Will smartphones ever replace handheld console and what it would take to do it?

[centurion_08]

I'm pretty sure somebody, somewhere, asked this question. Even thou i only seen the most powerfull phones only on youtube videos it got me thinking.

My current phone can run almost all the retro systems, and pretty demanding native-android games. These highest tier smartphones on the other hand can push balls to the wall graphics.

I have a feeling that the gap is closing really fast. I'm pretty sure the biggest gripe is the controler scheme, which is really inconvenient. What are your thoughts on the subject?

 

[Eigenvektor]

6 minutes ago, centurion_08 said:

I'm pretty sure the biggest gripe is the controler scheme, which is really inconvenient.

I'd say this sums it up pretty much. To replace a handheld console, you'd have to add convenient controls to the smartphone. Maybe also optimize the OS a bit for the use case of gaming. To save cost, remove some hardware features gamers don't need. Maybe add some kind of game store. And … voila, you have a handheld console.

[Stahlmann]

Didn't they already replace handhelds for most people? When is the last time you've seen anyone with their Sony PSP or Nintendo DS playing games in public? Personally i've never even seen anyone with a Switch in public...

[flashiling]

14 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

Personally i've never even seen anyone with a Switch in public...

guess that depends on the people and place you are at.

i had a co-worker playing diablo on his switch at work

[minibois]

I think phones have already replaced gaming handhelds.

If you just look at the sales figures of a GameBoy, GBA, Nintendo DS or PSP and compare that to the sales figure of the 3DS and PS Vita, you see a lot less have been sold.

 

The only handheld that remains relevant is the Nintendo Switch and Switch Lite.

The Switch Lite is of course the only 'fully handheld' of the two.

[Dragonwinged]

I currently use my phone as my primary gaming device. Here are my issues:

 

1. Touchscreen controls are far from ideal for handheld gaming, and I've yet to find a decent controller for smartphones that can alleviate this problem. I currently use my Dualshock 4, however connection issues and odd bugs prevent me from using it full-time, plus the DS4 isn't the most portable controller.

 

2. The Android Operating system is extremely bloated and consumes way too much resources while idling. A custom ROM may help with this issue, however it'll likely void your warranty and potentially brick your phone. There are dedicated gaming phones like the Asus ROG phone and the Razor phone. I don't have any info on their os optimizations, but there's probably someone here that does have access to that information.

 

3. The Google Play store is not well-optimized for game info. In order to find out if a game will support your hardware or run it well, you'll have to download it, and sometimes those games come with a price tag, so unless you want to spend money on a game that might not work, you'll probably end up pirating apps. From a copy of the classic Doom port from

*******, I found out that it doesn't have native controller support, making the game that much more difficult to play. I did send messages to both Steam and GOG, requesting them to add Android games to their libraries, however they have not yet responded. Their platforms are already optimized to provide information on games, like minimum specs and controller support. Although, it seems with each new version of Android, Google is making it more and more difficult to download and install apps from sources other than the play store. This may mean that eventually in order to purchase apps outside google play store, you'll need a custom ROM, or a phone pre-installed with the cabability to bypass google restrictions, such as the /e/ os project. More information on them here:

 

https://e.foundation/

 

4. Stigma. There's no real cure for this except time and good publicity. The mobile games marketplace tends to be thought of conataining nothing but cash-grabs designed to steal your money with in-app purchases. This negative stigma makes people want to avoid games labeled with the "in-app purchases" tag, even if the actual app is designed as a demo app, with the full game locked behind a single in-app purchase. One such example is the mobile game Grimvalor, a 2d action RPG with the tone and stylings commonly found in Soulsborne games. The google play store and ios app store are also flooded with cheap asset flips with heavy microtransactions and outright ripoffs of popular franchises that illegally use copyrighted assets. Just search for "pokemon" on your app store and you'll find dozens of apps that illegally use pokemon assets. The fact that Nintendo leaves these up while mercilessly persuing fangames is a sore point among many gaming fans. 

 

I do believe smartphones will eventually completely eclipse the handheld gaming market, but they'll need to get by these issues first.

[Zodiark1593]

Controls and quality of games are the only things really holding back smartphone gaming. Smartphones have really competent GPUs nowadays, and can handle relatively complex visuals. It’s not a speed problem anymore, but controls and dev effort. 

[SaudAlomari]

if you are talking about AAA games, I believe smart phones wont replace handheld devices just yet, because:

1 - most of mobile gamers tend to only play free games, which drives away developers who make AAA games that doesnt have in-game purchases.

