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[The Verge] It’s time for Microsoft to build an Xbox Steam Deck

Should Microsoft make their own gaming handheld to compete with Steam Deck?


  • Total voters
    303

gothmog

Gold Member
The other handhelds aren't lighting up the world. Switch works because it's a console and the successor to the Gameboy.
 

skit_data

Member
I personally think they will be a little too late to the handheld market. It's already getting a little too crowded. But I might be wrong.
 

blakdecaf

Member
Or they could save hundreds of millions in R&D and just licence an Xbox OS to OEMs to put out their own Xbox handhelds.

Just rake it in with software and subscriptions which is always what they used to do.
 

bender

What time is it?
I don't think we have many estimates on sales of the Deck beyond knowing it sold 1.62 million units its' first year and Valve saying it sold "multiple-millions". It's probably safe to say that it is under 5 million units. I'm not sure that's a worthwhile venture on Microsoft's part.
 

Kumomeme

Member
these window/SteamOS handheld market actually slowly become second pc market due to the growing interest of it lately.

competing against pc market is unwise. they better becarefull of about releasing game day 1 there as how it happened to their current and previous console, it could render their own product same way as how it happened to their own console.
 
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FingerBang

Member
Microsoft should not compete on the hardware. Microsoft is a software company, and I want handhelds that run PC games without the full bloated fucking PC around it with all the legacy shit required to make sure banks don't collapse. Make it cheaper than a Windows License, incentivize people to use the MS Store, and integrate it with the OS like Steam does with the deck, but let people install other stores and ensure it can support a decent suspend/resume. You won't fucking need former-boxes anymore.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
There is already a Steam Deck. There are also Windows-based handheld devices such Rog Ally.

There is NOTHING new that Xbox can bring to the table, especially in a market where Steam Deck exists and allows the entire Steam Deck library on the go. And Nintendo Switch exists that offers unique games that you can't play elsewhere.
 

Nydius

Member
I’m voting no for the simple reason of this would be yet another case where Microsoft gets into the market late, chases the market leader, and gets nowhere - but spends way too much money and dilutes their product along the way.

They’ve run this playbook with Zune, Windows Mobile (both PDAs and their first iterations of Blackberry knock off phones), Windows Phone, Surface Tablets, and, yes, both Xbox and Kinect.

Even if they built something on par or better than the ROG Ally and/or its other Windows equivalents, why would people buy it over the already established players? Microsoft has never cracked that code - they just think they can sell it on Microsoft branding alone and eat losses until it’s profitable. But that has never worked (see all the aforementioned products).

If you already have a Steam Deck or a Windows based handheld, are you really going to splash out the cash for an “Xbox” handheld? If you only have the money for one handheld, what would be the incentive of picking Microsoft’s over anyone else’s?

It would be just another case of Microsoft chasing trends.
 
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Allandor

Member
Well series S target is optimal for that. The latest AMD APUs can reach series x performance (tf wise) but with series s as a target, much lower power consumption should make it possible to get this thing into a steamdeck like device.
This way they already start with a big library and still have the same eco system.
 

EDMIX

Writes a lot, says very little
Oh you know ms gonna fuck it up and just use their windows store for games on it. Cant have it be too open after all.

This 1000%


Its going to flop and they will move on. I think they see Switch, they see Steam Deck and simply want to entertain those markets, but even the devices that are doing "ok" are not coming anywhere near close to what Nintendo and Mobile phones have in terms of market share

MS will get discouraged and leave that market too.

Will be a old, quite way to leave gaming hardware, but I don't think its a wild prediction tbh
 

FireFly

Member
Oh good, a Surface Deck to "show" the other PC OEM's how it's done

After decades of the Surface in various form factors, MS has not been able to convince the PC OEM's to do one thing different than what they are doing

You know what the PC OEM's actually copy? You guessed it, they copy Apple and MacBook designs
I guess this ROG Flow Z13 I am using doesn't actually exist then.
 

Three

Gold Member
If you already have a Steam Deck or a Windows based handheld, are you really going to splash out the cash for an “Xbox” handheld? If you only have the money for one handheld, what would be the incentive of picking Microsoft’s over anyone else’s?

It would be just another case of Microsoft chasing trends.
I think they will chase it for their windows gaming monopoly. That would be the incentive for picking MS' version. They will continue to release games that don't work on SteamOS out of the box and have people developing games for windows but with a better experience than the RoG Ally.
 

