Would love to give Portal a try, but until it’s 150 that’s not gonna happen.
This feels like an executive saying “I want to have an Xbox handheld”. Then saying to make it profitable without market research.
I feel like the Xbox brand is not long for this world.
Steamdeck and Ps5 it will remain for me then.
I have had good luck with the Portal since hardwiring the PS5, but the price needs to come down at least $50.
Will stick with my Steam Deck thank you very much.
Seriously. I got mine during the first sale. I’ve been getting humble bundle since the first super meat boy one. My backlog is immeasurable. And although there were quite a few incompatible games at first. Now almost every one is playable, other than notably Arkham City 😡!
How a handheld is priced more or equal than a PS5 pro? Which is also pretty expensive for a console.
I’m confused. The Xbox Ally X costs pretty much the same as the normal ROG Ally X. Don’t people in the US realize that prices in the EU usually include tax?
Is the Xbox Ally X a different thing from a ROG Ally X? Is it the same thing as a ROG Xbox Ally X?
Fuck Microsoft for this naming convention convention bullshit.
It’s not the same thing. The ROG Ally X is an AMD Z1 Extreme and the Xbox Ally X is an AMD Z2 Extreme. It’s not clear yet how well the Z2 Extreme performs in comparison to the Z1 Extreme.
The Phawx did some testing with the Legion Go 2 and their Z2 (non-extreme) performs worse than the ROG Ally X. -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVdOkbJ9Npo&pp=ygUVTGVnaW9uIEdvIDIgdGhlIHBoYXd4
My cautious expectation is that it will perform marginally better than the ROG Ally X, maybe be 10-15%, though I’m not touching anything Microsoft at this time in history.
I guess I have to put my foot in my mouth over a comment I made a month or so back. I had said an XBOX handheld would sell out against the Steam Deck simply due to brand recognition.
This was of course before I thought they’d be dumb enough to make a console twice as expensive aimed at the mass market. If this was targeted at the same price as the Deck, they might have had a chance.
I don’t know anyone that would consider one of these now.
Shit I dont know anyone who can afford this. No one in my work or friend group has a Steam Deck or Switch 2. Nearly 20 people all of us of us have ps5, XsX, or switch 1. 6 have a pc that can run the latest games without chugging. Not even the scalper guy at work has gotten a Switch2 to flip.
The market for Steam Deck is already so small, you would have to undercut it in price or overshoot it in specs by such a rediculous margin (either one) to get mass market adoption. Consoles were BORN FROM being cheaper and “punching above its pricetag” compared to modular PCs. This handheld is neither.
$1000 consoles and $100 games…here we come I guess. I’m so tired of fighting this fight. One of the tenants of capitalism is that you, the consumer, should demand more-for-less. It doesn’t matter that you got a good deal already. It is a consumers duty to demand a product for less, or even free. People have grown complacent and lazy with this duty - misinformation and complacency, and a culture that promotes both “fuck you I got mine” and “overpaying is a flex” has allowed prices to rocket under greedflation.
Urgh that must be gross having a scalper guy at work
One of the tenants of capitalism is that you, the consumer, should demand more-for-less
Oh dear, that was never a tenet of capitalism. Capitalism has only one tenet: amass as much capital as possible at all costs. Literally anything goes, including and especially capturing and controlling markets by stifling competition.
It’s a natural byproduct though. Assuming a free enough market, you should have several people all supplying the same good. Some will compete on price, some on quality, and some on overall service.
The problems happen when competition evaporates, either from regulations raising the barrier to entry, acquisitions, or resource scarcity. Capitalism assumes people are greedy and pits them against each other to provide better services to everyone. A lack of competition isn’t “capitalism functioning as intended,” but instead the opposite, it means something is preventing capitalism from working as intended.
It also requires perfectly rational actors with perfect information. If they can suppress information about competition or manipulate you to have loyalty then it doesn’t work, and both of these happen constantly.
I don’t think that’s necessarily true. If the market is sufficiently free, you only need a handful of experts to look past the BS and inform the public. In the past, we called those people journalists, and they would hold bad actors to task.
