Microsoft Just Teased Its Next-Gen Xbox Console, and Nobody Noticed (theverge.com) 39
Microsoft quietly teased its next-generation Xbox by showcasing its collaboration with Asus "to bring two Xbox Ally handhelds to the market later this year," writes The Verge's Tom Warren. From the report: The Xbox Ally handhelds run Windows, but the Xbox team has worked with Windows engineers to boot these PC handhelds into a full-screen Xbox UI. The Windows desktop doesn't even fully load, and you use the Xbox app UI as a launcher to get to all your games (even Steam titles) and apps like Discord. While the combination of Windows and Xbox here is intriguing, it's the way that Microsoft is positioning these devices that really caught my attention.
"This is an Xbox," said Microsoft during the reveal, clearly expanding its marketing push beyond a single console to every screen and device. It all felt like a true Xbox handheld reveal. There was even an 11-minute-long behind-the-scenes video on the Xbox Ally handhelds, filmed in a similar style to Microsoft's "Project Scorpio" Xbox One X reveal from nearly nine years ago. "This is a breakthrough moment for Xbox," Carl Ledbetter, a 30-year Microsoft design veteran, says in the video. Ledbetter helped design the original IntelliMouse, the Xbox 360 Slim, the Xbox One X, and plenty of other Microsoft devices. When Ledbetter is involved, you know it's more than just a simple partner project with Asus.
"For the first time, a player is going to be able to hold the power of the Xbox experience in their hand, and take it with them anywhere they want to go," says Xbox president Sarah Bond, in the same video. Microsoft thinks of the Xbox Ally handhelds as Xbox consoles with the freedom of Windows, and I think the next-gen Xbox is going to look very similar as a result. Related
"This is an Xbox," said Microsoft during the reveal, clearly expanding its marketing push beyond a single console to every screen and device. It all felt like a true Xbox handheld reveal. There was even an 11-minute-long behind-the-scenes video on the Xbox Ally handhelds, filmed in a similar style to Microsoft's "Project Scorpio" Xbox One X reveal from nearly nine years ago. "This is a breakthrough moment for Xbox," Carl Ledbetter, a 30-year Microsoft design veteran, says in the video. Ledbetter helped design the original IntelliMouse, the Xbox 360 Slim, the Xbox One X, and plenty of other Microsoft devices. When Ledbetter is involved, you know it's more than just a simple partner project with Asus.
"For the first time, a player is going to be able to hold the power of the Xbox experience in their hand, and take it with them anywhere they want to go," says Xbox president Sarah Bond, in the same video. Microsoft thinks of the Xbox Ally handhelds as Xbox consoles with the freedom of Windows, and I think the next-gen Xbox is going to look very similar as a result. Related
My predictions (Score:1, Troll)
I see this having strong sales at first by Xbox fanboys, but then I see it getting absolutely pwned by all the Linux handhelds due to their significantly better performance over Windows, even on the same device and running through Proton.
I imagine the hype train will be massive, but will see diminishing returns outside of soon-to-be disappointed Xbox fans and satisfied hobbyists who think to install Linux on the device.
Keep my prediction in mind.
Steam-only? or Steam+XBox+GamesPass? (Score:3)
I see this having strong sales at first by Xbox fanboys, but then I see it getting absolutely pwned by all the Linux handhelds due to their significantly better performance over Windows, even on the same device and running through Proton.
I imagine the hype train will be massive, but will see diminishing returns outside of soon-to-be disappointed Xbox fans and satisfied hobbyists who think to install Linux on the device.
Keep my prediction in mind.
Steamdeck is cool, but the Ally can play XBox and Windows games, including ones from Steam...so 5-15% framerate increase?...that's the benefit of Linux...but how much do you care? It's a 1080p display. Better battery life is cool as well, but for long flights, I have an outlet or many battery packs.
You and I might be different consumers, but I want to play fun games on Games Pass, beat them, and forget they exist. I think many are like me, especially parents. We'd rather give our kids something simp
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Out of curiousity I grabbed one of those steamdecks. And heres the thing, its played every game I've thrown at it flawlessly. Oh some things aren't quite as pretty as they are on my desktop gaming PC, but thats because the desktop has a 3060. But the point is, it runs. The only real hickup is sometimes the controls dont translate well to the handheld controller format (though weirdly, dwarf fortress is ...... intuitive?..... on it)
What? (Score:1)
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
They are probably confusing ‘nobody noticed’ with ‘nobody cared’.
