When Nintendo launched the Swap in 2017, it had no competitors in devoted handheld gaming, a sector it had established with the Sport Boy in 1989 and dominated ever since. Sega had come and gone; Sony, after two decided makes an attempt with the PlayStation Moveable and PlayStation Vita, had nearly given up.
As Swap 2 nears launch in 2025, issues look just a little totally different — however solely just a little. The colossal success of the Swap has awoken the slumbering giants. Sony and Microsoft are actually reportedly making ready devoted PlayStation and Xbox handhelds. Improbably, although, it was the PC gaming sphere that made the primary transfer. Valve led the way in which with the Steam Deck in 2022, which swiftly seeded a rising ecosystem of comparable, PC-based handheld units from producers like Lenovo and Asus. After a quiet decade, non-Nintendo handheld gaming is a factor once more. And meaning the Swap 2 won’t run unopposed for handheld gaming supremacy.
In a way, Nintendo is the sufferer of its personal strategic foresight. With the Swap, it was the primary to identify that the narrowing hole in processing energy between cell and at-home units had enabled a unification of handheld and residential gaming experiences. Lastly, the identical video games may work in each contexts. The Swap proved this level emphatically, and now everybody needs a chunk.
However with devoted units from Sony and Microsoft nonetheless years away, for now that competitors should come from Steam Deck and the opposite PC handhelds. My colleague Chris Plante persuasively argued that these units characterize Nintendo’s “greatest risk within the current.” They trounce the Swap on specs and have closed the hole to up to date AAA gaming within the dwelling till it’s virtually imperceptible. Software program-wise, they provide the compelling worth and staggering vary of nearly every thing on Steam — and far of PC gaming past it, if you happen to’re ready to fiddle a few bit.
Photograph: Nintendo
It’s true that the Swap 2’s worth and specs put it into direct competitors with the lower-end PC handhelds. At $449, it’s $50 costlier than the bottom mannequin Steam Deck. The Swap 2 is roughly comparable in energy and storage, has a significantly better display screen, and with removable controllers and a TV dock included within the worth, it’s rather more versatile to make use of. The bottom mannequin of Asus’ ROG Ally handheld ($499 or thereabouts) and the brand new Lenovo Legion Go S ($549) are additionally fairly shut opponents by way of specs.
In uncooked {hardware} phrases, these are all very comparable units. It’s value noting that the Swap 2’s unique entry to Nvidia’s market-leading DLSS upscaling know-how ought to enable it to punch a bit above its weight class. However realistically, there’s not a lot between them.
However — and it’s a really, very massive however — evaluating the Swap 2 to the PC handhelds by operating your finger down a spec sheet, or by noting that they will all play Civilization 7 and Elden Ring, doesn’t inform the entire story. Inside an fanatic bubble, PC handhelds are an enormous deal, however they don’t exist in the identical universe as Nintendo consoles. To place it bluntly, PC handhelds are nonetheless area of interest.
The Steam Deck has been an enormous success for Valve, however let’s put it in perspective. Valve has not mentioned gross sales numbers, however market analysis estimates that it has bought round 4 million Steam Decks. And Steam Deck dwarfs its competitors; the identical analysis means that, in whole, round 6 million PC handhelds have been bought within the three years because the Steam Deck went available on the market. Worryingly, there aren’t but indicators of sturdy progress in gross sales.
Stack that up in opposition to the Swap’s 150 million items bought and the wild distinction in scale turns into evident. After all, it isn’t a instantly analogous comparability. PC handhelds have solely existed for 3 years; the Swap has been round for eight years, and Nintendo has been within the handhelds enterprise for greater than 35 years. All the identical, Nintendo predicts it should promote 11 million items of the getting old Swap in its present fiscal 12 months — greater than 5 occasions the expected gross sales of PC handhelds in that point. In the meantime, analysts reckon that the Swap 2 will, by itself, outstrip the scale of the PC handheld market virtually instantly, with 6 to eight million items obtainable at launch, and as much as 20 million gross sales in its first 12 months.
Photograph: Valve
Valve is an enormous participant within the recreation trade, and a really wealthy firm. However it’s a newcomer to the world of client electronics retail, and it has plenty of catching as much as do — if it’s even taken with doing it. Steam Deck isn’t obtainable to buy in shops; you may’t stroll into Walmart and choose one up. Valve will not be shopping for adverts for it on TV or at bus stops. Corporations like Lenovo and Asus have extra conventional distribution channels, however they’re tiny minnows in comparison with the advertising, retail, and distribution may of Nintendo.
There are different components that make the PC handhelds area of interest merchandise. The consumer expertise of Home windows-based handhelds just like the ROG Ally and Legion Go is notoriously dangerous. Valve’s SteamOS is significantly better, however it’s nonetheless fairly far faraway from the reliability and ease supplied by Nintendo and the opposite console platforms.
You can not unbox a brand new Steam Deck, flip it on, and play a recreation right away. It requires tinkering to get the most effective out of. Though Valve’s verification system for video games is a useful information, it’s not assured you’ll get a great, playable expertise on each recreation. The Deck can be cumbersome and heavy. You’d by no means purchase one for a kid, or share one inside a household — it’s clearly not designed to be shared. Realistically, it stays a tricky promote for anybody who isn’t a gaming hobbyist.
There may be, reportedly, one upcoming system that might be able to change this narrative just a little. Microsoft is alleged to be working with a PC handheld producer on a system that may have Xbox branding and a consumer interface primarily based on a brand new model of the Xbox PC app. This has the potential to be a extra user-friendly system that gives quick access to PC Sport Go on the go, which might be fairly compelling. However, though Microsoft has now been making Xbox consoles for over 20 years, it has constantly struggled to make use of that have to make PC gaming extra seamless, regardless of repeated makes an attempt — and the system doesn’t sound like rather more than a stopgap till Microsoft’s personal devoted handheld console is prepared.
Nintendo won’t have true competitors in handhelds till its friends within the console area get entangled. Microsoft is reportedly eyeing 2027 for the discharge of its handheld Xbox. Sony’s transportable PS5 can be mentioned to be years away, if it’s ever launched. Issues are undoubtedly heating up for Nintendo, and by the top (and even the center) of the Swap 2’s life, the hand-held gaming market is bound to be a lot busier than it’s now. However for the following few years, competitors for the brand new console will stay distant — at greatest.
