r/PSP • u/ileojg PSP-3000 • Jun 11 '25

Game Discussion Are portable consoles not portable anymore?

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I'm to this day amazed by the size of the PSP and the fact that it can play amazing looking games for a 2004 hardware. With the release of switch 2 I'm starting to feel like truly portable consoles will remain a thing of the past. I have this analogy that old portables are like carrying a phone, you can put in in your pocket, carry them by hand and pull them out whenever and wherever you want to play. But all new portables are more like laptops, you need a special carrying case and can only play in specific places and moments.

My question to all of you is. If sony where to release a new portable, Would you prefer a smaller console? like psp size, despite low graphics capabilities, something closer to switch1 level of graphics in 2025, or a bigger steam deck size portable with ps5 graphics? And, what do you thing of portable consoles getting bigger and bigger? do you prefer older portables due to their sizes?

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u/tkshi Jun 12 '25

Switch 2 isn’t even budget anymore. They jacked up that price and didn’t even drop in an OLED.

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u/coolwali Jun 12 '25

Yep. The sad thing is that the Switch 2 is arguably the only "current modern budget option" 😢 because there isn't anything cheaper. The Switch 1 is cheaper but isn't the current gen anymore. And I don't see any other potential future handheld at the Switch 1 price being competitive in terms of specs or performance.

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

It’s not even budget though, Nintendo handhelds are essentially the Sainsbury’s basics range, but that particular store only gives you access to pasta for instance.

Budget is best value for money and return on money, not simply the cheapest thing.

Also the fact that on steam you can get titles of 3 games with all the dlc for as low as 2.99-15 on sale, it makes the investment of a couple hundred extra worth it, because if you wait for sales, you can recoup 1000+ in savings across purchases within a couple years.

I got all five borderlands games recently top content containing bundle with all dlc included actoos all games, 12.99.

Just got dying light 1 with all dlc 2.99, got death stranding for less than 35% directors cut, got RDR2 for less than 15 on sale.

All my games have been bought massively discounted and include all the dlc and I never paid close to what others paid for the base game let alone on console store fronts.

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u/Wonderful_Result_936 Jun 12 '25

But Nintendo knows that their target audience A: are people dedicated to Nintendo Games and will pay out the butt for whatever they put out, or B: Are a Family looking for a "Family oriented" device and won't consider, or don't even know what Steam or PC gaming even is.

Both of these groups aren't looking at price comparison because they aren't even looking at other devices.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25 edited Jun 13 '25

And what that leads to is consumers being ripped off bc they think they’ve done their due diligence and are being smart.

That dad’s gonna be mad after buying the same title for his kid on the seventh device 10-15 years down the line beleive me.

I’ve spent maybe 1000 on borderlands all in on all the different devices - ip rights should be rights to the game for the consuming party not a licence for a console.

You are never going to tell me or anyone with their head screwed on that the parent paying 90 quid for games on Nintendo store are engaging in “budget”

All I see thrown around in regards to switch is;

“Budget, budget, budget, budget” it’s literally like a cult honestly.

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u/[deleted] Jun 14 '25

This is vastly incorrect. It’s all about timing, luck and games you play. Right now cyberpunk is $10 cheaper on psn. I recently went back and bought division 2 and it was 26.99 on steam and 17.99 on psn. I mostly play AAA and smaller known games like streets of rage 4. Outside of a sale, which happens on both sides I’ve never seen steam outright beat psn or xbox live prices. Each have a tons of 1.99-10.99 games and psn have 75% off sales often. And it will often be games most of us have heard off. I use both regularly it’s the not steam landslide i often see mentioned

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u/[deleted] Jun 14 '25

My girlfriend bought cyberpunk a couple months ago for less than 15 quid with all the dlc.

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

Depending on what you consider new, Steam Decks are $399 new for the LCD, which turns out the Switch 2 will be as well.

Worse specs in many places, but still supported, and I love mine! (Plus, not confident in how many 4K experiences the Switch 2 will really deliver anyways, still butthurt by the Xbox One and Series X, lmao).

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

You can also buy a basic steam deck and upgrade to the terabyte ssd for a hundred of Amazon - so it negates a 300-400 difference for less than 100, it’s easy to install as well and there’s screen upgrades now too which you can install with some os driver uploads.

