What’s an Xbox? It’s a query that’s solely been requested twice in human historical past. The primary time was in 2001 when engineers at Microsoft turned PC elements into a house console. The second time is now, as Microsoft strikes past that {hardware} to new frontiers to gasoline its now-gargantuan recreation publishing equipment. A type of frontiers is PC gaming handhelds, and the ROG Xbox Ally X is the primary flag planted clumsily in that soil. It’s a step in the precise course however not a convincing one. It’s a half-measure at finest, and one which will provide you with sticker shock.
Lets get this out of the way in which: The ROG Xbox Ally X prices $1,000. That will get you an AMD Ryzen Z2 Excessive chip, 8GB of additional reminiscence, and an 80wh battery in comparison with the $600 Xbox Ally mannequin’s Z2 A processor, smaller reminiscence, smaller battery, and smaller storage (512GB of SSD as a substitute of 1TB). Microsoft solely despatched me the Ally X for evaluate, so I can’t let you know how the 2 match up or if the improve is value it. What I can let you know is that $1,000 is loads to spend on any handheld, particularly a PC gaming one that also feels this compromised.
It’s greater than double the value of a Swap 2, and $450 greater than the bottom Steam Deck OLED. At simply 7 inches, the 1080p, 120Hz display continues to be smaller than each of these cheaper options. The brand new Asus-manufactured handheld, like the unique fashions, nonetheless comes with an unlimited bezel that makes it seem like an inexpensive pill. Nothing concerning the Ally X shell, the flexing of the display while you press down on it, or the density of the elements inside offers the sensation of a luxurious gaming system.
It does really feel surprisingly mild and comfy in my palms, although. It’s one of many heaviest handhelds round at 1.57 kilos however the distribution of the burden makes it hardly really feel noticeable. The brand new Xbox controller-like paddles on the ends are far and away the most important enchancment the Ally X makes. They give the impression of being foolish. They are foolish. They’re additionally probably the most comfy built-in grips of any handheld I’ve performed. The most important letdown, then again, is perhaps the brand new modified Home windows OS.
An expensive Xbox pores and skin over a well-known Home windows expertise
The Xbox Ally X has a singular job and it doesn’t do it significantly effectively. Its central process is to prepare your entire PC video games from your entire totally different launchers in a single easy-to-navigate menu that allows you to swap between them like your tabbing throughout the Xbox console dashboard. Bonus factors for the Xbox Ally X being a transportable system that allows you to play the most important blockbuster releases on decent-to-good settings from the consolation of your sofa, mattress, or anyplace else that isn’t the desktop PC you already spend an excessive amount of time ruining your posture in entrance of. The Ally X will get a good grade on the latter. Sadly, it principally bungles the previous.
Out of the field, the hand-held continues to be very a lot a Home windows system. Solely after a pair hours of me fiddling round with downloads and updates did the Ally X have every thing it wanted to launch the full-screen Xbox expertise. That’s the system’s fundamental promoting level, at the least till the modified OS ships to different PC gaming handhelds in early 2026, and it’s not an amazing signal that it doesn’t activate the primary time with it able to go for October 16 launch.
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As soon as put in, you by no means have to consider Home windows once more, besides for each time there’s an error display, otherwise you swap to one of many non-Xbox launchers like Steam or the Epic Video games Retailer. Video games that require you to log right into a separate firm’s portal to entry them additionally interrupt the expertise. Taking part in Cyberpunk 2077 on Steam required opening the Valve-owned storefront adopted by the proprietary CD Projekt Crimson launcher adopted by the precise recreation’s fundamental menu. Not all of it’s Microsoft’s fault, but it surely’s only one instance of the boundaries of the extra gamer-friendly model of Home windows the corporate is touting.
Credit score the place it’s due: there are some actually cool options right here. The Ally X comes with a devoted Xbox dwelling button. Urgent it pulls up a cross-bar the place you may shortly entry shortcuts for not too long ago performed video games, the principle storefronts and launchers, and a bunch of settings menus and gameplay seize instruments to tinker round with. Maintain the Xbox button down and also you’ll pull up every window that’s presently energetic on the system. You possibly can toggle between these with the touchscreen or the bumpers after which shortly shut any of them out by holding down the “X” face button. The sleep mode additionally works properly. Press the facility button and the display goes off. Press it once more 12 hours later, enter your move code, and your recreation can be proper the place you left it.
