14 DAY TRIAL // The PlayStation Portable is a pretty successful handheld console, as Sony desperately tried to promote it to people around the world by any means necessary. While it didn't register big sales in other territories, the console is engaged in a very tough battle with the Nintendo DS in their native Japan, both being pretty successful in terms of sales and gathering quite a lot of fans.
While most of its users choose to behave according to the terms of use set by Sony in regard to the PSP, some of them prefer to install custom firmware that allows their devices to run various applications of the legal and not-so-legal kind, including running pirated games. Such a modification is possible by using a special battery that makes the device run in service mode, and thus be able to be modified in a multitude of ways.
With the recent PSP-3000, Sony tried to prevent any and all modders from hacking into the console, but it seems that those plans failed after a short amount of time. Now, it looks like the company has taken legal action against a PSP battery maker, Datel, which produced the Lite Blue Tool, a special battery that enabled anyone with some knowledge of firmware coding to implement changes in Sony's official program and thus allow the device to run any program.
This was revealed by Datel, which issued a statement to all of its customers who pre-ordered the product, saying that due to Sony's legal action it was forced to pull the tool out from the market. It also mentioned that when and if the situation was resolved, the product might be available once again for purchase, but, considering the top lawyer team Sony has rounded up, such a situation is very unlikely.
“Due to legal action by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe we are currently not able to fulfill orders for the Lite Blue Tool Battery. Any orders received for this product have not been processed and no charges have been made. We will inform customers about availability of this product when this situation has been resolved.”
It seems that Sony is bent on reducing piracy on the PSP by any means necessary, even if it involves going against battery makers that help, indirectly of course, the piracy and homebrew movement on the Japanese handheld. Let's hope that measures such as this won't be taken in the near future and that every PSP user will be a legal one.