Xbox Building A Handheld 'Makes No Sense', Says Former Blizzard Boss

What didnt make sense to me is to partner with ASUS ROG ally for an xbox handheld then make one of your own a year and a half later. Are you trying to compete with yourself?

I disagree. I think a first party handheld is absolutely welcome - and folks have been asking for it for years now. They'll probably gauge success from the 2025 model and see where to go from there - but I do think a native handheld is worth looking at and I'm glad they've side-lined it rather than outright cancel it.

Do they have any idea what they want to do at this point?

Nothing at Xbox makes sense anymore.
I hope we can get PCs running steamOS in a near future so it can fill the void of Xbox consoles.

In another article I noticed Jez was all too happy to give everyone his two penn’orth regarding Shuhei Yoshida’s putting subscription services on blast. Jez made a long list of quotes from industry executives to…’prove’ Shu wrong. I wonder if Jez will include Mike Ybarra’s comment in any upcoming articles regarding whether canning the handheld was the right decision or not🤔

I want them to lean into the xbox is a pc strategy. So a handheld that only has xbox store/interface is not something i want. Hopefully they get windows into a more gaming focused state. It seems like steamOS is lighting a fire inside microsoft and showing them that default windows is not the best choice for every device. They need a version with no bloat and is gaming focused.

Steam deck kind of already has the solution with the desktop mode as a separate thing to use for the computing side of setting it up and the gaming mode for ease of use/console feel.

At this point I'd be surprised if they dont sideline all hardware. Not saying they will of course (before folks jump on me), just every other MS hardware that has been announced and arriving soon has been sidelined. Why not go the whole hog at this point.

(The rog is not MS hardware, its Asus with xbox branding).

You could also argue that making an Xbox (or a PS) doesn’t make sense either since you can just install SteamOS on a small gaming PC and plug it into your TV… but people will still buy a PlayStation anyway.

Personally, No new Xbox hardware makes sense anymore(Handheld or otherwise). Their current business model has been killing the hardware side for years now.

Another Xbox president L. She needs to be fired immediately. How much was wasted in this obviously stupid idea?

It's waste of time and money. I'd guess maybe 5% gamers at most care about handheld (that is not Nintendo handheld).

And out of that 5% - - 95% are 10 years old or younger.

@Sindayl I think for Xbox that does apply, but maybe less so for PS. Whilst Sony are releasing games on PC there is no real strategy behind when or if they release, or even how good the port will even be. With Xbox you know the games will be on PC day and date, and if GP is you thing then you can still enjoy it on PC. Of course consoles will always have the ease of use factor that so many prefer.

Its why I have always been PS / PC to cover all the bases.

@Cornpop76 People love to slate the Portal and I really don't get it as I think its the best way to handle what is really more of an accesory to a main console.

Switch offers a hybrid and that works for Nintendo as people are happy with them offering lower tech. For MS and Sony people want the best they can get and that means a full fat console. Offering a cheaper way to have portable gaming without it costing the price of another full fat console is what we need more off.

I agree - unless Xbox make a Handheld that's heavily subsidised, but would be 'locked' to ONLY Xbox and require Subs for Online play, then I think working with 3rd Party PC manufacturers - like Asus, makes more sense.

Both an Xbox and PC are Microsoft Windows based and if MS can add 'Xbox' or an Xbox gaming layer into Windows OS, that allows Xbox gamers to play their 'Xbox Console' library, as well as access to Steam, Epic, Bethesda.net, Battlenet etc and of course Game Pass for Console/PC, then that probably makes an Xbox handheld 'pointless'. It may appeal to a 'few' but maybe not enough to make it a 'viable' product.

I doubt an Xbox Handheld would be 'significantly' cheaper than a Handheld PC boasting 'similar' specs - inc 120hz VRR display, similar GPU/CPU/RAM and Storage - even if it is 'subsidised' by MS.

Xbox only existed to bring PC gaming to the 'masses' but now PC's are more affordable and cloud is the 'cheap' way to bring these games to the masses. 20yrs ago, no-one would have thought you'd get a Gaming PC in a Handheld format but now Steamdeck as well as Asus, Lenovo, MSi etc have all got a Handheld PC on the market.

I can see MS making a Surface Pro Handheld PC/Xbox at some point in the near future - more so than a handheld Xbox console.

No one knows what Microsoft's gameplan is with Xbox including Microsoft, it seems they are just going where the wind takes them.

Feels like it’s going all software.

