The first PlayStation emulator for Android devices has been pulled from the Android Market due to intellectual property issues. The psx4droid emulator has been helping bored Android users get their nostalgic gaming fix since last summer. But today the developer Tweeted that Google removed the app from the Market.

In case you’re wondering though, it’s possible that the alleged content violation likely has nothing to do with the fact that the emulator allows you to run PlayStation games. The FPSe emulator is still available for download from the Android Market. Some folks are suggesting the difference is that psx4droid is based on source from another PlayStation emulator called PCSX, but doesn’t comply with the GPL license used by that software.

If you already installed psx4droid you should be able to continue using it, and there’s nothing preventing the developer from continuing to distribute the app outside the Android Market. But psx4droid developer zodttd says he’s rather find a way to return the app to the Market than to distribute it through a different app store, because he want to make sure that customers who have already purchased the app can easily upgrade to new versions of the emulator.

Update: Android Police has another theory. Apparently Sony has a trademark on the term “PSX,” so it’s possible that zodttd could get the app back into the market with a name change. Meanwhile Engadget notes that Sony’s Xperia Play phone with support for PlayStation games is due out soon. Coincidence?

We knew it was coming, but I still can’t help but be a little blown away that there’s no an app that will let you play classic Playstation games on a Google Android device. PSX4Droid is now available in the Android Market for $5.99.

Scan to download

Bear in mind, this is just an emulator. In order to run the games, you’re going to need a valid Playstation BIOS file and a way to get get ROMS for the games you want to play. There are a few different methods for doing this — ranging from downloading illegal files from the internet to ripping files from your own Playstation discs. I have a feeling that the PocketISO tool used for the FPSECE Playstation emulator for Windows Mobile might be useful.

Update: XDA-Dvelopers has a good tutorial on how to make the emulator work and how to get ROMS to work properly in the emulator.

PSX4Droid features on-screen controls, support for using the trackball as a directional pad, and the ability to use a WiiMote as a remote control if you connect it over Bluetooth. You can also save game states, which is a lot easier when gaming on a phone than hunting around for a save point in a game and missing your bus stop.

The app supports Android 2.1 and up.  You’ll also probably get the best results on a newer phone with a 1GHz or faster processor and decent graphics.

You can check out a few videos of Final Fantasy VII, Warcraft II, Ridge Racer, and Crash Bandicoot, and other games on Android devices after the break.

via Android Central and Engadget

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Want to play Final Fantasy VII on your Google Nexus One? Pretty soon, you’ll be able to. That’s because mobile phone hacker ZodTTD is busy building a Playstation emulator for Android.

The emulator will require a fairly speedy phone running Android 2.x, such as Nexus One or Droid Incredible to run. But it reportedly already runs faster on the Nexus One than a similar emulator on the iPhone.

Right now the user interface is still pretty rough, since it’s based on Nintendo and Gameboy Advance emulators for Android. But ZodTTD plans to add Playstation-specific controls. The emulator uses a phone’s touchscreen, trackball, and hardware buttons as controls.

ZotDD is also reportedly working on bringing the VLC media player and a Nintendo 64 emulator to Android.

via MobileCrunch

The folks behind the FPSECE playstation emulator have been building software that lets you play classic Playstation games on Windows Mobile devices for a couple of years. I remember playing Final Fantasy VII on my Dell Axim X50v and it looked beautiful. The only problem is that the frame rate was just a little too slow for the game to be considered truly playable.

Flash forward a few years and FPSECE has made some serious progress — and so have mobile phones. FPSECE 0.10.1 is now available to supporters who donate a few bucks to the cause (The latest free version is FPSECE 0.10), and XDA-Developer forum member Audio Oblivion has posted a video of the new emulator running on a shiny new HTC HD2 Windows mobile phone.

He says he was getting frame rates of 40 to 50fps on most games, and the on-screen controls look like they work really well for most, if not all games.

In order to run most PlayStation games with FPSECE, you’ll need to track down an SCPH1001.bin file and have a compatible Windows Mobile phone. You can find out more by checking out the user manual. And you can check out 10 glorious minutes of Playstation gameplay on the HD2 after the break.

via PocketNow

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