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Should Microsoft venture more into portability?

cormack12

cormack12

Gold Member
Born from this thread

With strong sales of the switch, should Microsoft invest in a dedicated form factor to take advantage of things like Xbox Play Anywhere?

With people baulking at the price of the Scorpio, maybe a cheaper hybrid that scales the game down dynamically could work but offers the power of the Xbox One?
 
M

michaelius

Banned
It's impossible to make portable 1,2TF device (to match specs of xbox one) with current technology.

And if it had less games would need to be patched to support lower resolutions.

Plus they just dropped support for their mobile phone OS which was supposed to be third pillar of Windows 10 environment.
 
Iced Arcade

Iced Arcade

Member
No. even Sony bailed and Nintendo morphed its handheld into a home console hybrid.

and power of the xbox one in a handheld? lol
 
J

jroc74

Phone reception is more important to me than human rights
I say no too.

Ppl need to remember Nintendo were always the kings of hand held gaming. Even with the success of the PSP

MS just basically bowed out of mobile phones, I don't think they are going to mess with portable gaming.

And Sony doesn't seem to wanna do it anymore. Even tho that's a door for MS, it's s door to not go thru.
 
Hoya Destroyer

Hoya Destroyer

Member
Nintendo seems to have the younger demographic covered with their portable products. Older teens and upwards, probably just game on their phones if they want to. I dont think MS would compete well with Nintendo, with the younger market.
MS wouldnt want to risk another Zune happening either.
 
P

pitchfork

Member
I think they might try their hand at this through some kind of Surface device in the future, but don't see any kind of dedicated handheld console
 
LordRaptor

LordRaptor

Member
If MS employed a bit more "joined up thinking", they wouldn't have let the Xbox division be funding big flashy graphical showcases like Ryse or Quantum Break.

They'd have been funding titles whose minimum specs are an off the shelf Surface, so anyone buying a surface automatically has a portable version of whatever exclusives those might have been and theres some synergy between buying one piece of MS hardware with another via Play Anywhere.
 
SpartanN92

SpartanN92

Banned
No...Just keep adding to the list of play anywhere titles. My laptop with an Xbone Controller is my portable solution.

The only thing I'd ask changed is the ability for your saves to carry over from xbox to PC on non play anywhere games. For example I'd buy a copy of Fallout 4 on steam if my Xbox saves would carry over.
 
J

jroc74

Phone reception is more important to me than human rights
pitchfork said:
I think they might try their hand at this through some kind of Surface device in the future, but don't see any kind of dedicated handheld console
Click to expand...

Bryan Newman said:
No...Just keep adding to the list of play anywhere titles. My laptop with an Xbone Controller is my portable solution.

The only thing I'd ask changed is the ability for your saves to carry over from xbox to PC on non play anywhere games. For example I'd buy a copy of Fallout 4 on steam if my Xbox saves would carry over.
Click to expand...

I think some mix of this is the most they do. Might work with surface.
 
1

120v

Member
if this were 5-10 years ago i'd be 99.9% sure MS would be looking into their alternative to Switch. but their "vision" for the xbox brand seems so muddled right now, who knows.

i do think dynamic form factors are the way of the future. but it's an invariable point in the future, could be a few years from now or a decade from now. most likely when pretty much any game can be effortlessly streamed
 
geordiemp

geordiemp

Member
Now, a surface pro that plays PC games with a Joystick,

That would be cool if it was GPU powerful enough to do so.

Maybe with 7nm
 
dsier

dsier

Member
No, definitely not. IMO there is not a chance they can be truly successful in the mobile space, because who would they try to appeal to? Casual Xbox players would like a true AAA experience, which isn’t possible on a mobile device (I think). Casual gamers will play on their mobile phones or tablets, trying to sell them a gaming centric mobile device is hopeless. So the only ones who would certainly buy such a device would be hardcore Xbox fans, but making a console only for them isn’t feasible from a business perspective.
 
LordRaptor

LordRaptor

Member
dsier said:
No, definitely not. IMO there is not a chance they can be truly successful in the mobile space, because who would they try to appeal to? Casual Xbox players would like a true AAA experience, which isn’t possible on a mobile device (I think). Casual gamers will play on their mobile phones or tablets, trying to sell them a gaming centric mobile device is hopeless. So the only ones who would certainly buy such a device would be hardcore Xbox fans, but making a console only for them isn’t feasible from a business perspective.
Click to expand...

portable doesn't mean handheld.
MS already have a portable device that they sell.
It just has zero emphasis on gaming, because the Xbox division declared themselves gatekeeper of everything gaming related.
 
