By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close

Forums - Gaming Discussion - Are Handhelds = Consoles?

 

Are Handhelds = Consoles?

Yes 184 50.14%
 
No 126 34.33%
 
Its more complicated than that 37 10.08%
 
Who gives a shit! 20 5.45%
 
Total:367
Wonktonodi on 24 September 2015
Mnementh said:
DerNebel said:
 

I can say that there's always been a distinction that's been made between consoles and handhelds and that suddenly disregarding that distinction (while at the same time still insisting on the distinction between consoles/handhelds and smartphones/handhelds) to win a sales arguement in one market is just desperate.

Actually VGC is the first place there I see that people made the distinction. And pokoko is right, the term console is much older than even home consoles, therefore in the past the term gaming console was used to differentiate it from other consoles. Maybe I'm just too old and rememer things and that isn't cool anymore in the 21st century.

Lots of video game media just use console and handhelds. It's an a abbreviation just like how we drop game our video game out if it. Some people aren't happy with it and cause a ruckus instead of reading the context when people use console instead of home console, but they need to accept that console is a commonly accepted abbreviation for home video game console or home console. 



Around the Network
Dr.Henry_Killinger on 24 September 2015
Mnementh said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:
Mnementh said:
Dr.Henry_Killinger said:
 

Home, due to the need of an external power supply.

DS, 3DS, Vita, PSP all need external power supply, without it you will not be long happy about them.

Everything on earth is externally powered by the Sun if you want to argue semantics. It is implied that need refers to dependency on a constant external power supply.

Well, I meant power cable and transformator (power brick). Some older handhelds didn't use that, but instead changeable batteries. And actually no technical reason is barring home consoles from living without power supply. You build one with an akkumulator like an laptop. If your wife wants to watch a movie on the main rooms TV, you could pause your game, unplug the console and plug it into the sleeping room TV to game on. That would be technically possible. The only reason we don't see such features is that manufacturers don't see it bringing much sales.

What's funny is the fixation on TV in some posts. What if PS5 only uses Playstation VR and doesn't plug into TV, is it a console any longer? Even a PS4 that is never used with the TV but only with VR, is it still a console based on the definition of plugability to the TV?

Your right, even that distinct is basically artificial, especially since you can take out the batteries of a GBA and turn a home console into a laptop.

The fixation on TV is quite ridiculous.



In this day and age, with the Internet, ignorance is a choice! And they're still choosing Ignorance! - Dr. Filthy Frank

Wonktonodi on 24 September 2015
tak13 said:

After that thread,let's make another similar....Are mobiles...phones?Or a phone is just a phone that is stable on a table,i.e a home phone?:P
Console,is a general term,In my language the word about it,is(I'll write it with latin characthers)paignidomihani(gamemachine)and before that we put home(oikiaki) or handheld(phoriti),these are epithets,unfortunately some people refer to home consoles,with the plain word''console'' and others refer to handheld consoles,with the plain word ''handhelds'' both are wrong,as I aforesaid handheld is an epithet and console(a device) is a general term,that needs these adjectives,home or handheld to be specialized/defined...
So,I answered(in a bizarre way,someone may say!)


Actually in terms of the phone argument, phone has become the term for mobile/cell phones while landline is now frequently the term used when the distinction needs to be made. 



KLXVER on 24 September 2015
Mnementh said:

 

I connect my PS3 not to a TV (as I don't have one), but to a computer monitor or to a projector. Is my PS3 no console now? Or wait, is my PC a console, as it plays games and can be connected to a TV?


I can kick a toaster, but that doesnt make it a football...



Mnementh on 24 September 2015
Wonktonodi said:
Mnementh said:
DerNebel said:
 

I can say that there's always been a distinction that's been made between consoles and handhelds and that suddenly disregarding that distinction (while at the same time still insisting on the distinction between consoles/handhelds and smartphones/handhelds) to win a sales arguement in one market is just desperate.

