Warner Brothers Interactive is planning a new Lord of the Rings game for the PSP platform. Designated The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn's Quest, this first entry in a planned multi-title series is being developed.

The PSP title is in development by TT Fusion, most widely known for their work on the LEGO Batman, Indiana Jones and Star Wars games. Warner Brothers Interactive has struck a long-term partnership with The Saul Zaentz Company and New Line Productions for literary and film rights to publish games based on The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The first game will be The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn's Quest, a new third-person action adventure title.

Now it seems Sony is interested in taking some of the candy from the hands of Nintendo babies, as it launches a new campaign intended to encourage younger gamers to come over to the PSP.

" PSP is going for a younger market, which isn't something we've really done before," says SCE UK product manager Claire Backhouse. "Our heartland is 16-24 year old men and always will be - they won't be neglected in the slightest. But the summer's game releases, such as Harry Potter and Petz, as well as the launch new PSP colours, are certainly appealing to an 8-15 year old audience.

The possibilities are never-ending with PSP-3000: you can access games, music, videos, online chat and photos. And it’s not just the console that comes in colour – the enhanced LCD screen brings games, photos and videos to life with bright, clear imagery. Take photos of your friends, listen to your favourite music, watch videos and play exciting brand-new PSP titles such as Buzz!: Brain of the UK, Resistance: Retribution, and Patapon 2. PSP-3000 also features a TV-out socket so you can view all your photos, videos and games on a television screen!

You can also communicate with your friends across the world for free. The built-in microphone allows you to add telephone chat to your PSP experience. Enabled with Skype, you can connect with friends and family on the move from any Wi-Fi hotspot.

There was a flurry of press activity today surrounding Atari's upcoming movie spinoff, Ghostbusters. The game, which takes place in Manhattan two years after the original films, is scheduled to launch for the Xbox 360 and PS3 on June 16 in North America and June 19 in Europe. June 16, 2009 marks the 25th anniversary of the first movie, which was originally produced in 1984 by Columbia Pictures. Today, it was announced that the game will be a timed Sony exclsuive outside of North America. That means that the PS3 will be the only place to play the Ghostbusters game in Europe, at least for several months.

Atari also announced that a PSP version is in the works, and will be released in the fall of 2009. The handheld PSP game, like the PS2 and Wii versions, is being developed separately by Red Fly Studio. We don't know much about the PSP version yet, but we do know that the Wii game features a completely different graphics engine and levels that take advantage of the waggle fuctionality of the wiimote. We expect the handheld port to be more or less in line with the PS2 and Wii consoles in terms of performance.

The PSP homebrew community was rocked last week by news that independent developers Davee and Bubbletune have perfected their Homebrew Enabler (HEN). This PSP 3000 homebrew hack potentially allows hackers direct access to kernel mode on the device, bypassing Sony's tough new security measures and allowing all kinds of code to run on the machine.

So far the only proof that this exploit works is a YouTube video (below) showing the TIFF Image Exploit running on Firmware 5.03, changing the firmware version and MAC address on a PSP 3000 unit. This comes after a picture purporting to show a Gameboy SP emulator running on a PSP-3000 via the HEN exploit. According to the developers, the video proves that their code survives a reboot and the system software and MAC address can be changed. This is something that only can be done with a kernel exploit. However, the blurry quality of the video and the lack of any more substantial proof has many wondering if this exploit actually works, and if it can deliver on the promise of fully unlocking the PSP 3000.

After all, if you were a developer who'd just cracked the PSP 3000 once and for all, wouldn't you choose something more exciting to show off rather than a MAC address change?

Codemasters will be first bringing their new F1 title to be called F1 2009 to the PSP later this year.

The F1 2009 PSP versions will feature multiplayer modes, but it is unclear as of yet what all these modes may be. It’s possible that the PSP may be able to support both split-screen and cooperative race modes, but no word on the possibility of online play.

The F1 2009 release will be the first title to ever include the Singapore night race, as well as the first title that will include the new KERS technology that was introduced into F1 this year, plus the HD technology that will be made possible by the use of an enhanced version of the company’s award winning EGO engine.