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[Topher]

Sony Group Corp. is in the early stages of developing a portable console that would play its PlayStation 5 games on the move.

The product is aimed at expanding Sony’s reach and contending with Nintendo Co. for the portable gaming market, according to people familiar with its development. It would also counter any potential mobile hardware from Xbox maker Microsoft Corp., which is working on prototypes in the category as well. Sony’s portable device is likely years away from launch and the company could still decide against bringing it to market, the people said, asking not to be named discussing private plans.

The idea builds on the PlayStation Portal, an 8-inch handheld device Sony released in 2023 that allows users to play PS5 games by streaming them over the internet. Tokyo-based Sony initially had intended for it to function as a standalone device like Valve Corp.’s Steam Deck, the people said.

Building a mobile device that’s capable of directly playing PS5 games would potentially make Sony’s software more accessible and appealing to a wider audience. The company has taken several steps in recent times in that direction, including making a bigger push into mobile and PC gaming as well as live-service titles.

A Sony spokeswoman declined to comment.

Mobile gaming, which brings in the bulk of the industry’s revenue each year, is today dominated by smartphones. Nintendo’s Switch console has carved out a lucrative niche for itself by offering the versatility of being playable both on the move and connected to a TV set. Its successor is expected to be released in 2025 and will retain compatibility with Nintendo’s rich library of existing Switch titles, potentially sparking an upgrade cycle among users of the nearly eight-year-old console.

Sony and Microsoft have not competed with their own portable gaming hardware for years, following popular but ultimately unsuccessful products like the PS Vita and PlayStation Portable, which were discontinued a decade ago.



paywalled:

Sony Working on Handheld Console for PS5 Games to Rival Switch

Sony Group Corp. is in the early stages of developing a portable console that would play its PlayStation 5 games on the move.

www.bloomberg.com

Belated thanks to bender for posting the news in another thread.

 

[nial]

This has been long rumored, does Bloomberg have its own sources?

 

[Gaiff]

>Releases PSP to rival the DS
>PSP is a great handheld and sells well
>Releases the Vita, barely supports it, lets it die
>Exit the handheld market
>Oh, shit, it's actually still profitable
>Come back after a decade after losing their entire market share.

The Vita was a great little system. Sony just didn't give it the proper support and poorly positioned it against mobile phones.

 

[ergem]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Edit: I’m thinking perhaps an ARM architecture and AMD GPU that closely resembles that of the PS5, but games still have to be reprogrammed and refitted to the architecture. Perhaps another dev team (like Nixxes’s job) doing the porting.

 

[JimboJones]

The Switch definitely proves the market is still lucrative and it's honestly the only way PlayStation regain significant market share in Japan (if that's something they really care about these days)

 

[MayauMiao]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Maybe in 15 years.

 

[ZehDon]

If Sony launches their new handheld before Microsoft and just straight up kills their pivot, I would probably die of laughing.

Microsoft: the clock is ticking.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

With Portal on the market, why would Sony release a dedicated handheld?

 

[salva]

I'm so close to grabbing a Steam Deck... with Xbox and (slowly) PlayStation releasing games on Steam, the Deck is well ahead. PS would be directly competing with the current Deck and Deck 2 if this releases in a couple of years

 

[Kacho]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Give it a decade or so. Their solution will likely be cloud based until hardware catches up.

 

[KeplerL2]

>Releases PSP to rival the DS
>PSP is a great handheld and sells well
>Releases the Vita, barely supports it, lets it die
>Exit the handheld market
>Oh, shit, it's actually still profitable
>Come back after a decade after losing their entire market share.

The Vita was a great little system. Sony just didn't give it the proper support and poorly positioned it against mobile phones.

Fundamental issue with Vita is making 1st party studios develop entirely new games for it. This solves it since it's just a handheld PS6.

 

[nial]

>Releases PSP to rival the DS
>PSP is a great handheld and sells well
>Releases the Vita, barely supports it, lets it die
>Exit the handheld market
>Oh, shit, it's actually still profitable
>Come back after a decade after losing their entire market share.