Disco Dave

Member
The Verge have offered their main PC guy to assist and advise Microsoft in this effort...
5eIXZ8I.png
 

pasterpl

Member
I think the raw material cost would be prohibitive - even for Microsoft. If they're building their Switch, they'll need to price it like a console, and the peripherals would need to be priced accordingly. Thinking it over, a dock housing just a straight forward AI-powered reconstruction upscaler should be feasible and actually relatively inexpensive. The Xbox renders at native, say 800p, and then the purpose-built upscaler can reconstruct it to a clean 4k. If the dock has its own internal fans, the device could run hotter to push the resolution up, giving a cleaner final resolve. The only issue is that the upscaler would likely be proprietary in this scenario - meaning no third party docks.
Not necessarily, it can be something like eGPUs we have got on the market now, with some extras built in, but the blue print can be licensed to 3rd parties to manufacture their own versions, all official and licensed. GPU and memory and storage would vary between these depending how much you want to spend, but the rest would be “bought” from MS, allowing to run Xbox games natively.
 
How many years are you willing to wait for such a far off concept? Because current AMD APUs are at around a GTX 1030 in terms of power while a Series X has roughly a RTX 3070 so we are far off from such a possibility and that's ignoring the big elephant in the room of how long these handhelds will run because battery technology hasn't significantly improved these past few years.
Sorry, I meant allowing me to install steam OS and windows on my Series X, not make it portable.
 

nowhat

Member
Pricing is going to be difficult as they have partnerships with Asus so not sure how that would work competing against a partner.
Uhm, competing with/completely undermining a partner is not unheard of when it comes to Microsoft. Or any large corporation for that matter.
 
It would be a very MS-style product, arriving late and poorly on the market when it is already full of rivals, whoever wants a steam deck...already has one on the market for years.
 
I think copying Nintendo and making an Xbox handheld/console-hybrid or even a separate handheld and console would be a mistake for Microsoft because it would show a lack of innovation/imagination and this kind of thing was what started them on the downward spiral after Kinect launched with Xbox One, bumping up its price and lowering the console hardware specs (versus the PS4), which then failed leading Microsoft to release an Xbox One without Kinect less than a year later from memory. By then it was too late, the damage was done and the PS4 soared ahead in sales due to its better specs and lower price.

Gamers already have a choice of Steam Deck and other PC handhelds so adding another would do little to change Xbox's fortunes in my opinion. Also, it means developers would have to design their Xbox games around a low power option, something that people have already criticised Microsoft for doing with the less powerful alternative to the Xbox Series X: the Series S.
 
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FireFly

Member
It would be a very MS-style product, arriving late and poorly on the market when it is already full of rivals, whoever wants a steam deck...already has one on the market for years.
At the end of the generation, they could release a device with Series S performance in portable mode. Then you have the entire Xbox catalogue available on a portable device.
 

Xyphie

Member
I think unless they build a device that can play the Series S profile of games right out of the box with no changes making a closed handheld is doomed to fail, and I just don't see the hardware that can do that be available until there's like a 2nm AMD chip. If they make a open handheld it's just going to be Microsoft's version of a ROG Ally, but with a price premium compared to the Taiwanese/Chinese OEMs.
 

Astray

Member
Same
Microsoft have the money but not the talent to succeed. It has been proved generation after generation.
It's not even a generalization like that, Microsoft theoretically has a chance at this.

The problem imo is they are entering an increasingly red ocean with no real unique value prop beyond "this would be cool". But hey, it's not my money they're spending is it?
 

Hohenheim

Member
Would be great if it opens up for Steam as well. If its a portable xbox UI that just allows the xbox store/game pass, then it would be a step back for me being used to the Lenovo Go.
I use both Steam and GamePass in that one, and it works very well.

This potential handheld Xbox needs to have a quick and nice UI, similar to the xbox console, but have Steam in there as well. With one quick action you should be able to start up Steam in it. And of course BattleNet (which they obviously will, since they own it).
 

Three

Gold Member
At the end of the generation, they could release a device with Series S performance in portable mode. Then you have the entire Xbox catalogue available on a portable device.
The xbox catalogue is pretty much the same as the PC catalogue so... 🤷‍♂️
 

midnightAI

Member
We couldnt beat Sony, so lets go for Nintendo head on, in a market that even Sony got out of because they couldn't compete, sounds legit.

