#53: The handheld market is getting crowded

The handheld market is about to saturate with the release of X, Y, and Z, and I argue that this is good.

Hello, good morning and good day.

Welcome to a new edition of the overkill digest newsletter, your go-to source for all things handheld gaming.

I'm currently reviewing the Odin2 Mini, and my review should go live early next week. And although I am still collecting all my thoughts, I can safely say that this has been the most fun I had playing games on a handheld so far. It might be due to the design (the PS Vita is my all-time second-favourite handheld) or the Mini's performance, but playing games on this is simply fun. However, I totally believe that Android only exists to annoy the heck out of me. How I loathe that OS.

Regardless, you can read (or watch) my thoughts early next week. But now, we have to talk about all the new things announced this week.

Big this week

I think I can safely say that handhelds are here to stay. During Computex, we've seen many new handhelds teased, clearly showcasing that the market has matured.

This week alone gave us the following:

The Zotac Zone, featuring an AMD 8840U and an AMOLED screen.
The MSI Claw 8 AI+, featuring a weird name and an 80Wh battery.
The Adata XPG Nia, featuring upgradeable memory?
And we've got updates from Onexplayer and AYANEO independent from Computex

And I don't think this will stop anytime soon. While some might argue that the market is too crowded and that they feel burned out by all these devices, I'd like to argue that we're looking at these devices incorrectly. While the Steam Deck might have launched in an area that was very much still a niche market, its popularity and the success of the ROG Ally have shown that handhelds are now basically just a different form factor for laptops.

And you just need to go to an electronics store or a Best Buy or something to know how many damn same-same-but-different laptops there are.

I believe the handheld market will see the same saturation. Most devices will be similar in the beginning, also because currently only AMD is truly working on handheld-focused chips (although these new Qualcomm chips teased this week might make ARM-based handhelds running Windows much more viable).

So, for the next year or so, I expect most laptop manufacturers to release their first generation of handhelds, figure out what works, and only then truly start to differentiate on more than just how their ABXY buttons look.

I am, for one, very intrigued to see where the market is heading. How will Valve adapt now that they have proper competition? Is SteamOS enough of a differentiation? And does that mean they might, therefore, never release the Linux-based OS to the public? Also, will Microsoft and Sony bring a handheld? And how expensive will an Alienware handheld be?

I'm here for it!

In other news

While Summer Game Fest wasn't as exciting as I expected (here is everything shown), it brought us more Alan Wake II content.
And if you are more into indie games, here is everything featured at the Day of the Devs.
But wait, there's more: The Devolver Direct brought us even more games.
PSVR2 support for PCs is coming on August 7, thanks to a new adapter. And while it's missing many features, maybe that way my PSVR2 will finally see play?
In our team discord, we track what games are currently very popular based on how many people play the game simultaneously. And this random clicker game featuring a banana (yes, a banana!) is going viral.
Tonight, Microsoft took the stage and showcased several trailers. You can check out the event on their YouTube channel.
Official Mod support for Baldur's Gate 3 is coming in September.
A new update to Enshrouded will bring more optimizations to the Steam Deck.
Remember all these Nintendo leaks? It seems the leak came from inside YouTube.
You can now play 3DS games on iPhone thanks to Folium (direct link to the App Store).
Also, someone transformed the iPhone into a PSP Go.
I swear, I'm not making this up, but Ikea plans to pay 10 people to roleplay as Ikea employees... in Roblox.
I'm planning a PC upgrade sometime at the end of this year (or early next year), and Fractal has just announced that I'm going to throw my cash at them.