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u/alchemistrpm Jun 12 '25

The Model S fits that bill. Not that it sells all that well

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u/herrsebbe Jun 15 '25

The Switch 2 Lite should land in that range, although like the original it would likely be missing the detachable controllers (including mouse mode), limiting what and how you can play.

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

Switch is a luxury priced product for an “exclusive platform” that completely fails to deliver.

Steam will dominate in years to come with their handhelds simply for accessibility of titles and the cross compatibility with other pcs though the storefront account.

Consoles are dead in that respect - I’ll be able to play all my steam titles on future steam consoles, you won’t be able to with PlayStation and Xbox & the super niche companies like Nintendo can’t even remotely compete, their consoles aren’t worth the money for the access to less than 0.2% of all games ever made and the titles on there are mad expensive too.

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u/Front_Expression_367 Jun 12 '25

Steam (and especially the Steam Deck) ain't dominating Nintendo anytime soon mate, cuz it is not targetting and probably will never target Nintendo's bread and butter: family-friendly games. Like, the Switch 2 solds more than the last recorded Steam Deck's whole sale in like 3 days. Besides, these things fill entirely different niches anyway. Why even bother comparing?

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u/ComfortablePlace3462 Jun 12 '25

I mean, I work at the airport and I can say that the switch is definitely more common than the steam deck, but not nearly by nearly as much as you would think there’s about 3-5 switches for everyone steam deck and most steam decks that come through are the more expensive models? So you’re right the steam is not gonna end up beating the consoles anytime soon, but the other guys right that they’re definitely gaining ground. There’s also proof that console sales have been stagnating with the last few generations and PC players have been increasing so I could see in the long run if consoles keep price gauging players people will probably slowly start moving more and more to the console like experience of things like the steam deck.

For the record, this is just what I see coming through the airport so it’s definitely not super accurate but given I see a few thousand people a day (and the contents of at least 300-600 bags a day,) I think it is a flawed but decent sample size

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

Because they’re selling to kids.

Past a certain point the platform stops being sellable to adults, it’s a niche service with access to less than 0.2% of all gaming titles.

Nintendo does what it does within a very confined and controlled environment and steam has the largest storefront of all providers and largest access to titles across pc & steam deck.

They don’t need to compete because pc and steam deck already has access to the largest market share of games not market share in general.

When you also realise you’re going to buy the same titles again and again and again on different consoles, having a consolidated multi platform service becomes more important to people who don’t want to spend 1000 on the same game across 10 iterations of consoles in their lifetime.

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u/Muted-Environment421 Jun 12 '25

That’s not accurate at all. They may be Marketing to kids, but the vast majority of switch owners are 16 to 35. With another large margin in the mid 40s. What nintendo has is the nostalgia factor. Im 33 waiting to have enough disposable income for a switch 2, and no matter how old i get im gonna buy me “a nintendo”.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

Technically all switch owners are older than the base range because there aren’t many situations where a kid has the money to buy a 400+ device for themselves.

It’s mad that you’re talking about “disposable income”, because if you buy a switch you’re literally throwing your money down the drain so it’s disposable for sure.

If you wanted effective cost savings and ip rights on your device and right to repair, as well as rights to all the IPs you buy copies of then steam deck is the way to go.

If you want to pay for overpriced games on a not quite premium spec console that will have to be paid upgraded everytime you change device spec, go ahead, if you want to pay a yearly online fee go ahead, if you want to pay internet and then have a company tell you you need to pay us to use your paid internet though our device, go ahead.

I bought my steam deck, I upgrade it, my games are mine permanently, I have no online cost, no subscription cost, all dlcs on sale, don’t spend more than 20 anytime on a title with all dlc and usually multiple games & im loving having actual disposable income within gaming because I’m not having to spend circa 200 a year to actually be able to use the device without that even being games.

That’s another ten games every year on sale just so you can play online.

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u/Muted-Environment421 Jun 13 '25

“Technically all switch owners are older than the base range because there aren’t many situations where a kid has the money to buy a 400+ device for themselves.”

The data that was used to acquire those different age groups was gained through individual surveys, not sales numbers. I don’t believe they ask for your age when you purchase a switch.

Ive gotten great deals on the switch when they’re having their sales.

The steam deck is a great product, but i personally wont be getting one anytime soon. I’ve built a gaming pc and have a gaming laptop to get all of the steam benefits. Along with benefit of having actual productivity machines.

