上周五，索尼高管与美国分析师进行的电话会议尽管表述模棱两可，但似乎又承认他们正全力开发一种新产品，以开拓针对“轻级游戏玩家”的移动游戏市场。这就不能不令人联想到，该产品很有可能就是传说中的索尼PlayStation手机或PSP手机。

Sony PlayStation phone prototype

无论如何，他们的说法仍然十分暧昧。索尼首席财务总监Masaru Kato以及高级投资关系总经理Gen Tsuchikawa这两名高管，在电话中分别对此事作出了回应。

他们在电话中表示，“我们并非不关注这些市场领域，我们会因未来的发展战略而进军这些市场，当然，我们现在还不能说出具体的开发产品，无论是智能手机还是平板电脑……很难向你解释我们将如何把游戏植入其中，这些产品不会由我们的不同分公司独立计划和推出。我们在去年4月为自己作了一个规划，引入了网络服务系统，在这种伞形结构下，所有产品的网络服务都得到了解决。这样一来，不同内容及其样品都可以植入其中……所以我们正考虑索尼在这一市场中还有哪些发挥空间。我认为这就是目前我所能告诉你的，关于这些产品的情况。”

在与一位不具名的索尼发言人通话时，美国分析师要求对方明确表态，但该发言人答道，“我认为我们不应该通过电话会议讨论具体的产品或功能，移动游戏市场对我们来说是非常重要的商业领域，我们之前已推出了索尼第一款移动游戏掌机—-PSP。但从那以后，移动游戏市场的已经向更大的领域扩张，手机可以玩游戏、平板电脑也可以玩游戏、所有移动设备上都开始支持游戏功能……我知道这个回答不够干脆利落，但请耐心等待，到时候我们自然会宣布索尼即将推出的产品和服务。”

这种回答至少说明了一点，即索尼确实正在酝酿一款新产品。有可能是PSP手机，主要针对那些喜欢休闲游戏、不乐意购买像PlayStation Portable这类专业性很强的单机视频游戏设备的玩家。

对这些回答的不同解释，只会徒增大家的困惑。无论如何，我们已能从中判断，确有一款索尼新产品将问世。要知道，索尼目前已经不得不和苹果正面交锋，因为后者的iPhone、iPod Touch和iPad已经蚕食了PSP的销售份额，而任天堂也计划在明年春季推出3DS掌机设备。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译）

Sony confirms PlayStation Phone, sort of

In a maddeningly vague pair of conference calls with analysts, Sony executives seemingly acknowledged last Friday that they were working on products that will address the “light gamer” segment of the mobile gaming market. That has led a number of publications to conclude that Sony has confirmed the existence of the PlayStation Phone or PSP Phone, first rumored in a story by gadget blog Engadget.

Whatever they confirmed, it certainly was vague. In two different calls, Sony executives Masaru Kato, chief financial officer, and Gen Tsuchikawa, senior general manager of investor relations, addressed the subject in response to questions.

In a call in Japanese that was later translated into English, the executives said, “It’s not that we are not looking into those markets as well. We will look into those markets in trying to develop strategy for the future. Of course, we can’t talk about specific products, but smartphones and tablets … it is difficult to tell you how we can put the games on them, but they are not going to be planned in different parts of our company. When we organized ourselves last April, we introduced network services, and within that umbrella, network services, all of these products are handled. Therefore, the planning and the prototypes for various content [are] all carried out within this … one umbrella. So we are trying to figure out what we can do as Sony in this market. I think this is as far as I can tell you regarding these products at market.”

In the second call, with U.S. analysts, the Sony executives were asked to clarify their remarks. The unidentified speaker said, “I don’t think we can discuss specific products or features on this conference call. Mobile gaming is a very important business area for us. We started out with the PSP – that was our first mobile gaming console. But, since then, the market as you know has expanded into bigger arenas, in that gaming on mobile phones, gaming on tablets, gaming on all sorts of mobile devices.”

“Now, PSP being a proprietary platform, was more concentrated on, how do you say, [the] core gaming segment rather than the light gamer,” the executive added. “But now we are addressing that market as well. I cannot be specific as to how we will introduce new product to address these markets, but one thing I can say is that we have those markets addressed, and we will come out with products and services to capture the broader gaming market.”

“I know this will not be a clear-cut answer, but please wait until we are ready to announce what ever products and services that we may come up with,” the Sony executive said.

If that’s not clear to you, then join the party. The upshot seems to be that Sony says it is working on something. It will likely be a PSP phone that will address gamers who play casually and would not likely buy a dedicated, stand-alone video game device such as the PlayStation Portable.

Adding to the confusion, we’ve seen different translations of what was said. It’s a hell of a way to acknowledge the existence of an important new Sony product. Sony has to do something to deal with Apple, whose iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad are eating away at PSP sales, and Nintendo, which plans to launch its 3DS handheld in the spring.（source:venturebeat）