(I jest, I actually think they will do this, but it wont be their main console, and they wont expect massive sales either and I think Sony will also re-enter the market with a full handheld. I suppose the one advantage of both MS and Sony doing this is they can stream directly from Gamepass/PS+ and also Remote Play (yes, I know Nintendo could do this also), we may not like the streaming future, but for handhelds it makes sense as you can mimic the power of the main consoles at least in areas with good internet)
 
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MayauMiao

Member
Or they could save hundreds of millions in R&D and just licence an Xbox OS to OEMs to put out their own Xbox handhelds.

Just rake it in with software and subscriptions which is always what they used to do.
But OEMs will end up selling the Xbox handhelds at premium.
 

Thick Thighs Save Lives

NeoGAF's Physical Games Advocate Extraordinaire
I'm personally looking forward to the Steam Deck 2 more so than a portable from MS. If it also comes with an OLED screen it will probably be a day 1 purchase.
 
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midnightAI

Member
I'm trying to imagine a Switch-like handheld where the dock actually does improve the quality on the screen via processing boost and not just extra wattage. A dock that is also an eGPU perhaps. Not talking about some massive powerhouse either. Like a 3060 mobile maybe. I could see that ePGU/dock being sold separately. Asus has their XG Mobile, but they produced very few of them and they between $1000 and $2000. This would have to be quite a bit less, obviously. Probably bunch of reasons why it isn't feasible though.



Would be DOA without that.
I said the same thing a while ago, my idea was to basically have two GPU's, one in the portable, one in the dock and then have some kind of SLI interface so it effectively doubles the GPU performance (it isnt exactly double, neither is SLI, but you get the point), the main issue would perhaps be bandwidth, but that should be solvable.
 
If its gonna just be a closed box in handheld form I don't see the point. One of the best things about the PC handhelds is that they function with the same open-ended nature of a normal PC. Half of my Steam Deck usage is emulation. And Microsoft now has their key franchisees on Steam and Sony is slowly following suite soooo....what's the sales pitch?
 

EekTheKat

Member
I'll admit - I would be intrigued if Microsoft used this handheld as a push back into ARM with their Windows on ARM project that was sort of a microscopic thing a while back.

ARM processors are generally more mobile friendly on the power and battery draw. And if their software for handling x86 apps and games work well it could make for an interesting device.

The downside is it would probably break compatibility with Anticheats across the board until the anticheat vendors update for it, assuming they even will bother to do so.
 

GHG

Gold Member
Unless you're entrenched in the Xbox ecosystem a product like this wouldn't make sense given the alternatives and the fact that it would likely be a closed off system (unlike the deck and the windows handhelds).
 

TheStam

Member
I'm not a Microsoft hater, but Steam OS is part of the charm for me as it really gives you this console like interface. I can just imagine how a Microsoft Windows like device would feel.

Awful corpo color scheme
Edge browser
Sign in with your Microsoft account
Hidden away tracking settings
Ads
 
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TrebleShot

Member
No point at all, I would like to see what MS could do with an open platform for gaming, sort of like an arm based handheld which would be awesome if it was open like steam deck or the ally.

But their history with hardware isn't great, but they should focus on Game Pass as basically being windows for gaming, make it a platform that's as easy as possible to use on handhelds but also scales to desktop.

Windows as it is, is an absolute joke.

If they launched a Windows focused on gaming, all the same functionality but controller friendly and has a nice front end, themes, nice integration to things like steam and if they like friends lists, discord integration within the OS or a hook into steam it would be epic.

Just work with people rather than the walled garden approach that Epic and my beloved Sony seem to be obsessed with.
 

TrebleShot

Member
I'm not a Microsoft hater, but Steam OS is part of the charm for me as it really gives you this console like interface. I can just imagine how a Microsoft Windows like device would feel.

Awful corpo color scheme
Edge browser
Sign in with your Microsoft account
Hidden away tracking settings
Ads
If Steam OS was on Windows and you could boot into it and ignore windows I wouldn't hesitate to install it now.
 

Krieger

Member
  • Fire your staff
  • Force your remaining staff to now develop games for 3 separate consoles
  • Make the Xbox environment even less attractive for third party developers
Is the Xbox department being run by a bunch of idiots?
 

RJMacready73

Simps for Amouranth
I would like Microsoft to make my Series X into an Steam Deck, and allow me to install Steam OS and Windows. That would be awesome

Meme Reaction GIF by Robert E Blackmon


Seeing as MS is losing the console race hard to Sony, opening the series X to be able play Steam/PC games would be a huge boost imo, as you're getting a helluva PC for the price alongwith access to the entire PC market, if this was the case hell id stump the cash up for one
 
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