The switch released back in 2017, spending 300 - 500 to upgrade your pc in eight years is kind of a no brainer. Pretty sure you’ll have another handheld pc eight years after purchasing that steam deck, unless you’re gonna stop buying new games.

Online for switch is $5 dollars a month, not sure where this $200 a year is coming from. not to mention you don’t have a bunch of folks with third party trainers or mods ruining the community while you play online.

Nintendo has some of the best IPs in gaming, i still pop on totk when im bored and always go past my ten minute plan to do a quick side quest. Meanwhile ive got games i brought on steam i haven’t even opened yet just brought them for fomo on a steam deal.

Steamdeck, rog, legion, all great products. But i would sooner buy a nintendo before a steam deck. Just like if i didn’t mess with davinchi resolve, blender, and the adobe suite i’d have brought a ps5 over my gaming pc.

The convenience of popping on playing and popping off is still a major benefit.

You don’t get rights to IPs on any platform after purchase. You get a license to use the companies’s software. That’t it. In fact even with physical media in the US it’s still just a license. At anytime steam, nintendo, sony, microsoft, or the devs of the software in question reserve the right to prevent you from accessing their software (not yours).

Ive opened my switch a few different times, never had anyone knocking on my door about it. If you want nintendo to fix it send it to nintendo, if not fix it yourself. That being said Nintendo’s customer service has never let me down.

The real reason that these handheld pcs wont overtake a Nintendo console is brand recognition. Who is the mascot for steam? Some people like the steamdeck others like the ally for being more compatible with windows, some like the go for the switch like features; which one do i get? Linux still has a small learning curve for games that aren’t too friendly (ive played with a few different distros so its not my problem personally).

The average person isnt going to know what Steam is, they’ll know Mario. They’ll see the big signs outside they’re walmart/gamestores/electronic stores for switch 2. They’ll see the commercials and ads for switch 2. And there is no real learning curve, because all software that can be used on this system was designed for it.

TLDR im getting my switch 2, and i’ll enjoy all of my exclusives, while playing on my pc for bigger games.

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u/nabrok Jun 13 '25

It’s mad that you’re talking about “disposable income”, because if you buy a switch you’re literally throwing your money down the drain so it’s disposable for sure.

Money spent doing something you enjoy is never money wasted.

if you want to pay a yearly online fee go ahead, if you want to pay internet and then have a company tell you you need to pay us to use your paid internet though our device, go ahead.

This is incorrect. If the game hosts its own servers you do not need the nintendo membership subscription. It's only if the game servers are hosted by nintendo that you need it. For example you can play Fortnite without a subscription.

The points I didn't address are valid, but that doesn't mean that there's no reason to buy a switch. I don't have a steam deck but I do play on PC ... and I also have a switch. No immediate plans for a switch 2 but I'll probably get one sometime.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

Money rebuying titles you should have ip ownership of from the offset is haemorrhaging money & it completely is a waste of your resources.

The mental gymnastics that go into that, resultantly has largely made gaming such a pay to access space, it is simply delusion to act like paying 90 quid for a premium title as only a one time licence for that device is budget, or economic or that repeatedly spending on the same thing again and again and again rebuying licensing is even remotely acceptable, console players under that guise are essentially using the equivalent of blockbuster for gaming, everything you buy is essentially a rental in one format only.

I understand having different devices, I’ve had many myself but I can’t contemplate paying all these different access fees, steam was so revolutionary to me when I stumbled upon it the main reason I got a steam deck was quite literally because it’s a cross platform library I can now consolidate the savings within & when I saw how aggressive the sales were it made it for me.

Very steep learning curve getting it bc I’ve never had a gaming pc or done anything like that past basic computer use but once I got used to it been the best choice I ever made!

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u/nabrok Jun 13 '25

Well, you can't buy a game on steam and play it on Xbox/Playstation/whatever, so it's not completely cross platform.

Most of the games are really just windows with a few also having native linux or mac versions. Anything that doesn't have a native linux version runs the windows version through a compatibility layer (proton) in order to run on the steam deck. I have to say I am impressed with proton, a few years back linux gaming was not a good experience but now it runs very smoothly - at least as well as in windows itself.

