The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time port for PSP has been released. No, you didn't read that wrong, guys - the seminal N64 adventure that lives rent-free in my head and has done ever since its release in 1998, has just been released as a PSP game, complete with control remapping and different TV output models.
It seems so strange to see the Sony PSP load-up screen followed by the iconic sight of Link riding Epona across Hyrule field, but at least this version runs better than Ocarina for the PS1 that I covered earlier this year. Link is actually defined on this version, and he continues to be defined, along with his surroundings, whether you move between 16:9 or 4:3 aspect ratios or play in 480P,480I,240P modes.
The PSP port comes to us from z2442, who, when speaking about the project said that 'We have come a long way from playing OOT with the sound off in Daedalus at 10fps back in 2008'. They also went on to say that, 'It has been a long road and with that I will be taking a long break'. I'm nor surprisd, to be honest - they need to spend some time just enjoying playing Ocarina for a while now and not working on it... Although I imagine they've seen enough of Hyrule for quite a while now!
To install Ocarina of Time on your PSP. You'll need to have a legally acquired NTSC 1.0 USA ROM of Ocarina of Time in Big Endian format, which is the standard N64 ROM dump .z64 format. You'll need to name the file 'baserom.z64' for the loader to pick up the file and break it down into the corresponding game assets needed to boot up the game for the first time. On that first boot, you'll create a native, full-speed port of the USA version of the game for you to take around everywhere on your PSP, confusing Zelda fans with some sacreligious platform swappage.
You can pick up the file from GitHub, and then it's just a case of making sure your PSP is charged up and ready to roll!
I've covered a fair few Zelda projects recently, with the latest being CryZENx's latest project giving The Minish Cap a new lease of life with GameCube-esque cel-shaded graphics. The Minish Cap has also received an AI-assisted port to the 3DS of late too. It seems that everyone is getting into the Zelda spirit with the new remake heading onto Switch, and now that we've seen box art for the Ocarina-themed Switch 2 console and controller, I'm hoping the game release is just around the corner!
