The PlayStationFirst Academic Development Programme is a Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) academic licensing programme for universities and academic groups interested in PlayStation development tools in higher education. Our development kit programme (dev kits) is unique in providing access to the full PlayStation software (SDK) and development hardware for teaching purposes in computer engineering, programming, software and game development.

We currently provide platform specific licences for academia covering:  Move.me™ and PlayStation®Mobile (PSM), PlayStation®Portable (PSP™), PlayStation®3 (PS3™) and PlayStation®Vita. PlayStation®4 (PS4™) dev kits will be available as a follow on licensing programme to University members registered on the PlayStation®Vita (PS Vita) dev kit programme.

PlayStationFirst is now actively seeking ‘Expression of Interests’ from Universities interested in the Academic Dev Kit Programme and PSVita™ development.  PSVita™ is the system that is most closely integrated with PS4™ and an essential part of the connected experience to create and innovate on PlayStation platforms. Interested parties keen to get skilled up on PS Vita™ and explore the future of PlayStation console game development are invited to email us!                            

We cannot accept individuals, students or unregistered game developers for this programme. Only legally registered institutions are eligible to apply, and will have to demonstrate the use of PlayStation® technologies as a critical part of the teaching curriculum. Individuals or students are not eligible. If you are an interested student, please approach your teaching staff to contact us, as we cannot respond to all individual requests.

To register your interest, please complete this application form and select University/Academia from the list.

PlayStation®First Partnership Programme

PlayStation®First is a Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) and Worldwide Studios (WWS) academic partnership programme to inspire innovation across PlayStation. PlayStation®First establishes partnerships with pioneers at the cutting edge of innovation, development and research.