@Ilyn what’s the point of portal when you can just use your phone + a much cheaper mobile controller to stream your games from your console or cloud?

@Sindayl Bigger screen, better construction, proper controller and most importantly its not tying your phone up and killing its battery whilst its doing it.

The nexbox has to be something outlandish. A handheld that comes with a dock with an egpu, $599ish. Allows for third party stores. Modular for consumer friendly repairs/upgrades.

@Millionski A cheap handheld locked to only Xbox is what people here seem to want - something maybe 'Series S' like but in handheld so 'lower' res (up to 1080p) and maybe £300-£400.

But that would still be competing with all those with Steamdecks, RoG Ally, MSi Claw, Lenovo Go or any of the other Handhelds - many of which will also be cheaper in a few years, let alone the next wave (or two) of Handheld PC's coming out.

It makes much more sense for 'Microsoft', the owner of the OS in both Xbox and Handheld PC's (not steamdeck) as both uses Windows and DirectX API for gaming, to work on their OS and better integrate Xbox into PC - especially for Handhelds.

By the time MS have researched and developed their own - specifically locked to Xbox for seemless transition of libraries and ease of use for its console only users who don't want a 'Windows PC' home screen when they turn it on, the market will likely be too small to recuperate their costs because many will own another Handheld that will also play ALL the Xbox games as they ALL release on PC and a whole lot of games not on Xbox Consoles and some that are only on Sony Consoles too.

Microsoft have just been stringing everyone along with fake announcements and promises. They're taking huge GamePass losses now, but with the goal to getting everyone on a streaming cloud-only gaming app.

The "biggest generational leap ever" is their Azure cloud servers.

@Ilyn My phone has a huge screen, the battery lasts forever, my USB-C mobile controller is absolutely divine and I have (almost) unlimited 5G without needing to share it with any other device.

Of course my phone is way more expensive than more basic device such as « Portal ».

I mean I've been saying the same thing since it was announced, Microsoft needs to stick to software. They need to really hone in on making great games & the success will follow.

The success of Microsoft ? Yes and the fall of Xbox hardware and Xbox store for sure, including our investment into the brand.

It's amazing how far behind people are. I could've made a good living being a tech advisor. It doesn't take a genius to see Game Pass was a bad business decision, Microsoft now knows was never a good idea to begin with that lead to studio closures and mass layoffs. Turn to the PlayStation community with PlayStation doing everything right and Xbox watches their software ... Um.... "Fly off the shelves" and Xbox actually makes money. They weren't making money on Xbox. They weren't making money on Xbox Anywhere, even. They're making ALL THEIR MONEY ON PLAYSTATION in the HOME THAT SONY BUILT!

When Xbox decided they wanted to follow the handheld, those of us with eyes to see knew it wouldn't work and for this very reason. Do consumers know and just aren't vocal about it, unlike the diehards that loom over the threads? Xbox fans want it because they're begging for Xbox to stay relevant. They don't want a Dreamcast repeat, except wiser SEGA fans know better today with clearer eyes looking back. It was painfully obvious Xbox wasnt blazing any new trails but just following the trends as they always do. The handheld is far too saturated to think they can take it on.

Moral of the story? PlayStation are the king of hardware. Let them build the hardware and make third-party software. It should've been that way all along. With less pressure, we might even see PlayStation's return to proprietary hardware (innovation in hardware) that leads to more unique experiences instead of off the shelf parts.

"There's no competition now with Xbox going third-party." Um. Yes, there is. You have three now: PlayStation, Nintendo, and Valve. You still have options, but, after the initial hype with the honeymoon phase and all of that wears off, third-party will abandon Switch 2 and focus on PlayStation and Steam. Happens all the time with Nintendo underpowered machines as more powerful gives devs more tools to push hardware and then Nintendos inferior hardware fades back into the mist. So, yeah, you'll get some surprising third-party games for a little while, but many third-party devs will look away and focus on more modern hardware.

Oh, and all the fuss about using a joycon as a mouse? Feedback doesn't seem to be very good for that gimmick and some are already saying: "Thankfully Switch 2 will allow you to use a real mouse" so the Joycon mouse already doesn't work. Kind of like SIXAXIS for the PS3, I recently just used in my playthrough of InFamous to get the platinum trophy

@Sindayl - Dude, your User Icon of Space Channel 5 ought to indicate to you that you know better. I went through the same era and watched the fall of SEGA. While then it was a tragedy and still is today seeing the pre-SEGA Sammy era, when we, with honest eyes, look back at that time, SEGA wasn't just hemorrhaging money as everyone likes to say, they had a lot of inner turmoil going on that wasn't condusive to a healthy growing environment for what SEGA once was.