C

crazygrape

Member
cormack12 said:
Born from this thread

With strong sales of the switch, should Microsoft invest in a dedicated form factor to take advantage of things like Xbox Play Anywhere?

With people baulking at the price of the Scorpio, maybe a cheaper hybrid that scales the game down dynamically could work but offers the power of the Xbox One?
Click to expand...
Thank you for posting it for me. Interesting responses, I would have thought more people would go for it.
 
ViolentP

ViolentP

Member
Portable PCs already offer anything Microsoft could bring to the table. The library is their best opportunity but even that isn't getting enough attention.
 
Sosokrates

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
An xbox tablet,like the switch but with a 1080p screen and the controls arnt detatchable, that can only play 360 + og xbox games and some less demanding xbl games would be cool.

I think a better solution would be to make 360, og xbox games and some xbl games compatible with win10 and then partner up with a 3rd party hardware manufacturer amd make an xbox win 10 gaming tablet. That would migrate a lot of risk and cost for MS.
 
N

Niceguydan8

Member
If so, they better have a good strategy.

It's been proven time and time again that Nintendo will own most of the portable space even if they are outdone technologically.

I'm all for competition but Nintendo has a stranglehold on that market for years with good reason. They dont really miss when it comes to portables often at all.
 
A

Atomski

Member
The only way they would find success in the portable market would be make games for the Switch.

No one would buy a MS made handheld.

zune.. never forget.
 
Majukun

Majukun

Member
no,if they didn't do it when there was a big profit margin,no sense doing it now that cellphones have eaten a big part of it.
 
Alebrije

Alebrije

Member
Nope, they should venture on new IPs instead new hardware. Also portable is monopolized by Nintendo and the market is risky due to mobile devices.
 
Goalus

Goalus

Member
Surface Phone first.
Establish that as an alternative to Google/Apple, and after that go for the handheld market. It might take a while.
 
Vigilant Walrus

Vigilant Walrus

Member
The Surface lineup is really cool. Why not approve that?

Get price down; more value; higher quality / warranty, and try to do things that Apple doesn't, like add more Color SKUs.


Surface Book 2 15 with GTX 1060 graphics look incredible. But it's also expensive. There are 1060 GTX laptops around 1000-1500 dollars. I want to see Surfaces that you can use for gaming and productivity at those brackets.

Secondly, the thinness of the Surface makes me worried about heat output. If you need to do 100% CPU load on it for many hours every day (or game for many hours), that CPU might push 85-90> Celsius constantly. That's unfortunately within normal ranges of thermals for a lot of vendors, but I hate the focus on ultra thin over making better thermals. Microsoft copied Apples obsession with thiness and it makes their products worse.
Heat, Noise and longevity matters. If you've ever had a sleek stylish thin laptop that ran like shit after doing work on it, because the temp goes high so quickly. It annoys me that users have to repaste their CPUs (breaking the warranty) for a lot of laptops to get decent temps as well as undervolting.


I think Surface has continually tried to improve, and I think they got the right deal. More and more I am working with people who are annoyed with their Macbooks and iMacs inability to use Touch and Stylus interfaces while doing all manners of creative, advertisement and content.
 
B

Benjamin1981

Member
Their portfolio doesn‘t fit the portable space. No way to nickle and dime the user with loot boxes without a constant internet connection on a portable device.

And they should invest in first party content on tjeir existing hardware before even thinking about a portable.
 
cormack12

cormack12

Gold Member
crazygrape said:
Thank you for posting it for me. Interesting responses, I would have thought more people would go for it.
Click to expand...

I think as well that Microsoft and Sony both chased the wii USP with Kinect and Move and ultimately got burned. MS more so than Sony. WiiU bombed and Nintendo changed their USP with Switch. So they'll be a bit more wary about chasing that, especially when the Vita is quite a recent failure as well (which did have remote play).