The Vita was a great little system. Sony just didn't give it the proper support and poorly positioned it against mobile phones.

Sony supported the PS Vita very well in 2012-2014, I think people just forget the state of SCEI around those years; coming after the mess of PS3 and a less than stellar launch for PS Vita, it made all the sense in the world to focus on PS4 if they wanted to have a healthy and profitable business.
Well, it all paid off in the end, and if they feel that they're ready to return to the handheld market since 2019 (heck, PS Portal is already a first step since you don't need a PS5 for it anymore), then good for them.
Also, PSP wasn't that much of a great success all around if you look at software sales, 2004-2013 was definitely the worst era of SCEI.

 

[Represent.]

Please dont bother, we dont need the entire industry fucking handicapped on PS5 level hardware in 2030.

No thank you

 

[JimboJones]

With Portal on the market, why would Sony release a dedicated handheld?

Because the Portal is lame as hell.

 

[Bridges]

No way this actually cuts into Nintendo's marketshare. If this thing is as powerful as it needs to be then it's going to cost at least twice as much as a Switch. You'll get a lot of current PS owners also get the PS handheld but if it can't play Mario Kart or Animal Crossing most of the Switch players are still staying with Switch.

It will, however, completely destroy Microsoft's chances at making a splash if Sony beats them to the market. It'd be almost cruel at this point to dominate them in yet another space.

Side note: Pretty clear now who has "won" the console war. You have MS and Sony both playing catch-up to replicate the Switch while also publishing their own first party games on Nintendo hardware.

 

[onQ123]

>Releases PSP to rival the DS
>PSP is a great handheld and sells well
>Releases the Vita, barely supports it, lets it die
>Exit the handheld market
>Oh, shit, it's actually still profitable
>Come back after a decade after losing their entire market share.

The Vita was a great little system. Sony just didn't give it the proper support and poorly positioned it against mobile phones.

Vita problem was that it was focused on console level gaming which also requires console level development & at that point the question becomes " Why are we developing for 2 different platforms"

Now they know the smart way to do things make games that will run on the handheld & home console.

 

[nial]

With Portal on the market, why would Sony release a dedicated handheld?

Because Nishino is the boss now and he loves his hardware.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

Because Nishino is the boss now and he loves his hardware.

Seems pointless though.

Then again, I thought PS5 Pro would be pointless as well.

 

[Topher]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Edit: I’m thinking perhaps an ARM architecture and AMD GPU that closely resembles that of the PS5, but games still have to be reprogrammed and refitted to the architecture. Perhaps another dev team (like Nixxes’s job) doing the porting.

Handhelds like Rog Ally can play PS5 games today.

 

[ByWatterson]

This means that PS5 to PS6 is gonna be cross-gen as hell.

We are reaching hardware singularity, no doubt about it.

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

No more shitstation portal please!!

 

[bender]

ctrl-f 'bender', no results found

 

[Gameplay Gods Bless]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Edit: I’m thinking perhaps an ARM architecture and AMD GPU that closely resembles that of the PS5, but games still have to be reprogrammed and refitted to the architecture. Perhaps another dev team (like Nixxes’s job) doing the porting.

Steam Deck can play a lot of PS5 games and the ones it can't play the ROG Ally can. That's a bit different because the games are coded to an API (DX12) and is less HW specific unlike PS5 game dev.

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

With Portal on the market, why would Sony release a dedicated handheld?

Because it is better.... It does not depend on the Internet.

And the resolution is real, not some pixelated shit and almost impossible to play without the Internet.


I do want a real portable console, not shit like PS portal.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

No, it won’t be in 4 years either

My guess is that games will need to be explicitly supported with ports, like steam Deck, but not everything will be supported

 

[Gameplay Gods Bless]

This means that PS5 to PS6 is gonna be cross-gen as hell.

We are reaching hardware singularity, no doubt about it.

