How To Play PlayStation Portable Games In Linux

​PPSSPP Emulator is an application that supports installing and playing PlayStation Portable games on Linux and other desktop operating systems such windows, MAC OS X among others. Just like other emulators, it is meant to improve the quality of PSP games on PCs as they are normally designed for low graphics and small screens. Using PPSSPP on your PC provides several options for improving the quality of graphics by allowing a user to customize; FPS, Screenplay size by upscaling graphics that would otherwise be blur. As a result, those who enjoy playing PSP games can enjoy them on PCs, Apple, and even Android devices. They benefit from improved graphics at least.  

How to play PlayStation games in Linux?

Download & Install PPSSPP emulator in Linux

​There are several ways of downloading and installing PPSSPP on different platforms. This article will focus on installing and running PPSSPP Emulator on Linux distributions (Ubuntu 16.04). Installing PPSSPP on Linux can be achieved in two ways.  

Installing PPSSPP Using the Synaptic Package Manager

​First, through the use of the graphical synaptic package manager. This is a Linux distribution application that features searching and installing applications with several clicks. Simply search for PPSSPP Emulator and select it for installation as shown below.

• Press the SUPERkey on your keyboard and search for “Synaptic Package Manager”
• Click on the application to launch it. Authenticate in case you are asked for the password as this app requires root privileges to be able to install additional packages on the PC.

  ​After launching the Synaptic manager, click on the ‘search’ button and enter “PPSSPP Emulator” then press ENTER or the search button below the search field. The screenshot is as shown below –

  ​Please note that a working internet connection is required.
Searching ‘PPSSPP Emulator’ will display the results as shown below.

  ​This screenshot shows the results related to PPSSPP Emulator search. Select all the files by left clicking the box and selecting the “Mark for installation” option. After marking all the necessary files, click the ‘apply’ button to commit the changes. Before continuing with the installation, the synaptic manager provides more information on the size of files to be downloaded and how much they will occupy on the hard disk. See screenshot below.

  ​Click on “Apply” to finalize making the changes and wait for the download and installation to complete. After the installation is complete, simply search for ‘PPSSPP’ to launch the program.  

2. Installing PPSSPP Emulator Using the Terminal

​The second surest way of installing PPSSPP is by use of the terminal or command line in Linux. To launch the terminal, press Ctrl + ALT + T simultaneously.

After the terminal launches type the following line to add the repository:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ppsspp/stable ​

Press ENTER and enter the user password to proceed with the process. sudo apt-get update ​Then finish by adding the last command to install the application.

sudo apt-get install ppsspp-sdl ​

Press ENTER and wait for the installation to finish. Up to this point, PPSSPP is installed on the computer.  

Adding games to your PPSSPP Emulator

​Now installing PPSSPP alone is not enough to play PPSSPP games. We should download games and add them to our PPSSPP Emulator. PPSSPP provides access to DEMO games on the PSP site.  So, installing games is simple. An internet connection is also required.

Launch the PPSSPP application.

• Click on Homebrew and Demos.
• Then, click on Download from the PPSSPP Homebrew Store button.

The application will search for available games and display them as shown below.

  ​The screenshot above shows a list of PSP games available in the store. To download a game, simply click on the name of the game. The right side of the application will provide more information about the game such as size, publisher and a short description of the game. It also provides an install button that is pressed once to begin the installation.

  ​The above procedure shows a simple method of adding games to your PPSSPP Emulator. The games can be launched by simply clicking on the games tab and clicking on the one you want to play. In addition, PPSSPP provides numerous settings and adjustments to configure the application to one’s suitability.  

PPSSPP Emulator Settings

​PPSSPP Emulator settings provide; graphics, audio, control tools and system options. Depending on the level of the user, the depth at which these settings can be used varies as it provides configurations that can also be used by developers as well.

  ​The graphics options enable the user to make adjustments to the model, frame skipping, fullscreen and window options. The audio configurations allow the user to enable and disable sounds, adjusting global volume, etc.

Under the control option, there is the Control mapping option that enables the user to change the buttons for carrying out various actions while playing games. Other configurations on this option include;  onscreen touch controls, analog limiters, etc.
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The following screenshots show a PPSSPP Emulator in action.

Video credit – PPSSPP