Topic: PSP Load Times Analysis

[iPPi]

http://www.gamespot.com/features/6159832/index.html?tag=topslot;action;3&om_act=convert&click=topslot

One of the biggest problems with the PSP is loading.  This is an analysis of from starting the PSP up to getting into the game.

[Cobra951]

Yeah, it's too bad that games can't be played from something like a memory card, to speed up load times considerably.   

[scottws]

Damn.  The fastest loading game takes almost a minute to load?  That's crazy. I'm glad I didn't buy into that pile of crap.

[Cobra951]

I detect a negative theme in the comments to the article, though.  There are several people saying that it takes nowhere near that long, on the quality titles at least.  The test method is being brought into question.  Personally, I don't recall having to wait a minute or more for anything (from a game UMD).  When you first turn on a game, you get initial boot time, deliberately delayed splash screens, logos, disclaimers, menus, etc.  People don't consider most of that part of load times.  Not having sat down with a timer myself, I can't question the validity of the results.  My reaction is purely subjective.

[Pugnate]

Damn.  The fastest loading game takes almost a minute to load?  That's crazy. I'm glad I didn't buy into that pile of crap.

That is crap.

[iPPi]

Yea the test method isn't exactly accurate.

The average load time for a level is usually 5-20 seconds depending on the game. 

[scottws]

They weren't testing load times between levels.  They were testing from the moment you turn on the PSP to the moment you can begin playing a game.  It says so right in the link.

[iPPi]

And that's why it isn't a good testing methodology.

Most people don't shut down their PSPs on a regular basis.  People sleep theres all the time, so the standard splash startup is nonexistent.  Also, you can sleep in-game as well, which makes the launching of the game only relevant if you are swapping games.

[Cobra951]

But even ignoring that, I have a problem with these tests.  More games are tacking on multiple splash screens up front, as in movies.  Those splash screens often can't be bypassed or sped up.  It's unfair to blame the system for the self-serving decisions of the software distributors.  Dead time showing me a Universal flying logo (or whatever) can't be called "load time".  Sorry.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah, it isn't *that* bad, though it can be a little slow.  But with homebrew apps it's generally lightning fast.  Loading Doom PSP takes no time at all for the frontend (you just have to wait for the PSP's splash screen), and then loading the game itself is like 5 seconds.  SNES stuff is nearly instantaneous.  Obviously those aren't quite the best examples being that they aren't full PSP games, but my point stands.  It can load things pretty quickly even from the memstick, and I think some of the longer load times are because the games aren't properly optimized, not so much because the PSP can't load them more quickly.

[Cobra951]

There are no seek times on memory cards.  I would expect load times from them to be faster.  I'm sure that reading from the mechanical device can't compete with the solid-state storage.  But doing a blind stopwatch thing from system power-up to game start is meaningless, or worse, because it paints an overly grim picture.