There's no denying that handheld gaming PCs now play an integral role in the gaming market. We can thank Valve for reigniting the old flame of portable enjoyment, with the launch of the Steam Deck in 2022 inspiring competition from the likes of Asus, MSI, and Lenovo. However, I've always felt that one obvious potential competitor is missing from the battle - and that's none other than Apple.
We're still waiting on the Lenovo Legion Go 2 (which is still a prototype), the Asus ROG Ally X's successor, and a Steam Deck 2 - and the latter isn't coming any time soon, according to Valve - so what's next? What could be the next monumental handheld gaming PC that would take the market by storm? That's right, an Apple M-based handheld gaming PC.
With Apple's recent M4 family chips and even previous lineups like the M2 series, there is so much that could be done with an Apple handheld gaming PC. These processors (notably the M4 Max and M3 Ultra) have opened the gateway to stronger gaming experiences, utilizing more CPU and GPU cores - and it's clearly a viable avenue, as more game studios are porting titles over to macOS.
Before I go any further, I know that a potential handheld gaming PC from Apple would more than likely come at a big expense for consumers (especially with stronger configurations). However, for what we could get, I'm more than willing to see Apple give it a shot.
The M-based chips are almost perfect for handheld gaming... almost
While it's great that manufacturers consider high-end APUs for the best performance on these portable devices, it's not exactly that simple: battery life and temperatures are crucial to a fully functional portable device, and luckily enough, Apple's M chips are suited just for that.
Since they are based on Arm architecture, the M-series chips thrive at power efficiency while still being able to deliver fantastic performance - and that's exactly what I desire with a handheld gaming device. That's not me saying that current devices like the MSI Claw 8 AI+ aren't already great with power efficiency and performance for games, but I'm willing to bet that Apple's processors could do a better job.
However, there's one major downside - these devices would more than likely be using macOS to run games. While I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing for the user experience (especially compared to Windows 11 for handhelds), most AAA games don't come to the operating system for a long while after release, let alone on day one.
The great thing is that there are some cases where games do indeed arrive on day one, with a recent prime example being Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed Shadows. Unfortunately (you might have guessed it), it doesn't run very well - which I would imagine is because of the forced ray tracing. It's exactly why I say the M-based chips are only almost perfect for handheld gaming devices.
Apple should consider game studio acquisitions or deals
Again, more and more games are being ported to macOS, notably CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077. Besides the concern of when these games will arrive on Apple's OS, the other most important factor is optimization: as powerful as the M-based chips are, no amount of processing power can brute force through poor game optimization.
I'm sure it's safe to say that most PC devs don't consider macOS when creating games, as the main platform for this is Microsoft's Windows 11: performance in games is more than likely going to be better on Windows PCs (excluding some of the recent ports), so it can be a gamble for macOS players.
There's a rather obvious resolution to this, though: Apple should either acquire or make a deal with a triple-A game studio. After all, Apple has the cash; buying out a popular studio to push forward macOS game development would be a wise move. And while I'd hope to see that happen without any exclusivity involved, it might be necessary to push the wider industry into viewing macOS as a legitimate platform for gaming. We've seen a similar thing happen with Microsoft and its acquisition of Activision - some feared that it would mean Call of Duty would be exclusive to Xbox and PC, but that ultimately wasn't the case (especially because it would've been a significant financial loss).
I believe that if Apple truly plans to give gaming on macOS a stronger focus, this would be the right step to take. It won't mean that every title coming to Mac devices will have dev priority, no. But what it would mean is that Apple would be taken seriously as a part of the gaming space, and games that do have dev priority will be better optimized for macOS.
Do I think this will happen? Absolutely not, and I'd even agree if you said I was delusional. But one can only hope...
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