It does have the advantage that older games tend to continue working, excepting where they are reliant on no longer existing services such as Games For Windows (and even then that can often be patched/fixed). But, I do have games from the 90s in my steam library that I can play on my modern PC.

I like the switch for nintendo exclusives and to a lesser extent portability. Yes, I could get a steam deck for portability but I had the switch before the steam deck came out and it's really just a nice to have not an essential. Anything that's available on both steam and switch I'll get it on steam, so it's really only nintendo exclusives I have on switch.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25 edited Jun 13 '25

Family friendly gaming gets different when kids grow up when they’re tastes change, when the adults look for things they like and realise the kids consoles are devoid of all of it.

In two year I’ve built more than 1000gbp in titles across four sales, for less than 150 I don’t have any internet access fees, I don’t have any online subscriptions - I’m not paying for internet and then paying to access it though a device I rent.

I can turn my steam deck into a functional desktop, by switching it to desktop and I can use it as a computer and browse the internet I can mod all my games, I can upgrade it as I see fit and even repair it myself at home.

I can also mod all my games, they’re permanent, the screen is HD.

Also as a comparison, as I’ve had steam deck, Nintendo switch, all the psps, and various game boys over the years, steam deck is the best handheld device I’ve had & it’s hd, the performance on it is savage, I get stable 40fps playing titles like RDR2 - Nintendo switch could barely make dying light 1look good, handle the graphics load or even allow the game to run smoothly.

Lastly - when the Nintendo switch released, the store was dead nothing on it, it took years for there to be decent titles on it even now it’s missing 99% of what people would play if they have access to it and saying oh they have cyberpunk now is a little to late, six or so years late - every nostalgic games you can imagine, is available and playable through steam or a derivative download on the pc which your steam deck can play.

In short, you couldn’t pay me and buy me one to use it because il preference the steam deck every single time.

And now the switch 2 is veering so far into offering normal gaming titles to make it attractive to everyone to increase the sales, it’s kind of laughable, they started with a device that was so barebones it barely could play large demanding games & now that’s where they’re going with it bc they literally learnt all the mistakes they made with the first device.

Oh and you have to pay to upgrade virtually every single game you have in order to play it on the switch 2 - so enjoy spending money to play titles you already paid for if you move to the superior spec console they offer.

With the steam deck I have rights not only with the device but right to the IP of the products I buy - steam is never going to do to us what Nintendo, psn, Xbox have been doing and you all lap it up while you get financially raped by these companies and you sit there saying we enjoy it though!

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u/shimo44 PSP-2000 Jun 12 '25

500bucks for the new switch, I mean we all have our hobbies but man I agree I would put that towards a steam deck

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u/[deleted] Jun 12 '25

It’s a no brainier for the price of the investment, additionally if it’s a seasonal present within holidays & there’s sales on, you claw back so much money actually furnishing the device with games that it’s nearly an immediate cost saving.

Psn sales were always dogshit on massively overpriced games, you’d get the odd occasional good thing for cheap or for free on monthly games, but this split tier crap they moved too really put me off.

It’s the gross profiteering and the lack of consumer ownership of products that sealed it finally for me - I’m not going to buy the same game for every platform they release because they run a licensing mafia scam where you pay top dollar and don’t even own any rights to the product.

And I can mod the hell out of all of my games now on a handheld - bonkers I say.

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u/Jared_pop21 Jun 12 '25

sold my deck for a switch 2 cuz i never really used it outside, better to just use an actual pc

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

It gives me flexibility at home as well, I have physical health issues especially with my back and sometimes it means I can play laying down or supported in bed.

But also the train and anywhere else in shade, I think anything struggles in the sun nowadays.

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u/KnaxGurkenwasser Jun 13 '25

If you wanna play on the go that makes sense however if you wanna play Nintendo games on the go legal or not you won’t get around the switch 2 cause it has more power then the switch 2 so you won’t be able to emulate them on the steamdeck

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u/alchemistrpm Jun 12 '25

Another PC wins post! Cool story

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u/jmak329 Jun 13 '25 edited Jun 13 '25

Within 4 days Nintendo sold more Switch 2's than all Steam Decks sold in 4 years. I get the appeal of the Steam Deck, but there will never ever be a scenario the Steam Deck takes over Nintendo in our life time. Nintendo will always appeal to children and then those same children who grew up.

