The Steam Deck was pushed specifically by an online storefront as a “first party console” for the purposes of being, if not a loss leader, something approximating it.
ASUS is not Microsoft. They were going to release a handheld format gaming laptop regardless. They just took some cash from MS to change the plastic on one of their buttons. Once they sell this, that is it for profits (aside from all the spyware ASUS bundles in). The GPDs and Aya Neos had the same problem. And these are significantly more powerful than a Steam Deck at this point.
I would need to dig through the marketing and cross reference AMD’s latest naming nonsense. But 1k for a gaming laptop is a shockingly good deal and the MSI Claw A8 has the same processor and, as of the Toms Guide article I found, was priced at £849.
Personally? I don’t think there is much point in getting something ridiculously powerful as a gameboy and find the Steam Deck to be a great sweet spot where I can play the games I want to play natively but also stream (locally or from a cloud service) if I REALLY need to play something Bigger on there. But I also never really saw a point to gaming laptops for similar reasons.
But the people who do want a gaming laptop? This is what you are looking at.
(laughs in Steam Deck)
The Steam Deck was pushed specifically by an online storefront as a “first party console” for the purposes of being, if not a loss leader, something approximating it.
ASUS is not Microsoft. They were going to release a handheld format gaming laptop regardless. They just took some cash from MS to change the plastic on one of their buttons. Once they sell this, that is it for profits (aside from all the spyware ASUS bundles in). The GPDs and Aya Neos had the same problem. And these are significantly more powerful than a Steam Deck at this point.
I would need to dig through the marketing and cross reference AMD’s latest naming nonsense. But 1k for a gaming laptop is a shockingly good deal and the MSI Claw A8 has the same processor and, as of the Toms Guide article I found, was priced at £849.
Personally? I don’t think there is much point in getting something ridiculously powerful as a gameboy and find the Steam Deck to be a great sweet spot where I can play the games I want to play natively but also stream (locally or from a cloud service) if I REALLY need to play something Bigger on there. But I also never really saw a point to gaming laptops for similar reasons.
But the people who do want a gaming laptop? This is what you are looking at.