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shikamaru317 on 01 February 2024
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G2ThaUNiT said:
shikamaru317 said:

Looks like Sony is making a new handheld. What do you guys think, should Xbox make their own handheld? If so, should it be an open PC handheld with Xbox branding, or a closed Xbox ecosystem only handheld? Or should they just stick with partners for PC handhelds like the Asus ROG Ally they already partnered with?

I'm curious as to whether or not Sony would treat it as a handheld with its own dedicated games like PSP/PS Vita, or as a portable PS5. I certainly hope its the latter because Sony is struggling on just supporting the PSVR2. I can't imagine they can afford to take even more first party resources to support yet another separate system. A portable PS5 is what I thought the PS Portal was going to be originally lol. 

I personally would prefer if Xbox just stuck with partners for PC handhelds. It's still getting the job done of associating Xbox with these devices. Xbox could go further by adding Game Pass to Steam, so even Steam Deck users get more Xbox content, and tbh, the console shortages proved MS can't just force manufactures to prioritize their gaming hardware over their more successful competitors. Now that handheld PC gaming is getting more and more competitors, by the time Xbox would get their own handheld out there, it would be in already saturated market. 

They would be smart to basically just make it a portable PS5 pretty much, make the specs high enough so PS4 games can basically just run in back compat mode, and high enough that developers can easily just resolution scale their PS5 games down to like 720p (or maybe FSR them from native 540p up to 1080p) and have them run with minimal porting effort required. If the specs aren't high enough to make porting from PS5 easy, and then they also waste first and 2nd party studios supporting this handheld with exclusive software like they did on Vita and are still doing on PSVR2, they would be making a very bad choice imo.

As for Xbox, I don't think it would hurt them if they tossed their hat into the open PC handheld ring alongside Steam Deck, Asus ROG Ally, MSI Claw, Lenovo Legion Go, etc., the field is crowded but Xbox does have good hardware engineers so they may be able to make a PC handheld that stands out among the crowd (then again, MSI Claw is kind of the stand out PC handheld right now, with it's styling and being the only one of them powered by Intel rather than AMD, whereas an Xbox handheld would likely be yet another AMD powered one). A closed ecosystem Xbox handheld would be a big mistake I think. I agree they need to get Gamepass onto Steam, it will grow PC Gamepass subs by leaps and bounds, not to mention it would be great for gamers, as modding games on Steam is way easier than trying to mod them on Windows Store/UWP. 

Last edited by shikamaru317 - on 01 February 2024