Gadget review: Xperia Play scores low on pro scale

They say inside every man is a little boy, wanting to play, score and compete. I guess that is why the gaming industry is worth billions of dollars and is in no way slowing down. While we've seen many innovations in gaming — magic now happens when you wave your arms in front of a TV — the original gamer remains loyal to the "button-mashing" experience.

Sony's latest — Xperia Play — is an attempt to fuse a strong gaming element into a mobile device. It is for the most part an Xperia Arc with minor differences in the screen and storage, and of course the camera which is considerably better on the Arc.

On first look the device appears to be a chubby phone but you see the gamepad when you slide it. There is a four-directional pad on the left and the four action keys that are found on all things PlayStation. Both sets are well spaced and sized and offer decent feedback — all of which is critical to the gaming experience. Of course, the joysticks found on PlayStation and PSP devices are missing here and have been replaced with analog pads. These feature a dot in the centre to serve as an anchor for your movement across the pad. It takes a considerable amount of time to get used to these and even then the sensitivity is a hit and miss, varying across and depending on games. The right side of the device, which is at the back of the screen with the slider opened, has the "L" and "R" buttons you would find on the console.

On the software side of things the device is powered by Android 2.3. However, the Play is about its gaming collection and two pieces of software will be at the front and centre here.

Xperia Play features Android games compatible with the Play's hardware controls. The other software — Playstation Pocket — is a library for all the games from the original Playstation/PS One era. It's still fairly bare but the catalogue is being built up. Performance wasn't an issue and gameplay was smooth. Battery life was close to the advertised 5.5 hours of gameplay.

The screen, however, is a little too dim when played outdoors; and since this is a "mobile" gaming device, I guess there's going to be a fair bit of that involved.

The Xperia Play is a great idea on paper but fails to meet its potential. Those looking for a true gaming experience would be better off picking up a PSP or waiting for its newest iteration due later this year.

Bhavishya Kanjhan is a digital marketing professional and an early adopter of all things digital. Follow his tweets on @bhavishya