Close to console-like recreation efficiency
These are the components of the Ally X that remind me of the most effective components of the Xbox Collection X/S. Fast Resume was a small addition this console era with a huge impact. Microsoft’s consoles retailer suspended states for a number of video games in an effort to shortly swap between them with out having to do all of the laborious work of saving, shutting them down, and beginning them again up once more. You possibly can see hints of that modern pondering within the Ally X’s retrofitted gaming layer for Home windows, but it surely feels incomplete proper now. It’s much less a deep tissue renovation than a recent coat of paint that missed some spots and is already peeling in others.
Let’s discuss video games for a second. I’m not right here to do benchmark evaluation. I performed every thing from Battlefield 6 and Murderer’s Creed Shadows to current smaller hits like Devour Me and Megabonk and so they all ran someplace between adequate and nice. On big-budget AAA releases I might get round 40fps on medium graphics settings or larger with frame-generation. Efficiency and visible element was constant and nothing ever crashed on me. On the similar time, there was by no means a second of “Wow, I can’t believe [insert game here] looks this good in my hands!” Something from Hades 2 or Hole Knight: Silksong on down runs completely, and fact be instructed I spent most of my time enjoying indie video games from Recreation Cross and Steam.
That’s a part of the conundrum of contemplating a $1,000 PC gaming handheld. Certain, you may run via bombed out buildings, land some kill photographs, and take aims in Battlefield 6. Regardless of the good ergonomics and dutiful efficiency, nevertheless, this isn’t the place I need to spend most of my time enjoying that sort of recreation. The identical goes for cinematic blockbusters like Spider-Man 2 and Ghost of Tsushima. These Sony exclusives are technically accessible for the primary time ever on an Xbox-branded system. Nonetheless, I’d desire to indulge in these worlds on console or desktop (additionally there was some bizarre visible hitching in Spider-Man 2 that I couldn’t fairly determine how one can repair). The Ally X is perhaps the closest to replicating a PS5 or Xbox Collection X gaming expertise in a handheld to date, but it surely doesn’t quiet really feel revelatory sufficient to justify the soar but.
That leaves two options. The Ally X is both a $1,000 field to play $20 indie video games you may run on the 8-year-old Swap, or it’s a dear accent that extends the standard PC and console gaming expertise past a single room and display. The Ally X is surprisingly good in that function. Cloud knowledge syncs seamlessly forwards and backwards between it and different gadgets you may play your library on, and cloud gaming runs easily sufficient to be a significant possibility for accessing an enormous library of Xbox console video games that aren’t natively accessible on PC, even when it’s nonetheless removed from being a satisfying answer.
The Steam-sized elephant within the room
Microsoft has up to date some PC video games in its retailer to have little badges that permit you understand how effectively they’ll work on the Xbox Ally handhelds. For no matter cause, although, there are many listings, together with Minecraft, that also don’t point out it in any respect. The Outer Worlds 2 is “handheld optimized.” Murderer’s Creed Shadows is “mostly compatible.” Silent Hill F warns to “check minimum requirements.” Sea of Thieves, in the meantime, will “perform great on your device.”
What checking for these little badges actually drove dwelling for me, nevertheless, is simply what number of video games aren’t accessible in Microsoft’s PC gaming retailer in any respect. Even if you wish to keep in its ecosystem as a lot as potential, you’ll nonetheless should enterprise to different storefronts for giant video games like Monster Hunter Wilds and Metallic Gear Stable Delta: Snake Eater. And these retailer pages supply no assist or guarantees for a way the video games will run on Ally X, along with making you cope with the still-cumbersome strategy of swapping between the Xbox hub and locations like Steam.
For all its neat concepts, maybe probably the most damning factor concerning the expertise of truly navigating the Ally X is how not one of the new, Xbox-centric modifications make it really feel almost nearly as good as Steam Large Image mode, which might sometimes by accident take over my display once I pressed the incorrect mixture of buttons. When that occurred, my eyes would instantly chill out. The controls instantly felt snappier. Even on the Ally X, Steam nonetheless feels prefer it’s profitable the PC gaming handheld race. It left me pining extra for what the $1,000 model of a Steam Deck would possibly seem like than what a extra seamless, feature-complete Home windows gaming expertise might be.
I went into my time reviewing the Ally X hoping it might verify the entire packing containers and turn into the unquestionable normal bearer for gaming on this type issue. As an alternative, it’s arduous to advocate to anybody who doesn’t have already got a large Microsoft PC gaming library, or have their coronary heart set on being a guinea pig for a Home windows gaming experiment that’s nonetheless very a lot a work-in-progress. What’s an Xbox? I’m undecided anymore. But it surely’s undoubtedly not the Ally X. No less than not but.
