Support NeoGAF

[bitbydeath]

Thread title says MS's own handheld canceled. People in said saying Xbox is canceled. Very confusing.

Thread title originally said Xbox cancels Xbox (or some such). Mods corrected it.

 

[KeplerL2]

How far along would you say the xbox handheld was vs the console?

Not very far, I think it would have come out 1-2 years after the PS Handheld.

 

[Dorfdad]

Controller Sebile will say hi soon


Perfectly put

What's so special about another controller? Does it have cloud connectivity built in? Hopefully hall sticks and the pro 200.00 controllers are garbage IMHO both versions.

 

[Super Lemon Drop]

Soooo is there an Xbox handheld or is there not an Xbox handheld? Can anyone figure out the basics of human communication anymore? This isn't that hard...

 

[DryvBy]

And its game lineup is complete trash. Nobody said it wasn't selling but its dead for what a Sony system used to represent.

Awesome sales #'s though. I am sure they benefit you and are really fun to play. The worst thing is that they are making money hand over fist. They have no incentive to do anything different than they are doing now. Now go back to being a good little soldier and keep buying remasters of a remaster of a remaster or the next COD game. You will keep buying once they take physical awsy too just like you paid to play online when it was so bad Microsoft was doing it etc.. The Ponies always have an excuse to keep being milked.

Duder, I'm backlogged through eternity on the PS5. These dang companies keep putting out fun RPGs and I don't have the time. A Persona game takes near 150 hours to beat and I have 3 more to go!

 

[T-0800]

And its game lineup is complete trash. Nobody said it wasn't selling but its dead for what a Sony system used to represent.

Awesome sales #'s though. I am sure they benefit you and are really fun to play. The worst thing is that they are making money hand over fist. They have no incentive to do anything different than they are doing now. Now go back to being a good little soldier and keep buying remasters of a remaster of a remaster or the next COD game. You will keep buying once they take physical awsy too just like you paid to play online when it was so bad Microsoft was doing it etc.. The Ponies always have an excuse to keep being milked.

 

[Negotiator101]

The handheld market is Nintendo's so I'd not bother and the money is best spent on growing Gamepass and new hardware for the home. Obviously Xbox is still a very important brand to Microsoft and regardless of having Gamepass on as many devices as possible they still need a console to keep that 35million subscriptions locked down.

 

[Team Andromeda]

Good job , focus on making the best console hardware around , even if it will cost the earth

 

[crackajack]

How would an own handheld even be actually different? The regular Ally runs on a Windows OS, the new Ally just gets a second logo. Xbox Series runs on some dumbed down version of Windows with DX and Kernel, being probably very similar? The main components would be at most slightly adapted Ryzens if not straight off the shelf. Unless they would opt for MSI Claw components, ie intel, which then still would be running Windows. MS won't ever use Linux, Unix or FreeBSD kernels, I guess at least. Platfforms are all either x86 or ARM today . No idea if PowerPC is even developed in some capacity further. There never was a ton but there is not much diversity in hw choices anymore and naturally Microsoft is just running/ adapting Windows for everything they make.

Their main concern should be to not be worse than SteamOS. That would possibly help all their gaming projects.

 

[Bernardougf]

Perfect gif for the occasion

 

[L*][*N*K]

Good, Xbox hardware as a brand is no longer viable imo

 

[Dr.Morris79]

Shame, barely anyone else did.

Been in the same boat with Dreamcast CD32
, it hurt back then.

Yes, yes it did

 

[DeltaPolarBear]

Soooo is there an Xbox handheld or is there not an Xbox handheld? Can anyone figure out the basics of human communication anymore? This isn't that hard...

The Xbox handheld that has Xbox hardware in its guts is cancelled. The Xbox handheld that is a PC with an Xbox sticker on it, and made by third-party, has taken priority.

i.e. Xbox is dead the same way Sega is. No more native compatibility, PC versions of the Xbox games only. Hence the focus on Play Anywhere in the recent showcase.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

That's fair but I read that Stellar Blade sold so well on PC and not PS5 because PC has a higher ratio of gooners and the modding site is all goon. Was I lied to?

They've already made a penis mod for Eve in the game.

You were not lied to.

Don't forget streaming games. Ms loves to claim you can play games places without ever mentioning they mean xCloud.

They live to gaslight.

"Play Xbox games on this system" when they could say "play the PC version of play anywhere titles or stream them."

It's not even in the fine print of their marketing BS.

That kind of thing could get them in trouble later on, dishonest marketing and all that jazz. But I think they might have a solution to that...

Yes and I imagine once the casual user hears PC they'll say no thank you and go buy something else. Will be interesting to see how the community enjoys MP games that are just filled with hackers now. Rainbow Six was a mess on PC I had to stop playing it.

That's a PC.

There isn't going to be some dumbass hybrid system.

I've actually been thinking, of a potential solution MS might use to address Xbox BC.

