sony

Despite Sony's focus on mobile games via the PlayStation Vita, there's been a second, parallel path in the mobile game front taken via PlayStation Suite. That initiative, now called PlayStation Mobile, was detailed with additional hardware partners and promises of indie-friendly openness at Gamescom in Cologne, Germany.

PlayStation Mobile aims to take small-scale gaming to a wider variety of devices: Sony Xperia phones and tablets, select Android devices, and the PlayStation Vita. These games will download on all formats and be cross-compatible, in an attempt to build an ecosystem that can extend beyond traditional handheld game systems like … Read more

The PS3 has a solid collection of streaming-video apps, but the lack of a dedicated YouTube app has always been a conspicuous omission.

That ends today, with Sony and Google rolling out a new YouTube app for the PlayStation 3. The new app features a big-screen-friendly layout with controls optimized for the PS3's controller. You'll be able to log in to your YouTube account, giving you access to your subscribed channels and other YouTube community features.

There's also an option to use your smartphone as as a controller for the app, letting you take a video you'… Read more

Smartphones have become part of daily life but are often too delicate to withstand everyday abuse. Not so for the Sony Xperia Go, an Android handset built to shrug off treatment that would destroy typical mobile devices.

CNET UK took the Xperia Go for a spin, a few dunks, plus crevice-clogging dust-ups to put this rugged machine through its paces. … Read more

The video game industry had a tough July, new data from research firm NPD has revealed.

During the month, total video game sales across the U.S. hit $548.4 million. That figure, which includes hardware and physical software sales, was down 20 percent compared with the same period last year when the industry hit $686.3 million in revenue.

It was a similarly bad story for the gaming hardware market, which saw revenue fall by 32 percent to $150.7 million. According to NPD analyst Anita Frazier, every console saw sales decline year over year last month. Only the … Read more

Since its relatively impressive launch last February, there's been a disconcerting lack of quality software titles available for Sony's powerful portable. Sure, there's a few notable games on the horizon including LittleBigPlanet, Call of Duty, and Assassin's Creed, but it's the downloadable efforts that really hold the true potential of the system.

Sound Shapes first debuted at E3 2011, where it headlined Sony's debut of the Vita. Since then it has slipped under the radar, quietly being developed by Queasy Games and Santa Monica Studio.

Now with the game ready to go, we're wondering if Sound Shapes is the shot in the arm that the Vita needs or if it's a disappointing casualty of its own hype machine.… Read more

Sony's Nasne DVR add-on is launching in Japan at the end of the month, but there's no word yet on when it might be making a trip overseas.

Sony announced the launch date today, saying that the device, which comes with 500GB of onboard storage, will be available to Japanese customers for 16,980 yen (about $216), including tax. The device will launch over a month later than Sony had initially anticipated when it announced a July 19 release date back in April.

Although the Nasne looks awfully similar to a PlayStation 3, the device doesn't play … Read more

Perhaps killing virtual zombies will tempt you to buy a new Sony Android handset. The company just announced that the game Call of Duty: Black Ops Zombies is now available for download on its Xperia S and Xperia Ion smartphones.

As part of an exclusive deal with Activision, the $6.99 title will be listed in the Google Play store for 30 days only for these new Sony devices plus the older Xperia Play phone. The game features 50 levels of zombie-killing action and is a port of the popular console software.

According to Sony, users can play in single-player … Read more

Apple and Samsung Electronics' lead over the rest of the handset field only widened in the second quarter, with the two companies combining for a staggering 108 percent of the industry's operating profit.

How can two companies exceed the 100 percent mark? When several of the other companies, including Research in Motion, Nokia, Motorola, and Sony, posted hefty operating losses in the period.

"With Apple enjoying leading share of the high-end smartphone market and Samsung extending its overall smartphone and Android market share, competing smartphone (original equipment manufacturers) are increasingly struggling to compete with these dominant smartphone OEM,&… Read more

Sony has been quietly readying a new Android-powered tablet that should supplant the company's Tablet S. According to a host of leaked images, the new tablet will feature Nvidia's Tegra 3 quad-core processor and come with three storage options.

Bearing the distinctive folded magazine wedge design, the Xperia tablet is an Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich device with a 9.4-inch display. Other specifications include an 8-megapixel rear camera, a 1-megapixel front-facing camera, Wi-Fi connectivity, and a 6,000mAh battery. Pricing, although unconfirmed, should start at $449 for the 16GB model and go as high as $649 … Read more