade-up factor, and I assume that’s going to be the case here.

So we’re looking at a good-will program – a short term good-will program that would continue for years afterward.”

There are still plenty of questions to be asked, however. Will the solution be free, for instance? Being a ‘good will’ program tends to suggest it will be, or that at the least the costs will be minimal.

But how will consumers prove their ownership of any given UMD title? Will the solution be an integrated part of the PSN store? Or will a hardware PC attachment be used for a more direct data transfer? And what proportion of PSP’s UMD library will be included in the scheme?