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Sony’s PlayStation Portal gives a confusing first impression
(www.theverge.com)
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this post was submitted on 13 Nov 2023
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Portal’s not so bad if you’re happy with just your PlayStation library and simply want something for your bedside stand.
I currently use a retroid pocket 3+ for almost only that purpose, and let me tell you, an 8 inch, 1080p screen + a full dualsense in my hands at night for just $200 seems like a really nice upgrade even if it means leaving my emulators on a different device.
(Too bad for Sony I’ll personally be spending a lot more to have a Steam Deck OLED though) (teehee)
I have a Steam Deck and I don't even own a PS5, so I'm probably way outside of the market for the Portal...
But I'm really finding it hard imagine this device finding a broad audience, since even in a hypothetical best case we're talking about a subset of a subset of PS5 owners. From what I understand the new PSVR sold pretty badly despite being a pretty solid piece of VR hardware, this feels like a very niche and underwhelming piece of hardware and so I really can't imagine it performing any better.
Someone will buy a PS Portal, and hopefully they like it, but when the smoke clears I don't see it being a big hit.
The Steam Deck OLED on the other hand, I suspect will sell out fast. It seems like there is a pretty big chunk of people who were interested in the first gen Steam Deck but opted for the wait and see approach, and I can imagine a lot of those people jumping on the Steam Deck OLED now that they know the device has lasting power. Personally I probably can't justify the cost of upgrading from the LCD model right now, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to...
I'll tell you a secret: if you have a steam deck, you have a Playstation portal as well. I beat days gone to platinum on steam deck... By streaming if from a ps4.
You could also get the ayn loki zero for a smiliar price to the playstation portal as well you have an playstation portal that can both play gta v and call of duty emulate ps1 games ontop of streaming your PlayStation 1 games
Yeah, I definitely agree that's it's targeting a niche within a subset. I think we're coming from completely opposite camps, though. I've never had, nor was ever interested in owning a gaming PC. I have some Apple devices for work, a PS5 (and switch) for gaming, and a cheap little android handheld for retro titles -which coincidentally I use to remote play my PS5 from bed almost every night.
For me, adding yet another platform to my ecosystem is kind of annoying, particularly with all the tweaking, tinkering and menuing I won't be able to avoid. But a Deck also means I'll be able to play older windows stuff that either never came to PS or were lost in the PS3 library, and I'll be able to travel with it better, so it's kind of worth it. Plus it'll look really nice when remote-playing my PS5.
Wait until you try the PC ecosystem and realize that it's where the games are the cheapest (thanks to bundles and Steam sales), where we don't even need to ask about retro compatibility because it's not siloed by generation...
Also by far the biggest library because recently console exclusive tend to be exclusive to one console but also ported on PC (except for Nintendo games).
Tv with the ps5 is downstairs, wife wants me to hang out and not just watch me play games, I want to game. I grab the portal and sit on the couch next to wife while she watches tv. We all win.
That seems like a very expensive way of avoiding talking to your wife.
Or it’s so I can talk to her instead of ignoring her…….
I get it, there’s a fancy piece of equipment and you cant find a use for it, so now you insult the people who point out the extremely obvious answer you missed.
I was only trying to be funny, apologies. I thought it was ludicrous enough that it'd pass. Channeling some boomer humour.
Seriously though, I do understand the appeal of it, just not the appeal-to-price ratio. £200 is a lot of money for a glorified screen mirroring device. It's not that it's overpriced per se (it's probably about right in terms of the cost of the hardware), just that I don't understand how it can be worth it with that functionality at that price point.
It's not useless. But it's not useful for a lot of people.
Huh, just like anything else on the market….
The question then is: is it useful for enough people?
The thing is there are a lot of devices that you can use to stream from you PS5 and also have other functionalities. Like playing games natively, or emulators.
Yeah you’re right, and that’s a big sticking point of the Portal, but I think it’s worth noting that if you want a device that does those things with a screen as large as the Portal’s, you’ll probably be paying way more than $200. And that’s before having anything with the kind of haptic tech as the dualsense.
I dont have a TV in my bedroom, but couldn't I set up a system for the same price where I can play all my console or PC games in bed on a full 30+ inch TV if I wanted to? For the same price that is?. It might be an interesting purchase if someone else wanted to be able to use the TV, but if I was buying one for me to play games on while in bed then my partner can gtfo lol. Though I suppose some people might want a more compact solution.
Yeah. I imagine with some savvy shopping you could probably get a 30ish inch TV and a mini PC or Android device to use exclusively for game streaming at a pretty affordable price.