2 - both mobile gamers and developers dont really know the capability of mobile device, since it has hundreds of variations, which makes mobile gamers hesitative to buy a +10$ game that might not work well on their device.

 

Solution:

1 - have an app that test the mobile devices gaming capability, like 3dmark or cinebench on pc, and not just that, all mobile games developers should use this app to reference the mark needed to run their game.

2 - have a dedicated games store, that only accept selling paid games and online games that are ad-free and gains only from in-game purchases.

3 - provide high quality and mobile-special controllers, preferably by big phone companies themselves like Samsung, Google and Apple etc.

4 - mobile gamers should always keep asking for AAA games from developers, and always support buying +10$ games so developers would finally consider developing for the great smart phone.

 

I myself love smart phones, and im sad that serious games are few in them, and my dream is to build video games for smart phones that are as good as a AAA game on consoles or pc, not necessarily the same visual quality, but has the same experience.

[Cheburek]

9 hours ago, SaudAlomari said:

if you are talking about AAA games, I believe smart phones wont replace handheld devices just yet, because:

1 - most of mobile gamers tend to only play free games, which drives away developers who make AAA games that doesnt have in-game purchases.

2 - both mobile gamers and developers dont really know the capability of mobile device, since it has hundreds of variations, which makes mobile gamers hesitative to buy a +10$ game that might not work well on their device.

 

Solution:

1 - have an app that test the mobile devices gaming capability, like 3dmark or cinebench on pc, and not just that, all mobile games developers should use this app to reference the mark needed to run their game.

2 - have a dedicated games store, that only accept selling paid games and online games that are ad-free and gains only from in-game purchases.

3 - provide high quality and mobile-special controllers, preferably by big phone companies themselves like Samsung, Google and Apple etc.

4 - mobile gamers should always keep asking for AAA games from developers, and always support buying +10$ games so developers would finally consider developing for the great smart phone.

 

I myself love smart phones, and im sad that serious games are few in them, and my dream is to build video games for smart phones that are as good as a AAA game on consoles or pc, not necessarily the same visual quality, but has the same experience.

Mobile phones may have a powerful cpu but have a veeeeery bad GPU.AAA games wont work because there is only so much work that you can offload to cpu.

Thats why many games like pubg,when ported to phone have reduced maany aspects that will ussually be handled by gpu like grass,lighting.Only high end smartphone games like genshin impact keep some of their graphics.

And solution 1 is already solved.There are not many phone benchmarks but there are  some,and games are developed on pc first anyway.

2.Pointless,there is already a paid section of most android stores.

3.Already exist,you can controller a normal xbox controller to a phone anyway,not much work to be done.

 

[SaudAlomari]

8 hours ago, Cheburek said:

Mobile phones may have a powerful cpu but have a veeeeery bad GPU.AAA games wont work because there is only so much work that you can offload to cpu.

 

i agree that mobile gpus cannot cope with pc and consoles gpus,

but i believe that games doesnt have to have top notch visuals to be AAA games, look at ps2 and psp games for example, they have many AAA games even though their visuals are modest,

and most high end mobile phones now adays,  can run them easily with an emulator, imagine to be able to run them without an emulator, itll be even easier.

 

8 hours ago, Cheburek said:

 

3.Already exist,you can controller a normal xbox controller to a phone anyway,not much work to be done.

 

mobile phones need mobile-special controller that will give mobile gamers great gaming experience to let them considering buying +10$ AAA games,

something like Switch controller.

xbox controller in the other hand is great on pc or console, but it gives an annoying experience on phones, you already have a somewhat heavy phone, its even worse to carry more weight of a console controller.

 

[michelletaylor]

Yes, we can think of it but the thing is that we can even play games in cellphones and laptops then why do we buy gaming PCs and Play stations, XBOX, etc? We all know the reasons and differences & it is the same reason that mobile phones cannot replace handheld consoles.

[gamagama69]

On 2/15/2021 at 3:32 AM, centurion_08 said:

I'm pretty sure somebody, somewhere, asked this question. Even thou i only seen the most powerfull phones only on youtube videos it got me thinking.

My current phone can run almost all the retro systems, and pretty demanding native-android games. These highest tier smartphones on the other hand can push balls to the wall graphics.

I have a feeling that the gap is closing really fast. I'm pretty sure the biggest gripe is the controler scheme, which is really inconvenient. What are your thoughts on the subject?

 

Mobile gaming is already extremely popular, the main reason the switch is popular is because of nintendo exclusives and more traditional games on it.