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There it is.
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Re: What? (Score:2)
Yay, a new version of OS Update Simulator Extreme.
I haven't touched my existing Xbox in years because I know what's waiting for me...100 gigabyte update culture. If they make updates optional I may consider console gaming again
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They are probably confusing ‘nobody noticed’ with ‘nobody cared’.
It could be both.
It's not a next-gen xbox console (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a Windows handheld with some tweaks/improvements rom the Xbox team. It doesn't currently play Xbox games. It only plays Windows games.
I'm not sure how it will let me "hold the power of the Xbox experience in [my] hands" if I can't play Xbox games on it.
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If they are on the PC Game Pass, and you are a current subscriber to it, then yes.
For me the software side to the Xbox Ally and Ally X are much more interesting than the whole product itself. I will be very interested to see experts get a hold of the OS image — looking closely at the changes and how it operates differently to BAU Win11.
Assuming that the Armory Crate software is not too integrated into the OS, I'd like to see attempts at getting the OS running on desktop PC hardware.
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If they're on PC Game Pass, then they're not Xbox games, they're PC games that happen to also have an Xbox port. Not every Xbox game has a PC port. Halo 5, for example. You can play it on your Xbox console, but not on the ROG XBOX ALLY X, because it's a PC, not an Xbox console.
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Soooo you're saying I can play all the Xbox games on this Xbox Ally?
Its literally in the first sentence of the marketing on the XBOX Ally home page. "Play all of your PC and XBOX games."
https://www.xbox.com/en-US/han... [xbox.com]
Re:It's not a next-gen xbox console (Score:4, Informative)
The term "xbox game" does not appear at all on the page that you linked to (outside of the fine print and navigation), let alone the phrase "Play all your PC and XBOX games."
The closest this thing gets to letting you play Xbox Games is "Stream with Xbox Cloud Gaming (Beta)" which is just super laggy cloud streaming, and "Xbox remote play", which is just streaming it from a local Xbox console.
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That's great for the hypothetical future where they implement backcompat and never release another console-exclusive. But that backcompat doesn't exist right now, and they do still occasionally release console exclusives.
Not an oversight, its a feature. (Score:2)
The correct word there is "cared".
Well that's= disappointing already.
Well, that part is what's called a "feature".
It runs an OS that can't run for more than day without a patch or a bluescreen. It has the power to crash, the power to disappoint, and the power to restrict you from doing almost anything you would want to. And it's made by Mic
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If Microsoft had managed to produce a usable game streaming service, I might agree, but nobody but nVidia has pulled that off (with GeForce Now).
By the same logic, you could call this a Playstation handheld, since you can run Sony's streaming service on it.
Besides, you can't really use a game streaming service unless you're tethered to a good home Internet connection, which renders a mobile gaming device somewhat useless.
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if I can't play Xbox games on it.
There's effectively no such thing as Xbox games anymore. Microsoft's strategy has for a while been that xbox titles are also available to PCs with no xbox exclusives.
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That's Microsoft's strategy for first-party titles. They don't have control over third-party developers. And even then there are some exceptions. Halo 5 never got a PC release, and for something more recent, the 2023 remaster of Goldeneye didn't either.
If there aren't that many third-party xbox exclusives, that says more about the viability of the xbox platform than any specific strategy on Microsoft's part.
Looks like.... (Score:1)
Looks like people forgot to care. Again. I know I did!
Woah (Score:2)
I've told 2 people about this new xbox handheld and was confused how they didn't already know about it, now it seems like I'm the outlier for knowing about it.
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This handheld not Microsoft hardware, though, it's an Asus.
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It's the current gen handheld edition. (Score:2)
Not next generation. And people did notice.
Not a Playstation or Nintendo (Score:1)
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No matter how much Microsoft tweaks up the X-Box hardware, it is still not a Playstation or Nintendo console. Those have the games people want to play.
Ahem. All the PS "exclusives" are now on or coming to PC and we're all wondering what you see in those ho-hum games.
Both the Xbox and Playstation are living off borrowed time now. Their strategy of trying to be PC's but in console form isn't paying off. The hardware is becoming so expensive that they are now at the same level as entry level PCs (US$700) and then you've got the extra costs because they're still selling the hardware as loss leaders. Paying for online, expensive stores, expensive peripheral