When people have adjusted to the better fit in the gaming world and getting rid of the unnecessary and look back and see documentaries made on the subject and Xbox will be honest with the world, we'll see the same thing. The inner struggle of Xbox and the man behind the curtain that was dishonest and a conman trying to get away with shady business decisions to make corporate board members more wealthy and steal from the pockets of hard working people. Give it time. The truth will surface and you'll see real transparency l, just as we saw from SEGA. Except SEGA wasn't dishonesty, you know better. It was jealousy and Sega of Japan and Sega of America's inability to get along and that was horrible as more Japanese games should've made it overseas to the Americas. Sony Computer Entertainment America and Sony Computer Entertainment of Japan knew right out of the gate, through the experience of Steve Race, that the two had to get along and work together, and that they very much did so and it crippled SEGA.

Xbox, however, has a much deeper story that's more than just Don Mattrick, but while Phil Spencer, Matt Booty, and Sarah Bond are still at the helm, you're gonna have to wait some time before all that surfaces. I would also say, at some point, because Activision/Blizzard employees will become frustrated with how Xbox does business and how out of touch they are, a lot of employees will leave to join other devs or start their own, eventually they'll want to leave and Xbox in the future will allow Activision to disconnect themselves or shut the studio down altogether and that $69 billion will be even more wasted. There's so many IPs there Microsoft will never use again, they'll die, and won't know how. Phil Spencer SHOULD have out of good will and as a sign of good faith and a peace offering and to gain friendship, shown up with a HDD in a fancy wooden box, much like Guerilla Games did with the Decima Engine for Kojima, to the front door of Insomniac Games with the IP of Spyro the Dragon to return him back home and to the front door of Naughty Dog with the IP of Crash Bandicoot to return him back home where he belongs. Crash Bandicoot STILL lives on through Naughty Dog, but Xbox has no idea what to do with him. He's a trophy to them, that's all, but they'll ignore him and they're using Call of Duty, a dying breed, and that's about it. Theres so much more, but these days with the cost of game development taking five plus years, $69 billion was poorly spent money

@neoxmahi Third party developers would be foolish to abandon Nintendo when its market share is bigger than Sony's. The Switch outsold PS4 despite the later having a headstart and I've no doubt we'll see the Switch 2 do the same to PS5 which has had a head start.

Besides that, Nintendo remains a platform with strong exclusive titles.

Playstation? It's got nothing. It's released 5 PS5 ONLY games in its whole existence: Astro Bot, Astro's Playroom, Demon's Souls, Destruction All Stars and Quantum Error. Two of them are very poorly rated. One of them in a remake of a PS3 game.

The other "60+ exclusives" Wikipedia lists are literally cheap recycled shovelware, mobile ports or VR titles that nobody has heard about. To take a random example that I googled: Gunship: Zombie for example is just a retitled port of a mobile game called Zombie Gunship and I sincerely doubt people brought a PS5 to play mobile ports which probably play better on a phone lol.

Every other game is on PS4, a remaster that people have already played on PS4/PC or a "exclusive" that released on PC too (Helldivers 2). Sure it managed to snag a few timed console exclusives like Black Myth and Silent Hill 2 but they both were on PC day 1.

That's the other thing, Playstation is held back by its own inferior hardware with the PS5 struggling to run Unreal Engine 5 games such as Black Myth Wukong and Silent Hill 2 Remake, both of which I played on PC, high settings with a FPS above 60 which the PS5 can't handle.

There's a reason PS5 is dead in its own country. People there are either playing on Switch or PC.

Speaking of poor business decisions, Sony has been making as many bad ones as Xbox. Look at Playstation's commitment to live service games nobody wanted, hence all of them being cancelled after years in development or released as flops rivalling that ET game such as Concord...if fact, Concord is probably the biggest flop in gaming history far surpassing both Redfall, ET and Gollum put together.

5 years spent on Concord, 400 million down the drain and then it was shut down in a week. God knows how much Sony has wasted on the other live service games it has cancelled. Meanwhile plenty of Sony IPs themselves remain dead, actual good IPs that could be revived but instead we're getting another live service flop this year named Fairgame$ and Marathon from the fallen Bungie with stolen content and AI generated artwork because all the talent left

If it weren't for Kojima's Death Stranding 2 or an asset reflip of Ghost of Tsushima, Playstation would literally have nothing releasing this year.

