Razer reportedly plans to build a phone for gamers, but needs more money

[Misanthrope]

5 hours ago, Stefan1024 said:

Why do all this big companies think they have to spend a lot on smartphone development?

 

The market is already flodded and it is very hard to have an unique selling point. Also a "normal" high end smartphne is already good for gaming. At least for the 10 minutes you need to wait for the bus.

 

I don't see a (financial) success for this product.

Hubris: it's no accident than Red is making a smartphone too. It seems like they eventually start believing the stupid hype they created for their brand and think they're actually competent enough to compete with the biggest companies in the world like Apple or Samsung.

[PlayStation 2]

So a tablet? Seems impractical.

[suicidalfranco]

knowing razer, it will probably be an iphone look a like only with worse build quality, thermal throttle like crazy, cheaper glue and rgb

[Doobeedoo]

Well will be interesting to see it. Price will be high I expect yes. 

[vanished]

18 hours ago, nerdslayer1 said:

[...]

 if they do are you interested, would you buy it? why or why not? would a phone made for "gamers" be worth it? 

[...]

In theory I would but I expect not to because I expect it to cost an arm and a leg.  "Regular" flagships are already insanely overpriced and a "gaming" phone would just increase that even more since they would need to out-do them considerably on hardware to earn the name.  Not that the increased hardware would actually cost so much more that they would need to increase the price to be profitable, but you know they would.  And by them I mean razer in this case but it's not like it's just because they're greedy - any other company would do the same.

[vanished]

5 hours ago, SCHISCHKA said:

I'm reading this from my Nvidia tablet which I am quite happy with. Nvidia should make a phone. 

This I would buy in a heartbeat, because if it was anything like the shield tablet, they'll take what is basically a flagship device, drop the crap no one needs like the camera, add amazing speakers, a competition-destroying GPU, and then price it at less than half of said competition.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

43 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

This I would buy in a heartbeat, because if it was anything like the shield tablet, they'll take what is basically a flagship device, drop the crap no one needs like the camera, add amazing speakers, a competition-destroying GPU, and then price it at less than half of said competition.

Drop the camera? How would we use Snapchat and live stream then? 

[vanished]

2 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

Drop the camera? How would we use Snapchat and live stream then? 

well to be fair the shield tablet did have one... actually two, and in fact the front-facing camera was 5 MP - higher than most at the time - but the rear one was also 5 MP and certainly nothing to write home about.  But tbh that's how I feel about all phone cameras anyway so there's not much point investing in a "good" one.

[suits]

Do they want to make a phone for gamers or a phone for gaming. Because that's two different things. A phone for gamers could be successful if it was a nice phone for a good price. A phone for gaming is pretty useless unless they are going to support it with worthy games that make sacrificing other areas of the phone worth it.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

Just now, Ryan_Vickers said:

well to be fair the shield tablet did have one... actually two, and in fact the front-facing camera was 5 MP - higher than most at the time - but the rear one was also 5 MP and certainly nothing to write home about.  But tbh that's how I feel about all phone cameras anyway so there's not much point investing in a "good" one.

A decent one doesn't add much to the manufacturing cost and R&D I guess. The issue I have is that many gamers probably also use Snapchat and all of these popular social media apps. If this "gamers phone" hinders their ability to use these apps, then what's the point of it? It might as well be a secondary device. 

Just now, suits said:

Do they want to make a phone for gamers or a phone for gaming. Because that's two different things. A phone for gamers could be successful if it was a nice phone for a good price. A phone for gaming is pretty useless unless they are going to support it with worthy games that make sacrificing other areas of the phone worth it.

Yea if Razer is going to succeed with this, they have to get developers on board. The games I see people pay on all the time on transit run smoothly on current flagships. Even if Razer prices it competitively, I don't see it attracting much attention from the current folks who have the flagship iPhones and Android devices. There are many cheap devices currently out there that can play games well, yet the flagship devices are still selling like hotcakes. 

[Qub3d]

19 hours ago, LooneyJuice said:

A smartphone for gamers. It may be overly cynical, but that sounds like toilet paper for crane operators, or spoons for gymnasts. Maybe even socks for ventriloquists or a toothbrush for extraterrestrials.

 

Actually, the latter would be a genuine departure from baseline designs to accommodate a completely new market segment. This phone, however, maybe not so much.

This post nailed what I was thinking. In addition, The "____ for gamers" idea has such a bad reputation attached to it. When I hear something is made for GAMERZ, I see a big black hulk of a machine with annoying LEDS and cheap plastic angular crap all over it.

 

I don't want that, Especially in the context of a phone. I want a phone to be usable, comfortable to hold, and fairly minimalist. I do not want a phone with a big-ass green snake logo on it that can strobe with green light.

