Having created some of the most recognizable brands in gaming, from Street Fighter to Mega Man, Capcom is turning its attention to licensed properties. Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law is part of this new push, and is a smart (if unobvious) choice of licensed IP. The game is based on the Cartoon Network Adult Swim series and already has a loyal following amongst gamers. Throw in Capcom’s deftness in the courtroom videogame genre (see Phoenix Wright), and you have winning potential.

Pursuit Force: Extreme Justice may sound like an 80s action flick you’d find in the 50 cent section of your video rental shop, but it’s actually Bigbig Studios’ sequel to the awesome 2006 driving/action game that nearly perfected the jump-from-car-to-car to take-out- the-bad-guys mechanic. The sequel promises to bring back those mechanics while toning down the difficulty a bit. The addition of multiplayer means that four players will be able to deal out extreme justice online or ad hoc.

2005’s Wipeout Pure for PSP was ridiculously good. It brought back memories of playing the incredible Wipeout XL for the original PlayStation back in 1996, except with more features, more speed and more reasons to come back. Now with Wipeout Pulse on the way, we’re completely giddy. It’ll be more of an evolution of the series rather than an all-out reinvention, but when a franchise has reached the polish of Wipeout Pure, sometimes evolution is all that is necessary, or perhaps that is even possible.

The original Need for Speed launched on 3DO in 1994, and a gajillion units later, the franchise remains a perennial top seller. Need for Speed ProStreet switches from the theme of the Need for Speed Underground sub-series to follow the events of a legal racer. But basically, it’s still all about getting to the finish line first. Even though the recently released console versions of the game have been getting lukewarm reviews, mainstreamers can almost always look to the Need for Speed brand for solid, accessible gameplay, and buy with confidence.

2005’s free downloadable flash game N is a quirky little game that features a tiny Ninja who has to maneuver within single-screen levels to collect little dots. If it sounds old school, it kind of is. But this is retro done right, as your little ninja has to operate in the confines of a great physics engine. Its quick level-by-level progression makes it exactly the kind of game that should be on portables like PSP. The game also won the Audience Choice Award in the web game category at the 2005 Independent Games Festival. Hopefully its release on PSP will help spread the word of the improved N+.

When Patapon first showed up as part of a video montage at E3 2007, it flashed by for a few seconds and we all thought, “Wait, what the heck was that? Rewind!” Now we know that Patapon is a highly stylized rhythm/action game. The premise for the game isn’t completely clear, but it has something to do with directing weird little warriors through a series of conflicts. What is clear is that Patapon is wholly unique, and we’re glad that the general consumer indifference towards 2006’s Loco Roco hasn’t made Sony shy away from trying new, interesting concepts on the PSP.

The God of War series thus far is pristine. With Ready At Dawn at the helm of God of War: Chains of Olympus, the franchise in all likelihood will remain unblemished. RAD is the confident, young development studio that released the acclaimed Daxter for PSP in 2005, a game that proved that full-blown console-style games do work on PSP if approached correctly. Hands-on time with Chains of Olympus shows that the game has potential not only as a gameplay powerhouse, but also as a showcase for the PSP hardware. And Kratos is as pissed as ever, incidentally.

In Japan, the importance of Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII cannot be stressed enough. The game’s exploits in the region were well-publicized back in early October, simply because it played a lead role in making the PSP desirable again. When Crisis Core launched in Japan as part of a special bundle with the slimmed-down PSP-2000, all 77,777 copies sold out in a flash, and momentum was sustained in the weeks to follow thanks to the release of the new hardware. Crisis Core won’t rely on its pedigree alone, though. Gameplay is shaping up nicely and graphically, it’s one of the best games on PSP.

Star Wars titles have a nice commercial track record on PSP. 2005’s Star Wars Battlefront II was one of the few early PSP games that was able to attract a meaningful mass of consumers, and 2007’s Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron has proven to be a top seller for the platform, even garnering attention as part of a limited Star Wars PSP bundle. Past success doesn’t guarantee future performance, though, and if this promising Star Wars title wants to replicate the success of its predecessors, it’ll have to pull out all the stops in order to do the license justice.

Where current music/rhythm games are more along the lines of performance simulators or timing exercises, Rockstar Leeds’ Beaterator will also feature a music mixing tool, which Rockstar originally released on the Internet in 2005. Rockstar Leeds knows how to develop for the PSP’s strengths—they’re the people behind the Grand Theft Auto “Stories” spinoffs that met with wide critical acclaim. The game is being developed in conjunction with renowned music producer Timbaland, so we expect good things. Hopefully games like Beaterator will open the door for even more music-centric games on Sony’s handheld.

Don’t laugh—it might come out this year. Honestly, we only hope. The vaporous PSP version of Polyphony Digital’s revered racing franchise was originally revealed in 2004, and on an official level, Sony has been almost completely quiet about the game for a couple years now. A PSP version of GT that has full connectivity with the upcoming PS3 version would be completely welcome here in 2008.

Who would’ve thought that such a plain-looking game with such a simple (yet mind-bending) concept could be not only one of our most anticipated PSP games of 2008, but one of our most anticipated games overall. Players rotate the M.C. Escher-inspired levels, using optical illusion to guide a starkly-defined human character through a series of challenges. It’s a true mind-bender and must be seen in motion to be appreciated. We only hope that this weird title finds success so the PSP can see even more unique games like this.

It’ll blend puzzle and RPG elements just like the beloved Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, but instead of using Bejeweled as the base puzzle mechanic, Infinite Interactive is using Collapse. Described by Infinite as a bit like “Collapse in Space,” there will be a greater sense of urgency, because the game is in real-time as opposed to turn-based. Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords was a surprise hit in 2007—we’re thinking Galactrix’s success won’t be as big of a surprise.

Gish. It rhymes with squish. That’s the feeling this platformer has; it’s just squishy. It’s reminiscent of Loco Roco, actually, except instead of a cute yellow blob that can burst into a bunch of little blobs, you’re a nasty 12-lb. ball of black tar. While Gish isn’t as happy-fun-times as Loco Roco and doesn’t implement the same world-tilting mechanic, it does give a satisfying feel of rolling through (and sticking to) levels—that is, until you have to grunt and squish yourself down a crack that’s one-eighth your width.

Now that Daxter has shown that a sidekick can step out of the shadows of its master to bask in success, it seems fitting that Insomniac’s little bucket of bolts is set to have his own adventure separate from big-eared Ratchet. Developer High Impact Games already made an impressive outing on PSP with 2007’s Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters. Secret Agent Clank is already shaping up nicely, with great variety and a snazzy tux fitted on an apparently previously-naked Clank.