Something triggered me to dig out my PlayStation Vita again. Unfortunately, I never had many games for the device, although Gravity Rush has stuck in my mind to this day as an entertaining and innovative game. Since Sony has now abandoned the console, I wanted to see what was still possible with it. Its predecessor, the PSP, was at least not safe from hackers.

A quick search revealed that the PS Vita has now been almost completely hacked. Regardless of the installed firmware, it can be overwritten with a modified one. This can be done either temporarily until the next reboot with the latest Sony firmware, or permanently via a downgrade to an earlier version of the Sony firmware. Since the latter is more convenient and has no disadvantages, it’s the recommended way.

Unfortunately, the guides aren’t very well written, which meant I had to repeat some steps multiple times. Not a big deal, but not ideal for less tech-savvy people. I’m currently considering whether I should write a guide myself. Some steps could certainly be simplified with a basic script. But I have no idea if I’m legally allowed to do that, even if it’s just about the ability to play your own software and personal backups.

The possibilities that the PS Vita offers with custom firmware are amazing, though. The control center can be expanded, the chip clock speed adjusted, the screen lock simplified, and one of the most important features: you can use an SD2Vita adapter to use microSD cards of any size as storage for the console. Considering that the original PS Vita memory cards are barely available anymore and have a maximum capacity of 32 GB, this is a sensible alternative. The e-Shop is still usable even after a jailbreak, so you can legally buy games and download them to your newly expanded storage.

Of course, with custom firmware, you can also bypass copy protection and install emulators. This makes PS Vita, PSP, PS1, Gameboy (Color, Advance), and other games playable. It’s a very dark gray area if you make the copies of the games yourself, and completely illegal if you need the BIOS files (for the Gameboy, for example). But it’s possible; the community has released quite a few tools for it.

In the end, of course, the question for me is whether all the effort was worth it. Compared to the Nintendo Switch, the PS Vita is significantly smaller, including the screen. On the other hand, my version of the Vita has the OLED touchscreen, the touch panel on the back, two cameras (one front, one back), and games that don’t look that much worse. It’s a shame it flopped. Probably also because Sony packed in all the hardware available at the time, and at €250, the device was quite expensive compared to the Gameboy. Sony simply failed to position it correctly in the market, as Nintendo later did with the Switch.

For me, the Vita is a great system despite, or perhaps because of, all that. It’s smaller than the Switch and therefore much more portable. And especially with the custom firmware, you gain quite a few features (and games) that make the Vita a great console and an even better retro console. Current AAA titles are obviously not the focus, but another round of Wipeout or Persona 4 Golden is cool too.