[TopWargamer]

21 hours ago, nerdslayer1 said:

"phones for gamers" didn't work out sony tried it 

That was actually my first phone. It was awesome! Honestly I wish something like this, but more powerful, existed nowadays.

[SCHISCHKA]

4 hours ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

This I would buy in a heartbeat, because if it was anything like the shield tablet, they'll take what is basically a flagship device, drop the crap no one needs like the camera, add amazing speakers, a competition-destroying GPU, and then price it at less than half of said competition.

i think theres no gorilla glass on the tablet which is prob why it is cheaper than samsung and the ipad mini. Prob cant cut gorilla glass off a phone. Certainly dont need a high end camera on a gaming phone, but i dont know if the market would agree with me. They just need a dock for the controller like they did with an earlier product. My only complaint is i cant attach my tablet to the controller

 

[dizmo]

This shouldn't be surprising to anyone. After all, why else would they have acquired Nextbit? Razer can make some attractive products, so I think this might actually be a decent looking device. Until of course they put their logo on it, which I bet will light up green. Gross. Good thing there's skins. I gather it'll be over priced, but it's really not hard to get quality hardware made these days. 

On 21/07/2017 at 5:24 PM, Drak3 said:

Inb4 Galaxy S8 clone with triple the battery.

So.. Another, even more explosive phone? 

I don't think there's much more room in that chassis. 

19 hours ago, JAKEBAB said:

Id never buy it and i think the market is already too saturated but, i can imagine it being matte black aluminum, (why didnt the s8 come in this -_-) similar to the blade with some sharp edges. It could look really sleek imo.

Because wireless charging. 

14 hours ago, FeralWombat said:

A phone for gamers... unless it runs Crysis, most gamers probably won't care. thanks for sharing the news though, I've had a laugh.

Mobile games in terms of sales are actually extremely massive. I wouldn't underestimate them. 

10 hours ago, Misanthrope said:

Hubris: it's no accident than Red is making a smartphone too. It seems like they eventually start believing the stupid hype they created for their brand and think they're actually competent enough to compete with the biggest companies in the world like Apple or Samsung.

You're looking at REDs phone in entirely the wrong context. They're not making a phone to compete with the consumer devices that Apple or Samsung make. They're making a prosumer phone that works within their ecosystem. They can sell it at much higher prices, making the ROI a lot easier to achieve. 

6 hours ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

This I would buy in a heartbeat, because if it was anything like the shield tablet, they'll take what is basically a flagship device, drop the crap no one needs like the camera, add amazing speakers, a competition-destroying GPU, and then price it at less than half of said competition.

They'd have a long way to go to figure out something that's energy efficient enough to double as a usable phone though, would they not? 

 

I don't think the camera is useless  I can't wait until someone makes a 4 or 6 sensor cameracentric phone. 

Then again, maybe on a gaming only phone...

[Drak3]

1 minute ago, dizmo said:

So.. Another, even more explosive phone? 

I don't think there's much more room in that chassis. 

Obviously it'd be thicker.

[KE2012]

If the phone has a single piece of software that is made in house Razer then they can forget me even considering it. They can make cool looking hardware but Jesus, they need to sack the software department and start anew. 

[iamdarkyoshi]

On 7/21/2017 at 4:13 PM, nerdslayer1 said:

"phones for gamers" didn't work out sony tried it 

Believe me I fucking wanted one of those when I was younger

[JAKEBAB]

2 hours ago, dizmo said:

 

Because wireless charging. 

I meant the frame? The part that is glossy black like the jet black iphone. My note 7 had matte black but s8 only has gloss.

 

[dizmo]

49 minutes ago, JAKEBAB said:

I meant the frame? The part that is glossy black like the jet black iphone. My note 7 had matte black but s8 only has gloss.

 

Really? The pictures I saw made it look like the same metallic frame that the Note5/S6 had. It's a glossy black? That's gross.

[Misanthrope]

3 hours ago, dizmo said:

You're looking at REDs phone in entirely the wrong context. They're not making a phone to compete with the consumer devices that Apple or Samsung make. They're making a prosumer phone that works within their ecosystem.

According to the video Linus made it's far too cheap to be just a camera ecosystem tool: Just the regular 7 inch LCD screen along with the fucking cables needed to plug in is the same 1500 (Not really but close enough) No processors, no camera censors, just a fucking screen.

 

 

[dizmo]

2 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

According to the video Linus made it's far too cheap to be just a camera ecosystem tool: Just the regular 7 inch LCD screen along with the fucking cables needed to plug in is the same 1500 (Not really but close enough) No processors, no camera censors, just a fucking screen.

He didn't really look into it much. It's a full fledged phone, but you can turn it into anything with many, many modules. You can look up the patent application and it goes in depth into what they have planned, down to a massive professional cinema style rig (more of a pipe dream there, I think, but it's documented).