Called this shit from a mile away in 2022. If the PS4 can hang as long as it has with it's awful CPUs imagine the PS5 next gen.

 

[Miyazaki’s Slave]

This is a switch....
THIS is a switch....

EVEN THIS IS A SWITCH.

You cannot beat them...might as well make money from them Sony!!

 

[Mibu no ookami]

No way this actually cuts into Nintendo's marketshare. If this thing is as powerful as it needs to be then it's going to cost at least twice as much as a Switch. You'll get a lot of current PS owners also get the PS handheld but if it can't play Mario Kart or Animal Crossing most of the Switch players are still staying with Switch.

It will, however, completely destroy Microsoft's chances at making a splash if Sony beats them to the market. It'd be almost cruel at this point to dominate them in yet another space.

Side note: Pretty clear now who has "won" the console war. You have MS and Sony both playing catch-up to replicate the Switch while also publishing their own first party games on Nintendo hardware.

The Switch 2 is going to be a minimum 400 dollars.

There are a lot of important decisions Sony gets to make about a PlayStation handheld AFTER getting to see Switch 2.

• Storage: Does Nintendo go with SD cards again? Sony could very easily put an SSD in theirs and have significantly more space on board than Nintendo
  • Being more friendly to digital games means a higher margin on sales via software so they can better sell the device at a loss rather than a profit which Nintendo tends to do
• Power: If we assume the Switch is as powerful as a PS4 Pro, Sony can easily target around being as powerful as a PS5 scaling down to 720p and 1080p. Having a bit of a power advantage over Nintendo again by willing to take a loss on hardware rather than profit
• Library: Switch 2 will have the Switch library but the PS handheld will presumably have the PS4 and PS5 libraries, that's advantage Sony, especially down the line

Nintendo's advantages lie around DLSS and the Switch brand, but at a super high price, they might find out where the rubber meets the road.

Sony doesn't need to destroy the Switch 2's market share (first the Switch 2 might do that on its own), it only needs to reduce it, to heavily favor PlayStation as a platform for getting games.

Let's say the Switch 2 sells 20 million in its first year. The PS5 will have reached The PS5 will have reached anywhere from 85-95 million units. If the PS handheld can play PS5 level games with slight scaling, it becomes a no brainer to put your games on the PS5 and its handheld. You really couldn't afford not to.

Switch 2 is going to run a problem of being expensive and most of its games are probably going to be cross gen too.

 

[nial]

Seems pointless though.

Then again, I thought PS5 Pro would be pointless as well.

In all seriousness, PS Portal is very niche to think that Sony will settle for such thing only.
It's the same with people claiming that it's pointless because Steam Deck and other PC handhelds exist. My man, literally nobody buys these.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

And the resolution is real, not some pixelated shit and almost impossible to play without the Internet.

This makes no sense. The resolution is whatever the resolution of the screen is.

Native rendering on a dedicated handheld would have a benefit over Portal, but unless they release it with a 120hz/VRR-capable screen, Portal would have more graphical benefits.

 

[Topher]

No, it won’t be in 4 years either

My guess is that games will need to be explicitly supported with ports, like steam Deck, but not everything will be supported

If we are talking about full-fledged PS5 hardware then yeah, not possible. Would have to be a scaled down version of the game with reduced fidelity, resolution like other handhelds today.

 

[{insert code here}]

The Vita was such a beast it's so sad that it never got any support. Playing Killzone Mercenary on it was just mind-blowing at the time.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

In all seriousness, PS Portal is very niche to think that Sony will settle for such thing only.
It's the same with people claiming that it's pointless because Steam Deck and other PC handhelds exist. My man, literally nobody buys these.

Fair point, but SteamDeck and other PC handhelds have more benefits over a dedicated PS handheld.

But like I said, I thought a PS5 Pro would be pointless as well, but Sony is more than happy with a niche audience for it and I bought it anyway.
(I bought a PSP and Vita as well)

So, not saying I wouldn't be interested, just saying it feels pointless.

