Apparent prototype photos show Sony’s canned “PlayStation phone” followup

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  PlayStation buttons? On a phone?! [credit: Taobao ]

There is an alternate universe where Sony Ericsson's 2011 release of the Xperia Play was a huge success. In that universe, a substantial portion of today's mobile games are played on similar successor devices, complete with physical buttons and d-pads that slide out from underneath the screen.

Today, we get a brief glimpse into that universe via late leaked photos of what seems to be a prototype of a planned Xperia Play 2.

The above photos (as discovered on the Sony Xperia subreddit) originate from a reseller on China's Taobao platform, which specializes in person-to-person sales of new and used goods. Ars can't independently verify the authenticity of the images, but they do line up somewhat with concept art for the Xperia Play 2 that leaked in 2012.

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