Nook Simple Touch hacked to run PlayStation games

Hacking a Barnes & Noble Nook Simple Touch eReader to run PlayStation games is certainly a sweet mod in my book. Having said that, I’m frankly more than a little skeptical about the actual gaming experience, as as the 6-inch E Ink screen is anything but high-resolution.

Then again, the primary advantage to an E Ink screen lies in the fact that it hardly uses any power and is easy to see/read in bright rooms as well as outdoors with no glare.

So if you’re the sort that likes to hack just for fun and the challenge, well, this software mod will undoubtedly  interest you. We all know that the Simple Touch runs Android underneath – making it eminently hackable.

Illustrating the versatility of the Simple Touch is a geek known as StarDroid (OpenPandora Forums) who recently posted a couple of videos showcasing the eReader as it ran soje PlayStation games. The gaming action is surprisingly fluid – even if it is pixilated and only black and white.

If you think this sounds like a good idea, you’ll obviously have to root your Nook, which voids the warranty. Apparently, you will also need to run some tweaks to speed up the screen refresh rate and support multitouch controls.

Fortunately, once those hacks are performed, installing any Android app, including the PlayStation emulator, seems easy enough to do.