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Updated: Sony Android ICS roadmap loses Xperia Play

May 25 2012 01:00 PM | todoleo in Android

Sony seem to have left the Xperia Play out of their upgrade plans to Android 4.0. The Xperia Play was the closest thing to a "Playstation Phone" out there, but was not as wildly successful as hoped. It is now not on the list of devices that will be getting the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update from Sony, either accidentally or deliberately!

Other arguably less powerful devices from the 2011 Xperia line up will be getting the Ice Cream Sandwich goodness from Sony, but - if this omission not the first "Playstation Certified" device.

We have reached out to Sony for comment, but at the time of writing they are unable to confirm the situation - we'll update you here as soon as we have the official line!

Are you surprised by this turn of events given Sony's apparent commitment to device updates of late? Are you a Sony Ericsson Xperia Play owner? Let us know in the comments!

[Via: SONY]

Update:

Sony have posted more information on the decision in this blog post:

Quote

In regards to Xperia PLAY, after extensive in house testing with our developer teams and working with our partners, we have concluded that a consistent and stable experience, particularly with gaming, cannot be guaranteed for this smartphone on Ice Cream Sandwich – therefore, we will not make the Android 4.0 upgrade available for Xperia PLAY.

This decision was also verified when we received similar feedback from the developer community; both experienced developers and advanced users, along with game content providers following our ICS beta ROM for unlocked Xperia PLAY smartphones.

Our priority has and always will be, to provide the best possible user experience on Xperia smartphones. In this instance the ICS upgrade would have compromised stability, where we look to ensure a quality gaming experience with games optimized and developed for Xperia PLAY.

So, it took less than a year for all of the top Google partners to break the OHA upgrade guarantee, impressive!

About the author

Geek at heart, he messes around with Android, Linux and Windows Phone. When not writing for the MoDaCo news team, can be found frequenting Twitter and Google Plus.

5 Comments

Nos
May 25 2012 03:35 PM

Strange how other Xperia handsets (with the same storage, processor and RAM) can run Sony's ICS update but not the Play.

Oh well, will stick with AOKP 4.0.4 :-)

PaulOBrien
May 25 2012 03:47 PM

I guess they key here is 'gaming performance' which they say won't be up to scratch?

P

todoleo
May 25 2012 10:46 PM

I agree with Paul. The Xperia Play had gaming as a primary function and if ICS were to limit/reduce that function they would be at risk of angering the majority of the device customers who had bought the device for that reason.

unrandomsam
May 25 2012 11:55 PM

ICS is the first release to have aosp support for gamepads etc

Second Ericsson was out of the picture they return to the Sony that I despise.

They are liars I wouldn't have bought my Play if they hadn't promised ICS

I hope the beta rom camera drivers are working or they at least provide them.

I don't buy Sony stuff anyway (SE wasn't Sony really) so I guess they lose nothing.

I think I need a new phone or a freexperia miracle.

unrandomsam
May 26 2012 12:00 AM

PaulOBrien, on 25 May 2012 - 03:47 PM, said:

I guess they key here is 'gaming performance' which they say won't be up to scratch?

P

Which is nonsense they could remove their bloatware and have better performance than what they have now.

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