[Unboxious]

The controls are bad, but the method for distributing apps is just as much part of the problem. Unfortunately Google makes it very difficult to find games in their store that aren't shameless cash grabs, and I don't see that changing any time soon; a shameless cash grab for a dev is a shameless cash grab for Google too. It's an embarrassment that you can't filter by things like whether an app has microtransactions in it, or requires certain permissions.

[Joshua_P_Gervacio]

On 2/15/2021 at 4:32 PM, centurion_08 said:

I'm pretty sure somebody, somewhere, asked this question. Even thou i only seen the most powerfull phones only on youtube videos it got me thinking.

My current phone can run almost all the retro systems, and pretty demanding native-android games. These highest tier smartphones on the other hand can push balls to the wall graphics.

I have a feeling that the gap is closing really fast. I'm pretty sure the biggest gripe is the controler scheme, which is really inconvenient. What are your thoughts on the subject?

 

As a protable gaming console, yes they pretty much have. But in terms of playing console games thats another matter in it of itself. If Smart phones would replace portable consoles like the nintendo swith, it would need be able to play console titles especially the new ones natively without using any emulators.

[darknessblade]

Smartphones will never take over the position of hand-held games.

 

Mainly due the bad support of the manufacturer.

Games can be played on EVERY "android device" even the ones they did not intent to make it for.

Limited performance/decaying performance if you have a lot of apps open.

 

Phone's are generally used for calling, browsing, and games

 

Hand-held consoles are for pure gaming, even a 10 year old NDS can still play games just as well as in its hayday.

 

a 10 year old phone can barely run a current gen game, if it even boots.

[centurion_08]

On 2/22/2021 at 4:56 AM, Dragonwinged said:

I currently use my phone as my primary gaming device. Here are my issues:

 

1. Touchscreen controls are far from ideal for handheld gaming, and I've yet to find a decent controller for smartphones that can alleviate this problem. I currently use my Dualshock 4, however connection issues and odd bugs prevent me from using it full-time, plus the DS4 isn't the most portable controller.

 

2. The Android Operating system is extremely bloated and consumes way too much resources while idling. A custom ROM may help with this issue, however it'll likely void your warranty and potentially brick your phone. There are dedicated gaming phones like the Asus ROG phone and the Razor phone. I don't have any info on their os optimizations, but there's probably someone here that does have access to that information.

 

3. The Google Play store is not well-optimized for game info. In order to find out if a game will support your hardware or run it well, you'll have to download it, and sometimes those games come with a price tag, so unless you want to spend money on a game that might not work, you'll probably end up pirating apps. From a copy of the classic Doom port from

*******, I found out that it doesn't have native controller support, making the game that much more difficult to play. I did send messages to both Steam and GOG, requesting them to add Android games to their libraries, however they have not yet responded. Their platforms are already optimized to provide information on games, like minimum specs and controller support. Although, it seems with each new version of Android, Google is making it more and more difficult to download and install apps from sources other than the play store. This may mean that eventually in order to purchase apps outside google play store, you'll need a custom ROM, or a phone pre-installed with the cabability to bypass google restrictions, such as the /e/ os project. More information on them here:

 

https://e.foundation/

 

4. Stigma. There's no real cure for this except time and good publicity. The mobile games marketplace tends to be thought of conataining nothing but cash-grabs designed to steal your money with in-app purchases. This negative stigma makes people want to avoid games labeled with the "in-app purchases" tag, even if the actual app is designed as a demo app, with the full game locked behind a single in-app purchase. One such example is the mobile game Grimvalor, a 2d action RPG with the tone and stylings commonly found in Soulsborne games. The google play store and ios app store are also flooded with cheap asset flips with heavy microtransactions and outright ripoffs of popular franchises that illegally use copyrighted assets. Just search for "pokemon" on your app store and you'll find dozens of apps that illegally use pokemon assets. The fact that Nintendo leaves these up while mercilessly persuing fangames is a sore point among many gaming fans. 

 

I do believe smartphones will eventually completely eclipse the handheld gaming market, but they'll need to get by these issues first.

What made you go full mobile? Did you got tired of hardware juggling, games became a chore or lack of time? Quite interested in that.

