Gadget Row

Sony Ericsson’s Xperia Play is essentially a genetic splice between an Android smartphone and a PlayStation controller.
Although Sony was a little late in adopting Android as its major operating system, and initially fell behind the huge market surge in smartphone sales that was the direct result of Android, the Xperia Play Sony Ericsson’s is helping bring the company into the innovative smartphone market.

In order to differentiate itself from the rest of the market, it was essential for Sony that they come up with something entirely novel that would capture the hearts and minds of smartphone users. Capitalising on their PlayStation market they developed a smartphone with a game controller that slid out from the phone in a similar manner to the way some smartphones incorporate a physical keyboard. This controller has a direction control pad, mechanical control buttons, and central circular control pads.

The phone comes with six pre-installed games which benefit enormously from the phone’s 1 GHz Snapdragon processor. They run very smoothly indeed and the physical buttons mean that valuable display area is not taken up with virtual control buttons. The display is also very clear and bright with rapid response times so there is no discernable visual lag.

The games are PlayStation certified and games developers have taken up the challenge to develop new and port older games to the Xperia Play and Sony have released a number of development tools in order to expedite this process. So far there are around 60 compatible games, but sources say that this is likely to climb to over 150 by the end of 2011.

If you are a dedicated gamer, or even a frequent one, then this is likely to be the smartphone for you. The only possible criticism is that because of the slide out game controller the phone is obviously somewhat thicker that other Android phones, however, if you love playing games while on the move then this is a price that is worth paying.

Certainly Sony took a gamble with this device and it is the company’s most innovative product since the Walkman. Get the new Sony Xperia Pearl and other great mobile phone deals today at dialaphone, visit the site now at http://www.dialaphone.co.uk/