Actually VGC is the first place there I see that people made the distinction. And pokoko is right, the term console is much older than even home consoles, therefore in the past the term gaming console was used to differentiate it from other consoles. Maybe I'm just too old and rememer things and that isn't cool anymore in the 21st century.

Lots of video game media just use console and handhelds. It's an a abbreviation just like how we drop game our video game out if it. Some people aren't happy with it and cause a ruckus instead of reading the context when people use console instead of home console, but they need to accept that console is a commonly accepted abbreviation for home video game console or home console. 

I have no problem with the abbreviation. If people talk about consoles and I can get from context it's about home consoles I'm fine with it. But f people start a thread about home and handheld consoles and people come in and claim handhelds aren't consoles, they aren't picking up on the context and making ruckus about a abbreviation used right. It's all about the context.



3DS-FC: 4511-1768-7903 (Mii-Name: Mnementh), Nintendo-Network-ID: Mnementh, Switch: SW-7706-3819-9381 (Mnementh)

my greatest games: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023

10 years greatest game event!

bets: [peak year] [+], [1], [2], [3], [4]

Around the Network
DerNebel on 24 September 2015
Mnementh said:
DerNebel said:

The point wasn't to include smartphones into handhelds, the point was to either include all devices that people game on in the discussion about who is the "king" in a gaming market, or seperate all of them in the normally used groups (and no vgchartz is not the only place that makes this distinction, other places do it too and when console makers talk about console marketshare they are also making the distinction between handheld and console) of dedicated handhelds, consoles (+ PC) and smart devices. But the person that I had this discussion with wanted to desperately make Nintendo the king of the japanese gaming market (in a reply to someone clearly talking about consoles), so he decided that handhelds and consoles had to be put together, but that smartphones didn't count.

So this whole thing had nothing to with "Sony-fans being defensive".

Well, you still don't see my point. If you say handhelds aren't consoles, but differentiate between handhelds and smartphones (as you seemingly do), nothing changes if you say handhelds are also consoles. The differentiation to smartphones still works. It just doesn't matter. So bringing up smartphones is just not helpful at all. If we discuss if handhelds are consoles too it doesn't change anything in the relation of smartphones to the two. If you say smartphones aren't counted as consoles ONLY because they don't plug into a TV, then you currently demand that VGC has on the main site iphones and android next to 3DS and Vita.

And to your discussion with one Nintendo fan - you said before: "I've seen it argued a couple times by Nintendo fans". So you make this a Nintendo-Sony issue while in reality it is only a Kurt issue (assuming your Nintendo fan is called Kurt). You shouldn't have brought up Nintendo and Sony at all (as you shouldn't have brought up smartphones). This type of generalization is made fun of in this comic: https://xkcd.com/385/

What? I'm not saying any of that, especially not the bolded.

I'm saying that you shouldn't arbritrarily count different gaming groups together while excluding others. Either look at all groups in one big picture, or look at every group seperately. And I wasn't even talking about hardware sales but about the value of the gaming market on each platform.

Also I'm not making this a Sony-Nintendo issue, I'm simply stating that I've seen this mentioned before by a couple Nintendo fans, one of which I've then had a longer discussion on the topic with. I'm not saying every Nintendo fan sees it this way, in fact I'm pretty sure the majority of them make the handheld/console distinction as well, but as it stands I've at this point seen this mentioned by Nintendo fans a couple times, which is what I said.



Jumpin on 24 September 2015

Handhelds are handheld consoles in the exact same way that mobiles are mobile phones.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

invetedlotus123 on 24 September 2015

I don't consider smartphone as handelheld because its a multifunction device that also play games, and for that reason I don't call pcs consoles.

For me its like this:

Smartphones are to handelhelds as pcs are too home consoles.



Ganoncrotch on 24 September 2015

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handheld_game_console

They are, by definition a console.



Why not check me out on youtube and help me on the way to 2k subs over at www.youtube.com/stormcloudlive

S.Peelman on 24 September 2015

Yes, look it up in the dictionary.