[Bl4ze_buoy]

Mobile phones just can't make handheld gaming obsolete. Take a switch for example, the CPU, GPU, may be pretty underpowered but give me a gaming phone where you can run AAA games like fortnite and apex legends at 30fps consistently with a controller for 300$.The exclusive games on something like a switch or vita or even 3ds are just sooooo much better than something like subway surfers. Games on handhelds are well optimized compared to android which is full of bloatware that occupies ram all the time even when its completely idle (side note:- this whole conversation is becoming like pc vs console like). Handheld gaming IS disappearing and Nintendo is the only company that wants to keep it afloat but they are doing a good job at it by making good first party games and a hybrid and that is why millions of people are still buying it. Even Nintendo made a hybrid because people just want an all-in-one device where they can game, watch movies or do their work but Nintendo didn't wanna get rid of handheld gaming all together. Vita had limitless possibilities(maybe even outselling the PSP) but sony gave up with very little to no exclusive games. TL;DR: Mobile gaming can make handheld gaming less common among people but not obsolete.

[Dragonwinged]

On 7/3/2021 at 11:53 AM, centurion_08 said:

What made you go full mobile? Did you got tired of hardware juggling, games became a chore or lack of time? Quite interested in that.

In 2016, I bought A PS4, because I was afraid Nintendo would continue with the practice seen in Skyward sword and Starfox Zero, pushing the gimmick of their hardware above and often to the detriment of rhe gameplay experience. Now as far as I've seen of the Switch, they haven't overly pushed the gimmick of switching and the new hardware features onto gamers, although that's not to say they're recent first-party releases have totally met the Nintendo Seal of Quality we have come to expect of Nintendo. 

 

A few years later I decided to buy a PSVita, because it had a number of older ports of games I wanted to play. I learned later however that many of the games I wanted to play could also be pldyes on my phone, not just through emulation, but with native android ports. Add to that the fact that Sony's own poor support of the Vita has left some of these official ports in not ghe greatest shape. Sly 3 theives in time runs slow on the console, and the ports of Wild arms and Wild arms 2 are prone to crashing. You won't find those same issues on mobile emulators.

 

But I mostly switched to full mobile because I don't see the point of a dedicated console anymore. As soon as developers actually start utilizing the hardware to itcs fullest potential, the handheld game console market will be pushed into the niches of retro nostalgia consoles and cheap chinese knock-offs. French developer Gameloft has already produced a high quality racing series (asphalt) and a fps halo clone (NOVA), which both started on the psp. And more AAA developers are now producing high quality games for mobile, albeit with monetization practices we've come to expect of mobile games.

[Rusty Proto]

I know this is an old thread, but if we can get some actual, playable games that aren't just spyware with some pretty graphics on top to come to the surface, and a few "gaming phones" of the sort of the Sony Ericson Playstation Phone that I can, maybe, buy from my carrier, or else a "reverse button controller case" for my current phone, I think mobile gaming may have a chance of becoming the next, albeit low tier PC gaming platform. That said, mobile gaming has pigeonholed itself due to greed. I say they need to come to the surface, because I do know of a few decent games that are plenty playable, though they've been overshadowed by everybody knows what.

[Ironfunky]

On 2/15/2021 at 3:38 AM, Eigenvektor said:

I'd say this sums it up pretty much. To replace a handheld console, you'd have to add convenient controls to the smartphone. Maybe also optimize the OS a bit for the use case of gaming. To save cost, remove some hardware features gamers don't need. Maybe add some kind of game store. And … voila, you have a handheld console.

Xbox controllers, steel series, Playstation, and Amazon luna controllers all work with android. Look up which games have controller support for best results (cod mobile has control support, but pubgM, does not, for example) I've tried some independent controller makers with android, they run poorly. An Xbox controller with a phone mount is perfect for this, the mounts can be had for less than 30$ in most cases(or probably 3d printed, I don't 3d print). Gen 1 xb controllers work best so used options are cheap and perform well, had issues with the seriesX in Android. If you want to clear the clutter of crap games on the play store just get Google play games, search your favorite genre and remove iap and ad filled options. 

[Dr_badwolf]

Smartphones have already replaced handheld gaming.
Just imagine a handheld as a PC... What specs would you want?

IF your handhelp is MIPS or ARM, then 1/1 translation in QEMU is easy.
However i have always used 16-1 ratio for x86 to ARM/MIPS translation in QEMU.

Consoles are for the RE**rded!

[Bramimond]

Smartphones and tablets have defeated dedicated mobile gaming devices years ago.

The Vita didn't see a successor and Nintendo merged their console and handheld product lines into a single device, since even they have lost confidence in supporting both.

 

I don't expect the SteamPortable to shake things up, either.

