The Sony Ericsson Xperia Play has now been reduced at online retailer Clove. Sadly, the PlayStation certified phone is still a wallet-trembling £419 (including tax).
Now, we could get over-excitable about the Xperia Play tanking and preemptively brand it a failure, but that’s going a bit far. It may have arrived over-priced with a weak games line-up, but there’s still plenty of time to claw back a victory.
Sony’s own PSP was branded a flop soon after launch, aimed at a very different audience to Nintendo’s DS, but it still maintains a loyal following, even now.
The finger could be squarely pointed at those PlayStation ‘classics’- the launch games- some of which have barely sold over a hundred copies.
We’re not sure if the £36 price-drop from Clove will boost Xperia Play sales much. Sadly, the iPhone still has a far stronger gaming offering than the so-called PlayStation phone. Android too has also picked up pace on the gaming front, with a special Tegra Zone for games making the most of super-powered dual-core phones.
We’re sure Sony has its hands full with other… things at the moment, but the Xperia Play is losing its momentum and USP. It’s still a respectable smartphone, with the latest version of Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) and a special extra processor for graphics muscle. Those slide-out controls mimic Sony’s gaming controller, with touch-pads replacing the dual analog-sticks.
Our fingers are crossed that they manage turn it around and give us some PlayStation classics and more optimised Android games very soon.
Source: Clove
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