Report: Sony to launch five smartphone titles in 2018

Sony is gearing up to release at least five smartphone titles in March 2018, according to new reports from Japanese paper, Nikkei. 

The five games will apparently by based on popular PlayStation series, and will launch first in Japan and other Asian regions. 

It's a rumbling that falls neatly in line with Sony's opening of new mobile game division, ForwardWorks, earlier this year. 

Sony explained ForwardWorks was founded to create apps and "full-fledged game titles" for Android and iOS devices, and would initially target players in Asia. 

"ForwardWorks will leverage the intellectual property of the numerous PlayStation dedicated software titles and its gaming characters […] to provide gaming application optimized for smart devices including smartphones," said Sony at the time.

Nikkei's report suggests Sony's mobile titles could be linked to consoles in some way, and may even be formally announced by the end of this year. 

It's also thought the console maker could use smartdevices as a means to revive older games and franchises left behind by current-gen hardware.