 

 

Mobile gaming on dedicated devices is now a niche thing. How many people do you see out with their Switch and how many people do you see out with their phone? Even back in the day with my GameBoy, I never really took it out. It solved the problem of not having enough money for a second TV. There never was a problem of "I'm not at home and need to play a video game". That was just a nice side benefit.

 

Unless you face the problem of not having enough TVs for everyone, dedicated mobile gaming devices aren't really that attractive. If you are rich enough, they make for nice toys that you end up rarely using.

[IPD]

The 2 biggest remaining appeals of handhelds is higher-quality titles (NOT FREEMIUM), and dedicated controls.  IMHO, a company like Sony could kill 2 birds with 1 stone by offering add-ons for Xperia.  Switch-style controls that can slide onto your smartphone, that also include a slot for MicroSD or other game-card/s.  Or even a BT gaming controller remote--but one that was designed from the ground up to work specifically with that brand of smartphone (not just "any android phone").

 

Granted, some genres don't really need external controls.  SHMUP works great with just a soft-tip stylus.  I wouldn't want to play SOR4 or a brawler game with stylus or touch controls (let alone a fighting game).  I liked the idea of 8bitDo's controllers being used with a smartphone, but the execution was abysmal (the device also bricked itself--which is why 8bitDo sucks).  Games shouldn't require you to map discreet buttons with "touchscreen buttons".  And imho, this is where a 1st party peripheral, purpose built for that smartphone--has potential; seamless integration into gaming controls. 

[rikitikitavi]

Talking about hardware capabilities - does iPad count?! Since Pros are equipped with M1, same (if I'm not mistaken) as in laptops that can run unsupported Witcher 3 better than the Switch... it doen't sound impossible to put same/similar performing chips into smaller form-factor.

 

If games like that would start appearing natively... maybe mobile market would change a little bit, and the proper hardware would appear. Maybe Steam Deck would pave the way for AAA games going 'mobile'... feels like by that time quality cloud gaming might be a thing.

[Senior_Chicken]

On 2/22/2021 at 11:56 AM, Dragonwinged said:

I currently use my phone as my primary gaming device. Here are my issues:

 

1. Touchscreen controls are far from ideal for handheld gaming, and I've yet to find a decent controller for smartphones that can alleviate this problem. I currently use my Dualshock 4, however connection issues and odd bugs prevent me from using it full-time, plus the DS4 isn't the most portable controller.

 

2. The Android Operating system is extremely bloated and consumes way too much resources while idling. A custom ROM may help with this issue, however it'll likely void your warranty and potentially brick your phone. There are dedicated gaming phones like the Asus ROG phone and the Razor phone. I don't have any info on their os optimizations, but there's probably someone here that does have access to that information.

 

3. The Google Play store is not well-optimized for game info. In order to find out if a game will support your hardware or run it well, you'll have to download it, and sometimes those games come with a price tag, so unless you want to spend money on a game that might not work, you'll probably end up pirating apps. From a copy of the classic Doom port from

*******, I found out that it doesn't have native controller support, making the game that much more difficult to play. I did send messages to both Steam and GOG, requesting them to add Android games to their libraries, however they have not yet responded. Their platforms are already optimized to provide information on games, like minimum specs and controller support. Although, it seems with each new version of Android, Google is making it more and more difficult to download and install apps from sources other than the play store. This may mean that eventually in order to purchase apps outside google play store, you'll need a custom ROM, or a phone pre-installed with the cabability to bypass google restrictions, such as the /e/ os project. More information on them here:

 

https://e.foundation/

 

4. Stigma. There's no real cure for this except time and good publicity. The mobile games marketplace tends to be thought of conataining nothing but cash-grabs designed to steal your money with in-app purchases. This negative stigma makes people want to avoid games labeled with the "in-app purchases" tag, even if the actual app is designed as a demo app, with the full game locked behind a single in-app purchase. One such example is the mobile game Grimvalor, a 2d action RPG with the tone and stylings commonly found in Soulsborne games. The google play store and ios app store are also flooded with cheap asset flips with heavy microtransactions and outright ripoffs of popular franchises that illegally use copyrighted assets. Just search for "pokemon" on your app store and you'll find dozens of apps that illegally use pokemon assets. The fact that Nintendo leaves these up while mercilessly persuing fangames is a sore point among many gaming fans. 

 

I do believe smartphones will eventually completely eclipse the handheld gaming market, but they'll need to get by these issues first.

For point 1, I do believe its a matter of practice. For example, look at the poeple playing pubg mobile with 4/6/8 finger claws! They practice to the point where movement and aim is similar to mouse and keyboard.