Cloud gaming company OnLive recently upped its efforts to conquer the UK market by launching its services for smartphone and tablet owners.
Now it looks like the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play, the first PlayStation certified Android smartphone ever built, could become one of the best places to experience OnLive on a portable platform.
For those who have yet to experience OnLive, it is essentially a game streaming service which lets you play the latest titles on your PC, laptop, Android mobile or iPhone. Recent releases like Saints Row: The Third can be enjoyed on a device which would not normally be powerful enough to support them because all of the graphics processing is carried out by OnLive’s servers, with the results streamed direct to your handset.
The problem with most smartphones, like even the mighty Samsung Galaxy Nexus, is that they lack physical buttons which are required to play the majority of major console and PC games. As such players have to rely on touch screen interfaces which lack the tactile feedback or precision of a physical controller.
This is where the Xperia Play differs, because Sony Ericsson specifically designed it to feature slide-out gaming controls, complete with a D-Pad, PlayStation buttons and analogue touch areas, to replicate the movement of control sticks.
When OnLive launched its mobile applications in December there was no support for the Xperia Play’s physical controls, which caused something of a stir amongst owners. OnLive listened to fan requests and quickly updated the app so that the full complement of buttons and controls are now compatible.
Anyone who has a Sony Ericsson Xperia Play and an OnLive account can now play games like Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, without anything hindering the experience. Because things like saved games are stored in the cloud, you could play at home on your PC and then head out with your Xperia Play and pick up where you left off.
Graphics in mobile gaming have come a long way in just a few short years. The release of the iPhone 4S, with seven times the graphical grunt of 2010′s iPhone 4, indicated that many companies are serious about upping the visual fidelity of games along with the potential complexity of their content.
Titles like Infinity Blade II, which uses a graphics engine which originated on the PC, have begun to take advantage of all the horsepower that lies under the hood of modern mobiles. But the Xperia Play was initially criticised because of its anaemic library of old PlayStation 1 games, which arrived on its initial launch, making only moderate use of its modern hardware.
With an Xperia Play-optimised version of the OnLive app now available to download, this underappreciated smartphone could be getting much more attention, particularly amongst those who do not want to take both their mobile and a portable games console with them every time they leave the house. It is of course more bad news for Nintendo and one half of Sony Ericsson, whose standalone offerings will look weaker by comparison.
January 27th, 2012 
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