The epic battle of gaming gadgets

By T.Y. AND K.N.C. | TOKYO

THE iPhone has not only overturned the cellphone industry, but the portable game market too. Its popularity has forced today's giants, Sony and Nintendo, to change in order to survive.

In the case of Sony, it means combining its portable Playstation console, called PSP, with a cellphone. The result, announced on February 13th by Sony Ericsson, was the Xperia Play. It will hit American stores first, in March. Sony will provide a platform for users to download and play selected PlayStation games by the end of the year. Sony will also release a new portable gadget called NGP (Next Generation Portable), with 3G wireless service this year.

The company may argue that it planned to do these things anyway—and surely it did have such plans in a filing cabinet somewhere. But the fire under their workbenches was Apple's runaway success, particularly with the iPad, which poses an even greater threat to game device makers than the iPhones' small screens.

Nintendo has been scrambling to catch up too. When the iPad was released Nintendo's boss, Satoshi Iwata, dismissed it as a direct rival. And he maintained his nonchalance last month when he welcomed Sony's NGP as a catalyst to spur the market. The worry, however, is that the market may enjoy those rivals devices more than his. Nintendo's response, to be launched on February 26th, is the Nintendo 3DS. It is provides 3D images visible to the naked eye, avoiding the need to wear cheesy glasses.

Moreover a gaggle of other competitors are eyeing the field, including Samsung's Galaxy tablet and smartphones, and even Panasonic, which is testing an online portable game device in America. Together, all this means today's gaming powerhouses are facing enemies on all sides. But they certainly have experience in getting past hostile environments to reach the next round.