So glad I switched to PC + Switch and abandoned Sony this gen.

@CaptainCluck God damn, this guy gets it. Refreshing to see. They drove the boat into an iceberg on purpose, and now are doing everything they can to keep people from jumping ship in the hopes they spend a few last dollars at the canteen. It's all *****.

MS already has a powerful handheld they can already bring their games to and succeed with; it's called Nintendo Switch 2. 😉

@TruestoryYep Couldn't have summed up Sony better. Sony has completely lost their way with PS5. Worst generation of PS ever by far. Their once great now dormant IPs, while their embarrassing live service stuff all gets cancelled, is the death blow for me. 💔😢
PS just sells cause it's PS. Switch can't handle many 3rd party modern, big-budget titles, and Xbox does miss out on some major Japanese stuff, plus apparently has "nothing worth playing", so PS5 is the default safe choice for many.

@neoxmahi It’s actually impressive that you’ve managed to display awful takes in just about every possible aspect of this discussion. Bravo.

@TruestoryYep I came in here to say all of this Re: Sony, but you pretty much covered all those bases so no need. Thanks. 😉

@Kaloudz @Kaloudz 100% agree. Ybarra has a checkered history as an analyst & needs to stay in his lane. The direction Xbox is heading here isn’t exactly a mystery nor is it rocket science…& yet so many otherwise intelligent people can’t seem to wrap their brains around it.

A hybrid handheld capable of running native Xbox games + PC via ‘Play Anywhere’, + Steam, EPIC, etc…would be a fantastic addition to the Series X console/PC hybrid successor…& I fully expect this is exactly what we’ll be getting in a couple years.

All of the typical Xbox doom & gloomers have been saying ‘Xbox is dead’ for well over a decade now. Xbox has ‘died’ so many times I’ve lost count. The brand is a damn Super Zombie by this point. Some of these new characters outright lie about Game Pass ‘losing money’ when we know for a fact the Xbox division is setting healthy revenue/profit records. These histrionics are possibly the most hilariously out of touch, but this nonsense is nothing new.

Yes, Xbox is clearly shifting gears & de-emphasizing in-house hardware as they concentrate on GP & SW sales on a variety of platforms, & so the Xbox brand is pivoting to remain healthy, not to kill itself off.

I have mixed feelings. I think MS needs to figure out a solid xbox hardware strategy. I think a portable if powerful enough would fit their game everywhere approach and offer something that would appeal to many people. However I still think MS needs an xbox OS release instead of windows that runs xbox games. Give people access to their full digital library.

@mjswooosh Couldn't agree more with you. The whole "Xbox is Dead" couldn't be further from the truth. They've been on a roll now for a good while, and this year alone has been super, super impressive.

I think there's a small group of people that just like to hate on them for no good reason - same way folks hate on Nickelback or some other form of medium that they think is "cool" to bash on. Sadly for them, it doesn't alter the facts that are contrary to their belief system. 😅

Yes, Xbox is clearly shifting gears & de-emphasizing in-house hardware as they concentrate on GP & SW sales on a variety of platforms, & so the Xbox brand is pivoting to remain healthy, not to kill itself off.

This is exactly what they're doing. 110%. They haven't just dropped 80 million to tuck tail and bow out. I'm not sure why folks latch on to news like this and run with some nonsensical narrative. As for Mike Ybarra, I never liked him much when he was in Xbox - making snide comments left right and center and I don't have much truck with him now for the exact reasons you point out.

@GuyinPA75 you are way wrong on this one. I'm an executive in my 50s and travel a ton. I miss gaming on the road and the new ASUS has literally allowed me to play some of my favorite games on the plan and in my hotel room. At my age I'm not price sensitive, so it was a no-brainer for me. I suspect there are thousands like me out there.

@Sindayl performance.

@Joe_Danger Glad you enjoy handheld gaming. But you are one of a very, very, very, minority. All because you enjoy handheld gaming not make me wrong.

If you were in a great majority, the Xbox first party handheld world been released by now. Microsoft knows there is no money to Xbox handheld market.

Nintendo is another story. They are like when you want a burger you go to McDonald's or burger king. Not KFC or Popeye's.

But... an executive that feels the world is exact because in their eyes they like something - so everyone else must too. Guess I've always been correct on more than just Xbox handheld market.

Microsoft really hurt Mike Ybarra didn't they. All he does is talk negative about them now.

Depends on how they go about it. I don’t see them dropping the S like model for next gen, so if a dock able handheld replaces it I could for sure see it being a hit