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Exclusive: Google Pixel 9 processor won't be the ambitious chip we hoped for (www.androidauthority.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You bring up an interesting point, and now I'm wondering: how would a gaming-focused phone sell in a post-Switch world? We all remember the Xperia Play, but maybe it was just too early. What if Apple released an "Arcade edition" of the next iPhone for $1000, which featured a slide out controller or some other slick integration of physical controls? How well would that sell, and what impact (if any) would it have on Switch/Steam Deck sales?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I mean, Asus and nubia have been making a gaming-specific phone for many generations now. Razer even gave it a try back in 2018, but I don’t think they released any follow up devices.

Lenovo also made a couple devices, but announced earlier this year that they’d be discontinuing their gaming phone business.

There seems to be a fan base and market for gaming-specific phones, but given Lenovo and Razer got out of the game and the fact that you haven’t seemed to have heard of any of these devices/product lines: my guess is that they are super niche.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I appreciate the links and examples, but none of those has physical gaming controls like I was suggesting. Obviously high end hardware is important in a device like this, but the physical controls were my key point.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I hear you, and fair enough, but I think the fact that none of these gaming-specific phones has physical controls like you described built in speaks to how impractical that ask is.

And I think it’s important to note: there’s weren’t just powerful phones (in fact, many of them seemed to get bested by other phones in more benchmarks than they won), they were specifically marketed and sold as gaming phones; that was the specific niche that Asus, Lenovo, Razer, and others all sought to fill. Despite that, and despite basically all those companies having a ton of general experience building gaming hardware of one sort or another, none of them thought it was a good idea to include physical input methods on-device. They pretty much all have accessories that turn it into something looking akin to a Switch or DS, but none had them baked into the actual phone.

And I honestly think that makes a lot of sense. Thumb sticks aren’t super pocket-able, and I feel like even if they could be made to fit into a pocket, sliding them in and out of bags and pants over and over would make them fail faster. And while A/B/X/Y buttons might be more reasonable on that pocket-ability metric, do you want to smush them (or thumb sticks, for that matter) against your face while you take a call?

While current controller-esque buttons and thumb sticks remain the primary input method for games, I really don’t see gaming phones including those input methods within their physical form factor. It might be a limitation of my imagination, but I just can’t envision how one would make that work (and it seems I am not alone in that).