We heard a few days ago that Sony Ericsson would have an announcement for us today, Sunday February 13th. The event has now taken place and was viewable through Facebook. What did Sony Ericsson have in store? Three new Xperia handsets is what. We’ve already seen a lot about the Xperia Play, even before the Super Bowl commercial. However a few more details were given today.
The Xperia Play will begin shipping from March and those in the US, will be among the first to get it, unlike the X10, where the US were one of the last countries to receive it. The Xperia Play will be released on Verizon from spring. Currently there are over 20 publishing partners for the Xperia Play and over 50 titles ready for launch, with the number growing on a weekly basis. An exclusive Xperia Play game will come preloaded on the handset, although which game wasn’t specified. However it is likely to be dungeon defender as this was shown a fair bit during the conference. Other confirmed titles for the handset include Assassins Creed, Dead Space, Battlefield, Guitar Hero, Reckless Driving and Fifa. Fifa will also include multi player, which will be the first Fifa game to include this on a phone.
Two other handsets were also announced during the conference, before the Play. The Xperia Neo which we’d also already heard of and had previously been known as Hallon. The Xperia Neo will feature an 8 megapixel camera with Exmor R, like the Arc. Also like the Arc, the Neo features Mobile Bravia Engine technology on the screen. This handset will also be shipping from March, along with the Xperia Arc and Xperia Play.
Finally we briefly saw the Xperia Pro. Not many details were given about this handset, however we do know that this one won’t be launching from March, nor was any other release information provided. The Xperia Pro is based off of the success of the X10 Mini Pro and comes with a slide out QWERTY keyboard, making emailing and messaging a breeze. The handset also features a “smart keyboard” which makes the hardware and software of the handset work together. For example, while reading an email, if you open the keyboard the phone will know you want to reply, or forward this message and the dialogue box providing this options will appear once the keyboard is opened.