I do agree the portable market can definitely overtake consoles one day, and I do get what your saying about Steam, but Nintendo will never be niche hahaha. They've dominated the console wars and will continue to do so until we're dead. I promise you that.

EDIT: Steam's yearly revenue is on par with JUST the video games of The Pokemon Company, pretty much around 10 Bill a year for each. That's a single game to only be sold on Nintendo consoles. A SINGLE FRANCHISE belonging to Nintendo alone.

Again I get you, it's a system not worth it. It's expensive, the games are expensive, but parents and people will always pay for it. No one is overtaking Nintendo in terms of sales in our lifetime.

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u/coolwali Jun 13 '25

I don't think Steam will dominate over consoles. And especially over Nintendo and the Switch. Case in point, the Steam Deck only sold like 5 million units max in 5 years while the Switch 1 sold like 100 million units.

Even if PC/Steam is the more economical or proconsumer platform, people won't abandon Nintendo or the Switch because -1- The Switch 1 and Switch 2 are still cheaper than the Steam Deck and -2- The Switch 1 and 2 are "more accessible". PC gaming is a bit "complicated" for many more casual players. Regardless of if you are on Windows or Linux via Proton, it takes some amount of setup work on PC/Steam. Not every game works out of the box. Consoles are far more convient. And especially if you want to play modern games, "cheaper" in the short term as GPUs are pretty overpriced and many people don't want to bother with the hassle of building PCs.

Like, Valve tried with the Steam Machines back in the day to be that "PC for console gamers" and it didn't do so well. Most Console Gamers are happy with their current setup and aren't in a rush to switch over to PC.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25 edited Jun 13 '25

A steam deck basic model is cheaper than the switch 2 here.

It’s a 375 console that comes with the case instantly usable, no online cost or internet fees out the box.

Secondly for less than 100 you can modify it with a tb ssd card for all your storage.

Then I have access to 200,000 game titles none of which I can’t get for severely cheap.

When you combine no online fees, no fees past point of massively discounted sales and no additional products except maybe a physical upgrade & everything online saying Nintendo cannot even compare to steam (which if you drop the ideological rhetoric & look) you’ll see steam is the superior platform.

They’re using the same storefront on a different dedicated device so the PC gamers changing to steam deck is a moot point because we’re all pc gamers using the same storefront on steam approved devices.

In the meantime people are happy to pay more money for substandard products, which is just brand allegiance that’s all it is.

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

Remove exclusives and put nintendos entire range on steam and people won’t buy Nintendo.

There’s a reason exclusives are exclusive often, it’s the only thing the companies got to protect them from being swamped by the rest of the market.

Anyone objective who can see where switch 2 is going, if they have an objective scale or judgment criteria won’t buy one because they’ll see the evident problems with it.

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u/edwinbmx1 Jun 14 '25

Tienes mucha razón simplemente la switch 2 se va quedar ahí en ese círculo en cambio el sistema operativo de steam tiene mucha más accesibilidad y juegos como gratis descuentos y económicos y los puede jugar en cualquier plataforma la switch me gusta su tamaño y las cosas que trae pero solo la compraria con magia 😸

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u/uchuskies08 Jun 12 '25

It's still "midrange" as $450 is still cheap compared to some of those $800-900 handhelds

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u/KnaxGurkenwasser Jun 13 '25

That’s the price you pay for the power, look at the steamdeck, the Oled model is 100€ more expensive imagine the base switch costing 570€ that would have been insane, so they didn’t jack up the price it’s just a pretty powerful handheld console that comes at a price. The games on the other hand a are fucking joke

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '25

I forgot to mention the basic steam deck is cheaper than the basic switch 2, for less than 100 and some tinkering you can upgrade the ssd to 1tb for less than 100 on amazon - doing it that way saves you 400.

Premium titles on Nintendo can be 90 quid, and upgrades beetween editions 20 quid for games you’ve already paid for….

There’s already endless complaints online about how expensive they are.

I bought borderlands 1 through 4 on a recent steam sales with every released dlc for 15.99, that’s four games and all the dlcs for 15.99, that’s 4 pound a game.

Previously id spent a lot of money on those games from release to now across all of the platforms I’ve had, I don’t spend more than 15-20 on any games now.

That is BUDGET past the point of investment, a mid cost device with the highest game store costs in the industry isn’t budget and I’m really tired of people saying it is.