Polygon: I tested Xbox's powerful - and heavy - new handheld

Most handhelds can't fit in your pocket....and haven't since....GBA?

Switch, ROG, Steam Deck, Switch 2 (just to name a few) cannot fit in your pocket. You use them sitting with it on your lap, propped up on a table, or airplane desk tray, lying in bed. How many use these standing up playing them elevated?
DS lite could barely fit in my pocket. 3DS OG was catch as catch can.
 
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I get the complaint because not everyone is the same and it also depends on how people find comfort in holding a handheld. But dayyum, my AR is like 5lbs unloaded and easy to wield. My gf complains about the weight though she has gotten used to it. The BAR on the other hand is one of the heaviest guns I've ever fired, just brutal.

Over the years I've definitely gotten out of handheld gaming. I like having the option, say if we go on vacation or something, but my neck and eyes prefer the big screen every time. That and most of these PC handhelds and the Switch 1 just felt too cumbersome to me, they lack good hand ergonomics. I'd have to invest in some better grips but I'm just not interested in that at all.
 
Weak manbaby arms confirmed
We need to start a social media campaign to get all the writers for Polygon to release their bicep measurements. We'll need height and weight too, because being fat doesn't count for having big arms. It's like a guy without a job bragging about having the day off.
 
Cant lift the Ally ?, no problem, there is a console for you.

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I have no issue with the Steam Deck or even the Legion Go, but my hands get cramped after a few minutes with the switch 2. The lack of grips really hurts the ergonomics of the device, though it can be easily fixed with some after-market grips.
It's a pity, Nintendo could have gone with a thicker more ergonomic design allowing them to fit in a bigger battery. It is no way a portable and i do not see how that aspect would be hurt by slightly bulking it.
 
Surprised we don't have a lot more impressions as quite a few people were hands on with this thing
Was cautiously optimistic for this, but seeing the 7inch screen and now that they have stated the OS is locked to ASUS for the time being screams BETA. This OS is going to come in hot and heavy. Still going to be a few more years to get this OS good IMHO.
 
This is a dumb question, but will it be BC for the Xbox OG and the X360, XOne?
I mean, they're saying it's a console, aren't they?
Only through streaming, officially. But it's Windows so unofficially you can use emulators. I googled on ROG Ally and emulation and found a ton of different videos showing off Xbox, 360, even PS3 emulation,
 
Surprised we don't have a lot more impressions as quite a few people were hands on with this thing

I wouldn't even want the impressions. It was at Fan Fest in a controlled setting. Its the same people that all had positive closed door previews of Redfall.
 
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I'll be honest, without ML-based reconstruction, this feels like an obsolete stopgap handheld. ML-based upscaling is pretty much a requirement for handhelds to have real longevity and scaling as later-gen releases come out. Currently, handhelds are forced to play at very low resolutions near 480p to run the recent releases, and unfortunately, FSR2/3/basic xess are just horrible at those resolutions. The lack of ml and fsr4 is too glaring an omission to ignore, handhelds are he prime options to make use of the tech due to limited bandwidth and power and yet we will once again have to rely on the shit that is fsr3...its okay at 1440p and above but for handhelds where you have to upscale from 540p etc its a damn disaster. The sad thing is this hardware, while significantly superior to the switch2 in compute, will end up being similar just due to the lack of foresight from AMD.
 
I'm only really curious about the supposed OS-level alterations intended to better support this type of handheld, and I'm seeing little details being properly divulged. Being able to boot my Windows desktop into a "Games mode" for better gaming performance is absolutely something I'm interested in, given they showed things like Discord still working in "Games mode". As for the ROG handheld? I'm not really interested, frankly.
 
Isn't it a bad trend,
when each next handheld is "a little heavier"?

I actually hope Sony bucks the trend and releases something small and actually portable and the trend reverses.

The phone industry tried to go small again but it wasn't possible to reverse that trend.
 
No RDNA4 sucks. Hopefully this device is successful enough for AMD to invest some R and D into that.

I know im going to end up with one so ill be a guinea pig
 
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I'm guessing the battery is so big because of how power efficient and not bloated Microsoft has made the OS, just like they promised!
But let's be fair. The switch 2 battery life is in worst case 2h (Cyberpunk2077) or maybe even less.
I wouldn't blame the Windows OS for the need of a huge battery.
 
Can't wait to see videos of crying kids and frustrated parents after they realize that this new "this is an Xbox" device does not run most Xbox games they owned on their Xbox consoles.

 
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