[Xperia Play General] TLRtheory:
Honestly, I don't even consider that thing to be a viable competition to the Xperia PLAY.

This has been done before quite a few times... and none of them ever get to the point that Xperia PLAY has because they barely get past old, outdated emulator content. A good controller solution actually has to bring a system's own games beyond mediocrity... this'll half-work with a couple general keyboard-compatible games like Zenonia, but it's not breaking any mold that Xperia PLAY didn't break twice.

• Flaw #1: Peripherals are cumbersome!: First and foremost, who wants to have to carry around an additional device with their cellphone and have to do on-field assembly every time they wanna play a game? Not only that, but with the time any proper gaming device has already started up, owners of this would still be left dickin' around with the pairing/connection process.

• Flaw #2: Bluetooth Connection Drains Battery Life: Battery life for gaming is beyond decent on Xperia PLAY thanks to a lot of optimizing technology (the screen, the Elpida chip, etc)... for most other Android phones, however, battery life is crap... and even crappier for gaming. I don't know if you've ever tried out the current BT controller solutions (BGP100, iControlPad) but this equates to even worse battery when you've got a constant BT connection going.

• Flaw #3: Lack of Analogs: The major revolution of the Xperia PLAY is that we get to see so many games get a hit of true dual-analog a generation early. The OpenPandora and iControlPad also attempted this, but the game selection didn't go past emulated content... so neither of them really broke any mold. Xperia PLAY, on the other hand, allows true dual analog control on games of THIS generation. Of course Gameloft's quality is iffy at times, but when these touch-pads fall in the hands of a competent developer, we get experiences like Dead Space that are absolutely

on another level

compared to their touch-screen counterparts.

• Flaw #4: Game Selection ALWAYS Sucks: This is, by far and large, the biggest reason these all never skyrocket. These solutions always work well for emulators, but barely ever anything more. When a user buys something like the iControlPador one of these, this should mean that they never, ever have to put up with trying to control a system's own fighting games, platformers or FPS with touch screen nonsense (SFIV: Volt, KoF-i) again. Xperia PLAY delivers on this front.

This Gametel thing, however, will leave 'ya hangin' in the past... with all those famously imbalanced old-school fighters, horribly-translated/imbalanced/slow-paced RPGs that we probably wouldn't have played if we were old enough to have a grasp on quality, platformers with the most ridiculous physics ever, all those horrid aberrations of tried-and-failed control schemes that came with past-gen FPS... and even if we do happen to enjoy it, it a short-winded humor for the nostagia-drunken at best... and if we were to be honest, we've probably all gone through the trials of downloading a bunch of emulators we barely ever use.

Xperia PLAY; on the other hand, doesn't have to piggyback off the successes of SNES/PSX/GBA/GB/GEN/N64/GG/SMS generation because it already has near 200 games playable with it's controls. It's a badass emulator, but it's the only solution out there that actually has some lasting appeal after people sober up from their nostalgic intoxication and realize how poorly their old school games aged.

Long story short... this ain't got

****

on the Xperia PLAY.

Not even close

.