Sony Ericsson's upcoming Xperia Play handset - aka the PlayStation Phone - has turned up for sale in China.

Taiwanese website ePrice says it was tipped off to the fact by a reader on the mainland, and promptly sent one of its Shenzhen-based correspondents to go and have a look.

Source: ePrice

The result: a wealth of hi-res snaps of the gadget - model number R800i - that would seem to be shots of a genuine device. Here are three - ePrice has a lot more.

The Xperia-branded handset has all the key PSP controls, which slide out like they do on the PSP Go. The layout isn't identical, suggesting this isn't a fake made by grafting bits of the handheld console onto a Sony Ericsson phone. The 'joysticks' are made from touchpads

Source: ePrice

The site says the Xperia has a 4in multi-touch touchscreen and a 1GHz CPU and runs Android 2.3. The key application is PlayStation Pocket, but with no service in place and no content to download, the app doesn't do anything now, ePrice claimed.

Source: ePrice

The hardware seems essentially ready to go, suggesting to us that a Mobile World Congress launch next month is on the cards. ®

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