The issue seems to be that government has given in to moneyed interests and allowed them to shut down critics. If we had actual consequences, like jail time or confiscation of personal wealth for illegal behaviour, I think it would self-correct.
You appear to be conflating Capitalism with the concept of free markets. They are wholly different and distinct concepts, regardless of what Capitalism’s propagandists would like everyone to believe.
Capitalism, being an economic dogma that worships private ownership and relentless pursuit and hoarding of wealth, actively incentivizes behavior that destroys free markets: trusts, monopolies, oligopolies, regulatory capture, sabotage, patents, union busting, mergers and acquisitions, financialization, and more, gradually eroding any free market until it no longer meaningfully exists.
When most people refer to capitalism, they mean free market or laissez-faire capitalism. Many (most?) of the issues you mentioned require government to step in to occur. For example:
- trusts - government structure to protect wealth
- oligopoly - failure of government to prevent collusion (price fixing and whatnot are expressly anti-competitive)
- regulatory capture - government must be complicit since regulations are typically a government thing
I think government has a place in protecting the free market, but it needs to be restrained so it doesn’t get manipulated into destroying the free market. For example, a regulation could protect consumers, but it could also raise the barrier to entry and prevent competition from correcting the underlying problem.
A lot of the issues stem from corporate welfare, where wealthy people are able to manipulate corporate structures to build their own wealth and protect themselves from liability. I think it’s largely those liability protections that encourage anti-competitive behavior. End the protections and courts can meaningfully punish corporations when they break the law.
The sad thing is that a few dozen people will buy it no matter the price, and will have a thousand dollar piece of e-waste when Microsoft decides to kill it off
A few dozen people don’t make a product viable, tens or hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of people do.
It’s just a computer. Microsoft can’t kill it off (thankfully)
That all depends on exactly how the OS is implemented.
It’s locked into the Xbox ecosystem. Even if it can be changed, which I assume they’re going to work really hard to not allow with steamos being so easy, most would simply give up before trying something else
It’s not locked to the Xbox ecosystem; it’s a Windows PC with a better UI for a controller to navigate. And I really don’t see this being any more locked down than Asus’ previous Ally stuff.
How do you know that?
They announced it… Runs steam as well
They announced that the OS and hardware isn’t locked down like an XBOX? I’d love to see that if you have a source.
It’s just a windows PC in handheld format that has a new Xbox app that turns off a bunch of windows functions that use up perform despite having no benefit for gaming. But it is a windows pc, you can hook it up with a dock, and use it as your daily PC.
This is in line with the other Windows handhelds’ pricing, which are still doing half as well as the Steam Deck despite having to run an interface as awful as desktop Windows.
Clearly they don’t care about their consoles. This is just an extra option for gamepass, their main selling product. The point of “play anywhere” is “they don’t care from where you play”.
There is no console wars anymore, just services. And those who still think of fighting this war, they are morons.
I’ve recently learned that, if you connect your Battlenet launcher to your Xbox account, you can in fact play Diablo IV, Call of Duty and whatnot with your gamepass subscription. That works even on Linux.
Idk man the steam deck made more than its fair share of waves. And the ally was supposed to be a direct competitor.
Moving exclusively to linux and piracy, thank you capitalism
Buy indie games that are actually trying to make good games and do cool things though.
I’d rather spend that kind of money on an escort
That way I’ll only be fucked once instead of being routinely fucked by the subscription fees
Hmm subscription escorts
that called a girlfriend/boyfriend heyoooo
lol
lmao even
roflmao even
roflcopter even
roflwaffle perchance
You can’t just say “perchance”
800-1200 for a low end “gaming laptop” isn’t super out of the realm.
Figuring out (meaningful) specs on the Z2s is… hard but https://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/handheld-gaming-pcs/amds-baffling-new-ryzen-z2-apus-for-handheld-gaming-pcs-include-a-premium-ai-model-with-an-npu-and-seemingly-the-ancient-chip-from-valves-steam-deck/ seems to be the best comparison out there and it sounds like it is within the realm of the Steam Deck plus AI Magic NPU. Which is potentially incredibly good in a handheld for upscaling/framegen purposes if you roll that way (I don’t care if you do or don’t).
