Not in its domestic market in Japan. A handful of niche hobbiests may have things like a SteamDeck, but it’s far from mainstream, nor is the market seemingly terribly interested in it.
Agreed. Most Japanese gamers are still console sluts. I don’t know why, but I think space limitations might be a factor. A console has a much smaller footprint compared to a desktop PC.
I recently got a Steam Deck after the Switch 2 reveal because Nintendo priced me out, but the vast, vast majority of people aren’t like me. The Switch 2 will do fine, but not nearly as well as the Switch 1 due to prices being less accessible. I wonder just how many actual new exclusive games Nintendo is going to be releasing for it - their new releases were pretty sparse on the Switch due to so many ports, and they’re already pumping out Switch 1 game upgrades for Switch 2 and marketing them like they’re new releases, not to mention it’s going to be PS4/PS5 dual releases all over again for a while.
As a satisfied Steam Deck owner who will never buy a Switch: The Switch is in a league of its own and has absolutely nothing to fear from handheld PCs. The entire handheld PC market is just a tiny fraction compared to all Switch or future Switch 2 sales.
No it doesn’t. I love my steam deck, and have used it to emulate many Nintendo systems, but Nintendo will always defy people’s expectations by having amazing first party titles. It’s their software, not the hardware.
Love my Deck and think the handheld PC format is awesome… but Nintendo has nothing to worry about. Switch 2 is going to far outsell these devices. It’s much more appealing to mainstream audiences, it’ll be heavily marketed, and it has Mario, Zelda, and Pokemon.
That’s just pure clickbait
Nintendo has a measure of competition again, but I’m sure they’ll be fine. If nothing else they can always find somebody to sue for piracy.
Can’t hear this over the sound preorders going nuts.
Until handheld PCs can be as compact and light as the Switch, it’s not a problem at all. I can fit a Switch Lite into my pocket, I can’t say the same for a Deck.
The soluton to this is to bring back JNCOs.
You can’t really say the same about a non-lite switch 1 either.
The crossover is a very small sub group. Switch 2 is gonna do numbers. These people just make up new bullshit to have another article to push.
Yep!
Every person I knew who was into the Switch 2 complained about the price and then pre-ordered.
In over here chilling with my Steam Deck playing a TOTALLY LEGAL VERSION OF A RED MAN IN A JUMP SUIT.
Exactly these things ability to sell will only be limited by Nintendo ability to produce them lol. I’m glad my kids aren’t old enough to know what any of this is yet. I’m counting my days.
I think with the expanded third party support we saw on the Switch (and will likely follow with Switch 2), handheld PCs will still remain a mostly distinct market from the Switch. They are more of an alternative option - more choice from the massive PC backlog + emulators, but none of the heavy hitter Switch 2 exclusives. They will keep the pressure on Nintendo, however, to keep indie developers happy enough to go through the extra work to make Switch ports of their games, as the PC development experience is far more flexible. For PC gamers, the Switch serves as what I like to call a “gap filler” - anything that doesn’t get released on PC almost certainly gets released on Switch, so the platforms complement each other quite well.
The size of the switch 2 will be its downfall.
It’s smaller than a Steam Deck and that sells just fine, A long with the rest of handhelds being of the similar size.
Don’t think so. Those who actually are interested are just a vocal minority, compared to Switch userbase. I’m personally conflicted on this one.
On one hand, I kinda want to get a Switch 2 because I know how convenient it is to just pick up a Switch and play a game without fiddling with settings.
On the other, I have so many games on Steam/Heroic it just makes sense to get a Steam Deck or a competitor.
For now I’m waiting for the reviews of Lenovo Legion Go S with Z1 Extreme and Steam OS, then I’ll probably make a decision on what to get
Don’t get me wrong I love my Steam Deck… But with its mass-market appeal the Switch 2 is going to steamroll over the handheld gaming device market.
As streamlined as it is, the Steam Deck is sometimes finnicky due to it being a PC (which is an amazing thing for tinker-minded folks). Plus it cannot play some of the most popular PC games on the planet (Fortnite, LoL, Roblox, etc).
Windows handhelds are even more niche, because dealing with Windows on handhelds… Man that takes some serious dedication.
I would wager that Nintendo is going to sell at least 20x more units as the whole handheld gaming PCs lineup combined.
If limited games were actually an issue then the Switch wouldn’t sell. It can only play the games made for it. There are so many more PC exclusives than all console exclusives combined.
The day I see a Steam Deck in Walmart in Mexico (my country) is the day I am gonna acknowledge these PC handheld devices as Switch competence (I mention the Deck because it is the only one that I am slightly interested in getting, probably other brands are already there).
I think the Fortnite, LoL etc stuff will be fixed soon enough.
If there are enough SteamDeck (or SteamOS) people around, they would have to fix it, or they would be missing out on those people.
Plus it cannot play some of the most popular PC games on the planet (Fortnite, LoL, Roblox, etc).
Out of the loop. Why is this?
Most of the time it’s because client-side anti-cheat is not being well or at all supported on Linux.
For instance Roblox used to run on Linux through launchers such as Grapejuice or Vinegar. However the devs now explicitely block Roblox player on Linux due to a large quantity of cheaters coming from there according to their stats. Since their actual Linux userbase is minuscule compared to other platforms, they just chose go the easy (and probably financially sane) route.
As for Fortnite, it’s all about the ROI baby !
If we only had a few more programmers. It’s the Linux problem. I love the Steam Deck hardware. Valve has done an amazing job there; I wish they would get to tens of millions of users, at which point it would actually make sense to support it.
Mostly due to lack of support from the developers, but that often reaches into willful obstruction. People are stubborn and clever, if it can run on windows it can likely run on Linux, but the devs will sometimes put willful roadblocks against things running on Linux. Allegedly to stop cheats, though since most anti cheat software does support Linux I think they just don’t want to deal with the OS.
League of Legends used to work until they brought their kernel level anti-cheat from Valorant into League as well.
If you install windows it can, but natively it can’t as those games don’t support Linux. However, you loose a lot of the value of the steamdeck (SteamOS) by installing windows.
Also windows sucks on a handheld. I dual booted for a while, but it’s just not really worth it.
While I look forward to seeing the market grow, right now handheld gaming PCs are still a small niche compared to the number of Switch 2 units that will ship. Valve can’t manufacture at the same scale as Nintendo, and every other product on the market is a niche within a niche.