Why not just offer a dual-boot option?

Basically, what if Microsoft have one partition that's Windows with the customizations & changes seen in the ROG Xbox Ally devices (tho preferably even further improved), and another that is essentially Xbox OS from the current consoles. The Xbox OS partition would probably have the Xbox Store depreciated, so no new titles would be added to it but previously purchased titles could still be accessed, along with Xbox Game Pass (unless that gets phased out).

The reason I'm starting to think that'll be their stopgap solution (until they fully integrate Xbox BC into Windows via emulation/translation/recompilation), is because they've already done this decades ago. Remember when stuff like Windows 95 basically ran on top of DOS? Well, same thing here. It wouldn't be Windows running "on top" of Xbox OS or vice-versa, but it'd be there to address a similar problem: legacy and BC support.

That's what I'm think MS are going to do for the next Xbox "console" device, and it probably makes the most logistical sense for the timeframe they're working with. Even so, they have a lot of issues to work out. Now, I'm not sure how seamless it is to switch between Dev Mode & Retail Mode on the current systems, but if it's something that doesn't involve a reboot process or hard reset, then a dual-partition Windows/Xbox OS approach would need to mimic at least that much. They'd preferably want it to be a smooth switch-over and, IIRC, it kind of was like that with Windows 95 and DOS, no? I never really used '95 (before my time), but I'd like to picture it was mostly seamless considering '95 was more like an extended shell running on top of the DOS kernel vs. being a "full, true" OS of its own like it is today.

MS'd have to come up with a way to make that seamless, despite it basically being two OS partitions on the drive. They'd have to find a way to keep reserved drive size low, maybe such as keeping shared code between the two OSes on a private storage install, and some shared kernel code running in a reserved portion of RAM? I don't know, that's up to their engineers to figure out. And stability would have to be paramount; some way of restoring the user state in both OS instances between switches automatically should probably be prioritized.

It's honestly the only way they can offer Xbox BC in Windows (or a Windows device) while avoiding big licensing hurdles that'll take forever to get through (and cost tons of money), and do so with reliable stability. I'm sure longer-term they want to offer that BC directly in Windows through some type of compatibility layer or whatever, but that'd be a more herculean task (by magnitudes) than what they're trying to do with Asus currently for the new ROG Xbox Ally.

MS should really abandon HW and focus on Xbox as a PC gaming platform, so essentially a competitor or adjacent to Steam.

If there really had sense, they would fully embrace Apple and look to provide a storefront and translation layer for Apple Mac development. If MS pulled theor considerable clout behind Apple, then they could become the dominant gaming platform on Mac with no meaningful competition from Steam. That would also drive considerable Mac sales as the platform would now be opened up as a serious gaming platform.

I don't think there's a lot of sense in them trying to be a big player on MacOS at the expense of Windows, because that's what would happen. Plus, I don't think Apple are comfortable with the idea of Microsoft wanting to make such big inroads on MacOS, when MS are already part of the reason they're being forced to open up iOS (MS was a big backer of Epic during their suit vs. Apple).

Apple's initiatives with gaming on MacOS have been of their own doing, and they've been making a good deal of progress. MS bum-rushing their way into that space might get a lot of games compatibility in a short-term way, but potentially put Apple in a very similar position MS find themselves in with Valve on Windows for gaming. Why would Apple risk that?

That doesn't even begin to touch on the fact that Microsoft likely wouldn't bring the effort you're imagining....they wouldn't want MacOS to be just as capable a computer gaming platform as their own Windows, right?

Thankfully Valve have been forward thinking enough to prepare for this day.

I'm really interested to see what their next moves are, with Steam Deck 2, additional OEM partners, wider retail & advertising reach, Steam OS, and potential return of Steam Machines (under a different branding, though).

Also more hopeful in Valve pushing for tighter customer hardware/driver/kernel/OS integration efforts for their devices, vs. Microsoft who seem to be taking a wider (in terms of chip partners and more "off-the-shelf" approach) shotgun approach. That might provide more choice, but less performance optimization long-term.

I'll go one further with, it was already leaked during the Activision acquisition and it is most definitely a PC they are working on.

I suspect the handhelds and consoles PC's are being built in parallel to find which wins out as it makes zero sense to release both.

Asus won against MS for the handheld, let's wait and see who takes the crown for PC.

Yeah, agreed. I'm guessing milestones have been hit with the ROG Xbox Ally at a pace where, instead of waiting for it to release before deciding between that and a dedicated traditional Xbox handheld, they've just gone ahead and cancelled said handheld outright.

The "console" side...well for all we know it could be Asus again. If they were smart it'd be SEGA; SEGA's made arcade boards w/ PC hardware for a while now, so they're familiar with that space. They also have brand name association & nostalgia pull with gamers a way PC OEMs or even Microsoft themselves don't, especially in some Asian markets.

It'd also be a truly "full-circle" moment, in a way.