And the ROG Ally 2023s seem to be at the 650-900 range. So new chip gen combined with pre-pricing for tariffs and those are “reasonable” if you like the rest of the ROG specs. Personally? I think a 120 Hz 1080p display on a handheld is idiotic but if it is your only device there might be an argument. I forget if those support VRR.
But yeah. Definitely feels like another increasingly common MS fail which is becoming increasingly the case as they devote all of their competency toward enabling genocide (friendly reminder that BDS encourages boycotting of MS)
But with the Switch 2 just launching and being the perfect device that will give you a handy while you play? And the Steam Deck still kind of the best all arounder for closer to half the price than not? Really feels like this is being sent out to die.
A Google search preview from the official Barcelona Asus store “Asus by MacMan” has accidentally revealed what many feared: the ROG Xbox Ally X will retail for €899, while the standard model sits at €599.
These European prices translate to eye-watering figures globally, potentially pushing the premium handheld well beyond the $1000 threshold in certain markets.
Now, let’s all calm down. This is based on leaked data.
If I had to guess, Microsoft leaked this themselves so that they could gauge just how much we balked at the price, and then come down to something more reasonable, making the still over-priced unit look like a better deal in the end.
Until we see the actual device for sale at this price, let’s set down the pitchforks for another day.
Isn’t before the price is set in stone the time to make a big deal out of it? Like you said, they probably leaked it to gauge the response. We should mock it for the absurdity that it is so they know they’re way off the mark before it comes out.
That is, assume the price is something we want changed. Honestly, I don’t really. I want this to flop. We need fewer Microsoft products out there, not more. I want people on Linux powered devices, so we get more support for Linux software.
RIP Xbox.
Did they bother looking at the history of console launches that were above $600?
You know, all those household names like 3DO, Jaguar, and CD-I, that prove how historically there is NOT a big audience for expensive consoles.
Good ol Playstation even learned their lesson with the PS3.
And now in the middle of a global recession, one where people are even turning on Nintendo for price increases - Xbox is releasing their most expensive console ever with no exclusives, and not a single reason to use this new “Xbox” because game pass is available on everything else.
I’m sorry. But whoever is left at Xbox needs to pull their head out of their ass and breath real air.
This move is out of the 90’s with crossbranding that smells of desperation. WHY would you call it so many names? WHY the ROG Xbox Ally? And not the Xbox Ally?
You really just had to slap the corporate partnership with ROG in the name of the product at the front like that? People smell that bullshit ten miles away now, as it basically the equivalent of putting corporate flowers on a devices grave. Like the Verizon Blackberry Storm, or the ATT Nokia NGage.
FFS “XBOX ALLY” is a great name! They could have even called it the “Xbox ALLY by ROG”
Now it’s going to be another “Xbone” situation because Microsoft can’t unincorporated their brain from making terrible decisions.
The ROG Xbox Ally is an overbranded ununique afterthought of a console designed to milk Xbox nostalgia from people that don’t have the budget or desire for an expensive portable PC.
I wish Vegas took odds over the potential failure of this console, because it’s almost certain how much of a failure this thing is going to be at launch.
Just my 2 cents. Haters better tell me how many of these they’re planning to buy at launch to scalp.
But you get freedom of windows for free.
Windows on handheld. Linux 2.0 - finally
Jesus jumping jehoshaphat, this is absolutely fucking bonkers
For comparison the Windows 11 ROG Ally is $500 (Asus.com)
My guess is that this will be able to play Xbox console games that aren’t on PC like The Darkness. Would explain why we’re seeing other console exclusive titles appear on the Xbox app.(Edit: Nope.avi)The ROG ALLY doesn’t have Z2E
My guess is that this will be able to play Xbox console games that aren’t on PC like The Darkness
They’ve already confirmed that no, it’s just running Windows Game Pass.
https://www.purexbox.com/news/2025/06/no-the-rog-xbox-ally-handheld-doesnt-play-native-console-games
What the shit? Are the specs better than the ROG Ally or something…??
From what I’ve read, it will have the new AMD Ryzen Z2 chipset which could lead to better battery life, also… better grips, impulse triggers, and slightly better RAM.
Shit. Might as well charge $2 then. Clearly this thing ain’t messing around