 

[kazuyamishima]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

We have a lot of illustrate users on this site telling us that Switch 2 will have performace similar to a PS5, so it seems that it might be true.

On a more serious note, as the article suggests, Sony is years away from developing some handheld capable or running games at the same performance as a PS5.

 

[nial]

Fair point, but SteamDeck and other PC handhelds have more benefits over a dedicated PS handheld.

Sure, but they may as well not even exist for the large, mainstream market.
And unlike the Steam Deck, this new PlayStation handheld will actually have a retail presence.

 

[Calico345]

 

[Shubh_C63]

Sony Microsoft
Always chasing. Never innovating.

But smart seeing so much share going to Nintendo bucket, just your handheld presence would be enough to guarantee minimum sales and hurt Nintendo by some fraction.

 

[DKPOWPOW]

So everyone besides Nintendo and Oculus are going ass backwards eh?

Nintendo merges handheld and console market, effectively creating a hybrid. Capitalizes on it, and doesn’t look back. Yeah they made the Switch lite, but it was the lowest selling hardware of the 3 models (I believe the OLED already surpassed it in Japan & America).

Sony and Microsoft instead… decide to make a handheld only?

Why? And then… to top it off it’s sole purpose is to play games… already made available on your previous consoles?

It’s shocking how 2 game companies… completely forget that you need games to sell your consoles. New, fresh, exciting games. Not shit everyone has been playing for the past 5 years.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

Sure, but they may as well not even exist for the large, mainstream market.
And unlike the Steam Deck, this new PlayStation handheld will actually have a retail presence.

True, SteamDeck sales are a complete joke.

But I don't think Sony should try to compete with Nintendo in the handheld-market head-on.
Nintendo got it on lock.

 

[gothmog]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Edit: I’m thinking perhaps an ARM architecture and AMD GPU that closely resembles that of the PS5, but games still have to be reprogrammed and refitted to the architecture. Perhaps another dev team (like Nixxes’s job) doing the porting.

The scaling tech in the pro working as well as it is probably unlocked many future hardware iterations. I wouldn't be surprised if we also saw a much smaller PS5 as well.

 

[lh032]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

Edit: I’m thinking perhaps an ARM architecture and AMD GPU that closely resembles that of the PS5, but games still have to be reprogrammed and refitted to the architecture. Perhaps another dev team (like Nixxes’s job) doing the porting.

Pssr , 720p 30fps.

 

[March Climber]

You mean Switch 2...right?

 

[nial]

I think we're about to see a huge shift regarding SIE's hardware strategy with the PS6 in a few years. Kinda like the Wii being a huge shift for Nintendo.

 

[Exede]

I se this as a success when its like really compatible with PS4/5 digital to bypass the need of devs developing for two systems at Sony.

 

[SolidQ]

Is it even technically possible? PS5 hardware on a handheld?

with AMD APU based on UDNA easy. It's about fps/resolution

 

[coachmcguirk91]

Fundamental issue with Vita is making 1st party studios develop entirely new games for it. This solves it since it's just a handheld PS6.

Yeah, by the time the Vita came along, Playstation just didn't have the resources to develop for two separate platforms. Hopefully by 2027 or 2028, Sony can come up with a reasonably priced handheld that is close in power to PS5

Also, every developer will want to support Sony's and Microsoft's handhelds for probably 6-7 years. Which would keep this generation viable until 2035. Which is funny to think about

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

By Takashi Mochizuki.

So very well could be tales from the ass.

 

[Jesb]

What’s the point. They don’t even support their own hardware. See VR2

 

[PSYGN]

What’s the point. They don’t even support their own hardware. See VR2

And their games are on on other platforms, too. They are making it easier for others to make the Switch, heh.

 

[SlimySnake]

Yeah no thanks. This will be a 4-5 tflops console at best. Likely retail for $699. Provide series s quality graphics. And make devs add another fucking version of the game.

Ps portal is fine. Same fidelity. Just improve the tech in there.