Since the release of Henkaku, there are only two things that have been on my mind for the most part and now one of them has finally proven to be actually possible! I couldn’t be more excited to talk about the PoC/Alpha release of Moonlight for the Vita, all thanks to developer xyz!

For those that aren’t aware of it Moonlight is an open-source implementation of the nVidia GameStream client that allows you to stream your Steam games (and some non-steam ones) to a mobile device of your choice. It allows for high-quality streaming with minimal to no input lag of your games and a few YouTube searches should be enough to prove that to you. Originally the GameStream system only allowed to stream to nVidia Shield devices, but Moonlight allowed people to stream to their favorite devices and I can only say I was mindblown when I tested it on my Nexus 5.

However you know what that device lacked? Physical buttons. You know what the Vita has? Buttons! With this release – and subsequent development – you won’t need to get a cheap Chinese Android console or carry a controller around with you and your phone/tablet.

Now that’s enough of my excited talk, let’s get down to brass tacks and see what this Proof of Concept release can do:

This is a super pre-alpha. What works:

• Initial setup and pairing
• Starting steam
• Input

What’s missing:

• Sound
• Proper UI
• Starting apps other than steam

For something that is a pre-alpha, I’d say that’s already pretty damn good. However there are a few things you need to take into consideration before trying this out: Make sure you have a decent wifi router if you are testing within your house, and if you are going to test it outside (even if that’s not worth it, at the moment) make sure you have a very good 3G connection depending on how high the quality of the streaming you are trying to achieve. Here are further instructions by the developer:

There are two vpk files available: moonlight-2000.vpk uses 2000 kbps, moonlight-5000.vpk uses 5000 kbps. If the 5000 version stutters for you, try the 2000 one, if the 2000 one looks too crappy, try the 5000 one.

Before you launch the bubble, create ux0:data/moonlight/server.txt using FTP and type in your server IP address (e.g. 192.168.140.1)

If the app freezes (most often happens on a GET request), just restart the bubble.

However, not everything is good news: apparently developer xyz says he is very busy and unable to continue to work on this port actively. However he feels the groundwork has been laid for someone else to pick up his torch and finish his work.

Nonetheless this is great work and deserves kudos still. Hopefully someone will come in and fill-in the blanks of his work.

With all of this said head here to grab the PoC release and if you are the developer that will pick up the torch and continue work on a release that could breathe new life into the Vita, head to xyz‘s Github and fork it!

Hopefully Henkaku will continue to give the Vita the life it never actually gave it, despite the namesake.

Bonus: Courtesy of reddit user MonoAudioStereo, here is this port running a game