It takes a lot of effort and money to do a USP as a feature that's worthwhile, especially for return on investment. Nintendo actually occupy a very comfortable space. They're not a 'competitor' and do well in the second console space. I remember people would eventually get a PS3 and a 360. But now with digital sales tied to accounts and needing to purchase a Gold/Plus subscription to access the ecosystem I don't think this will be as common on the next generation of consoles.

I do think there's more scope to develop the remote play equivalent for sure, and to lead on cloud based games.

Ultimately I think the next battle will augmented reality versus virtual reality. I'm leaning more towards augmented being a better experience, which Microsoft is leaning more towards I think. While Sony champions PSVR.
 
U

Unai

Member
I wouldn't want a xbox mobile. What could be interesting is that if microsoft did their own GPD Win-like PC.
 
S

SporeCrawler

Member
they failed with zune and they failed with their nokia devices, which were pretty good. so no. maybe they can somehow expand their surface lineup to portable gaming but i doubt it.
 
C

crazygrape

Member
cormack12 said:
I think as well that Microsoft and Sony both chased the wii USP with Kinect and Move and ultimately got burned. MS more so than Sony. WiiU bombed and Nintendo changed their USP with Switch. So they'll be a bit more wary about chasing that, especially when the Vita is quite a recent failure as well (which did have remote play).

It takes a lot of effort and money to do a USP as a feature that's worthwhile, especially for return on investment. Nintendo actually occupy a very comfortable space. They're not a 'competitor' and do well in the second console space. I remember people would eventually get a PS3 and a 360. But now with digital sales tied to accounts and needing to purchase a Gold/Plus subscription to access the ecosystem I don't think this will be as common on the next generation of consoles.

I do think there's more scope to develop the remote play equivalent for sure, and to lead on cloud based games.

Ultimately I think the next battle will augmented reality versus virtual reality. I'm leaning more towards augmented being a better experience, which Microsoft is leaning more towards I think. While Sony champions PSVR.
Click to expand...
Good points. I am holding of on augmented reality until the next generation. I will just have to be happy with my son's switch for my portable needs lol.
 
E

EdgeXL

Member
If Sony could not be bothered to keep supporting the Vita then MS would do no better with a handheld.

If anything MS should make more games that can run on Surface tablets as well as Xbox and PC for a true "Play Anywhere" experience.
 
hououinkyouma00

hououinkyouma00

Member
Oh god no.

This isn’t me railing on Xbox fans, but Xbox doesn’t have enough exclusives to fill their console let alone a console plus a handheld. They definitely aren’t going to be able to make a handheld with Xbox One power to just port over games either.

For me personally, and again not railing on Xbox fans (I’ve owned every single Xbox console, and I’ve sunk hundreds of hours into the exclusives) but I would like to see Microsoft finally just move over to PC. Maybe make a Steam Machine-esque 1st party PC with the Xbox brand so that you sort of have a console still available that the majority will buy.
 
Falchion

Falchion

Member
It would be interesting but it's so high risk and I think the chances of it paying off for them are really low.
 
Rephin

Rephin

Member
They shouldn’t touch a portable at this stage. Mobile and Switch are firmly holding on to the crown at this point, and I’m not sure who would even support a Microsoft portable with software (first party or otherwise).
 
Shouta

Shouta

Member
I think the biggest and most obvious reason for Microsoft to not do so is just how difficult it is to be a big enough success to make it worth the R&D and manufacturing investment. The only group that has had success worldwide in that sphere has been Nintendo, who has built a brand over the last 28 years since the release of the Gameboy. Sony's attempted it twice now and only has had moderate success worldwide, mostly propped up by strong sales in their home market and a few other circumstances. Microsoft wouldn't have the home market advantage if they decided to create a portable as it's not a big enough place to really support them there. Their brand power overseas is also limited in the place that would garner the most sales.

The last part is pretty key. Japan has been a huge part for both Nintendo and Sony's handhelds. Although it has shrunk in recent years due to the rise of smartphone/mobile gaming, it still presents potential sales. Microsoft doesn't have the presence in Japan to move units there nor do they have the potential game support to make it a viable thing. They'd have to rely on the Western markets, notably the US, for it but portables have a significant time gaining enough traction here to make a new device worthwhile.

There's other reasons as well but the above two are the big ones and why it wouldn't be a great idea, I think.
 
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