Micropython used in a PlayStation game

[kspes]

Hi Everyone,

I don't know if this is a first for micropython, but it might be.
In a previous post, I explained how my company used micropython to port an old game from 2009 and release it everywhere.
Well, today that game has been published on Playstation 5 :)

Been working hard on this for several months, and it's just the first of many python games we plan to resurrect, both ours and from third parties.
What's also interesting is that, in order to avoid the hassle of dealing with Sony's SDK's, I've embedded the game (micropython included) inside Unreal Engine 5. So the whole game is running in a sort of a "virtual machine"-like environment inside UE, and then UE tools are used to export the game to Playstation 5 (it's much more complicated than it sounds).

PS: I also have the game working on Nintendo Switch and XBox but it's not yet published.

Overall, I'm quite happy with how microython is performing, it's been quite a jurney learning how it works and how I can tune it to work good in a low latency enviroment needed for games.
Had a lot of performance problems on Nintendo Switch since it has a slow CPU (~ 1Ghz). Micropython and its garbage collector was giving me a lot of trouble, but managed to optimize the code well enough to run at a stable 60 FPS. Some of the code had to be converted to C++ though.

PS: I'm using micropython 1.22.

[cwalther]

Very cool! I just gave a conference lightning talk about Playdate games using MicroPython (a very very condensed version of this), but a PlayStation game is a totally different animal! That would have been a nice example to mention in my talk.

[mattytrentini]

Was that lightning talk recorded @cwalther? I keep hoping to find time to extend pew-playdate...

[kspes]

Nice! Well if you ever get to give the same talk again, feel free to mention the playstation port :)

[cwalther]

Yes, the talks were recorded, should appear at https://www.python-summit.ch/recordings/ within a few weeks. (Preparing the talk has inspired me to resume work on it, and I was hoping to get a new release out this week, but am currently held up by some weird file I/O errors where I haven’t figured out yet whether I am doing anything wrong or whether it’s a bug in Playdate OS.)

[mattytrentini]

Thanks @cwalther, it was a really good talk! The video is now available.

[Josverl]

Whow - MicroPython on the Console - Super Cool
if you need X-Box testing - let me know

[kspes]

Thanks :) Will hopefully remember to update this thread when the xbox version gets released.

[mattytrentini]

Congratulations on the Playstation 5 release! And a very creative way to deploy MicroPython by embedding it inside UE. 😄

[kspes]

Thanks :)

Yeah, embedding the whole game inside UE saved a TON of time porting the game to consoles. Now that I've gone through the initial pain of figuring out how to do it, I can now port all our other games (we have about 30 of them, 7 of which are made is python)

[jonnor]

Very cool! This has to be one of the more ambitious real-world embedding uses of MicroPython. I would love to hear a talk about it and the lessons learned!

[kspes]

ha, not a bad Idea, I'll go contact them, thanks for the tip!

[kspes]

heh, looks like they actually covered it :)
https://www.adafruitdaily.com/2025/10/27/python-on-microcontrollers-newsletter-qualcomms-dev-grab-q-open-source-circuitpython-10-1-0-beta0-and-much-more-circuitpython-python-micropython-thepsf-raspberry_pi/

[mattytrentini]

Anne, who edits the newsletter, usually covers anything significant that I raise at the Melbourne MicroPython Meetup - so if we cover it there (like I did with Tibor for the PS5! And apologies for forgetting your name at the time.) it'll also likely get covered on the newsletter.

[dhalbert]

I told Anne about this, but she probably saw it elsewhere as well. To submit stuff for the newsletter, email cpnews sign-of-the-at adafruit full-stop com.

[kspes]

Anne, who edits the newsletter, usually covers anything significant that I raise at the Melbourne MicroPython Meetup - so if we cover it there (like I did with Tibor for the PS5! And apologies for forgetting your name at the time.) it'll also likely get covered on the newsletter.

Hey, cool, missed that one, thanks for covering it :)
(No worries about the name :)