Xbox SHOULD become a HYBRID-CONSOLE

I think if they can make Series S handheld in 3-4 years they can sell a lot of it and by then it will have a big great library along Game Pass. They can release it without any requirement to support it, along their new generation high-end hardware.

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They can make a Xb1 handheld right now and advertise it like a retro device ala the Atari handheld.

That being said the HW team is likely pre-occupied with the answer to the PS5 Pro.

I’d be OK with this but I think it’d have a pretty low ceiling in the market because it’d basically be a unsupported device within 2-3 years of it coming out. Don’t know why anyone would buy that over a handheld gaming PC.

I think we had this debate many times over in the other thread lol.

Hahhaa I was just thinking that

The issue with hybrid approach is you can’t charge $1000 to get series s type of performance on good battery life. Even stuff like the ally which is weaker than the S cost $700 at launch . I think the market is getting overestimated because you can’t get series s type of performance at a price the mass market will spend

Agreed. But.

Give series S and Xbox on it a second chance.

It is the first time they have done it. Now they have all the data and all the real world scenarios. They poorly estimated memory utilisation.

Let us give a chance to next iteration.

I think it’s clear that the next generation should have two SKUs again, one $399-$499 baseline, and $699 high end. Baseline should be in the ballpark of the competition.

It’s an alternative to a Sony console except with Xbox games and os.

Pricing Series S at $299 made no difference on sales so the power sacrifice wasn’t worth it. That being said if it leads to an earlier Series S level portable it was worth it.

I honestly don’t see a market for such a device.

I’d rather have a proper console for my TV. I don’t game much when I’m traveling so a handheld is of not much use. I’ve played my Switch in docked mode 98% of the time.

With all due respect I think you are underestimating how fast hardware is shrinking and getting more efficient/powerful. The new Iphone and probably the next Android are able to play the same AAA games consoles can. The current series S is small enough to be configured into a portable system. In 2028 a board with the same series X power should be as small as the current series S.

I think I just saw that AMD has a new CPU that doesnt need a dedicated GPU to run most games at 1080p 30 frames or something. Phones are catching up, integrated gpus are catching up, and everything is getting smaller. There is no reason to think the richest company in the world with the best engineers couldn’t get near Series X level power into a handheld in the next 10 years. We have seen DIY modders take every generation of console and turn them into portables at home. I am sure Microsoft could do the same with their own hardware.

Valve, Legion, and Asus next iterations will probably be more powerful than the Series S im not saying it would be smart phone thin or run for 10 hours within the next generation, but it is definitely possible. I would think with the Xbox being a closed system unlike the steamdecks and legion gos that the games could be better optimized to look and perform as best as possible.

I think even an Xbox portable the size of a small laptop or surface tablet would suffice for most people. What i want is something I can take everywhere and play my Xbox games on that runs the same OS as my series X and works the same way. No windows running in the background no steam a full on Xbox. The only other alternative is for Microsoft to release the Xbox OS as an installable operating system on any device.

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You don’t think such a device can do steam deck numbers?

Not even close.

It would be overpriced, outdated on release, and a closed system that won’t get many new games. And Xbox One doesn’t have that “nostalgia factor” either.

I’d never heard of the Atari handheld you mentioned before. While I have no numbers, I doubt that it sold particularly well. But a pocket calculator could run Atari games, so the costs involved are basically negligible. An Xbox One handheld would be an entirely different beast.

Don’t get me wrong, it would be cool to see. But no one, outside of the most hardcore fans, is interested in buying an Xbox One right now. Portable or otherwise.

I don’t think so, the WiiU is the best example that only Mario and Zelda can’t save your console. It can be different now after 130 million people know Mario, but at that time, those IPs were not enough.

Xbox has Minecraft. Minecraft is the only IP that can copy Mario’s Spin-offs and be succesful. They also have Rare’s IPs. If they make the effort and have a good strategy, they can also have invaluable IPs. So they should stop being afraid of Nintendo. One of the main purposes of Gamepass is being a protection to those games who won’t sell well and be a medium for people to try the game, so they can take advantage of that to implement a good strategy for that kind of games. And this without mentioning the now confirmed multiplataform rumors, which can help with sales and promote your games to other platforms (The only good thing from making them multiplataform).

By making Xbox’s exclusives multiplatform, the console, as it is now, becomes even more useless. Not only Hi-fi Rush, but also Sea of thieves will come to PS. That’s why Xbox need to differentiate, and the console is the only option.

It will be a less powerful console, but Xbox is following the model of quantity over quality to fill Gamepass, so it can even be beneficial to them. We know that Spiderman 2 had a budget of 300 million, but what is the budget for Xbox’s games? Maybe Xbox is making a minimum of 2 games with that money.

The interest in Xbox consoles is dying little by little, but not in their games. Now is the best time to make the change to a hybrid-console, while Xbox is still known as one of the Big 3. And Xbox won’t compete directly with Nintendo, as the premise is to be a more powerful console.

Of course, if the rumors about PS’s hand-held are true… It will only be worse for Xbox.

This is true.

I think it has the same problems Xbox would, and requiring developers to port games to it would hinder its success. Not to mention, Sony can’t even support their existing platforms.

I think the model only works when you can create one game and it runs everywhere.

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I agree with you if the best they can do is something that can only run last gen xbox One games or older there is no point in making a portable. People want to play the same games they play on their home console. That is part of the reason why the Switch has been so successful. They started doing that towards the end with the 3ds and Wii U offering the same games on both and it was the right move.

I am not as concerned with the price it would take to get Series S level performance out of a device the size of a surface tablet or small laptop They would just have to put it on the Xbox all access financing path and tie that into gamepass monthly payments. That is how all the Cell phone companies get people to spend $800+ every 2 years on new phones. I would add $5 to $10 a month to my gamepass subsciption if I got a new Xbox everytime they released one. If people couldn’t finance their smart phones with their carrier monthly plan hardly anyone would be getting a new phone much less every 2 years or so. Gamepass all Access would be a way to offset higher costs of a higher end console or portable console.

Also if they wanted people to only be able to play older games locally current smartphones are pretty much at that point now. They could just realese some last gen or older games directly on Android or Iphones. Halo Combat Evolved being released on phones with full MP support and cross play with MCC would be pretty dang awesome on a phone with an Xbox controller. I know you can play Infinite now through the cloud, but it isn’t the same as natively on a phone or portable device.

https://twitter.com/IdleSloth84_/status/1753539464071094493?t=Sa338D6A7aakMEcs9tBGdg&s=19

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Series S should have been a portable. Dont care if it would have cost 600 plus

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