I recently posted about finding time to game as a parent and the community has provided a bunch of good suggestions. Thank you! After reading all comments, I think it really boils down to accessibility of gaming for the occasional moments of free time that I do have in my busy schedule. The ability to pick something up easily, make some progress, pause it, and resume quickly at the next available window appears the best way to go. Many have suggested a Steam Deck or Switch (I own the latter) but I wanted to get some opinions on gaming laptops. My preference is to play on PC (I subscribe to Game Pass) so that’s why I brought up this topic. I believe a gaming laptop provides some form of mobility and plays most things but doesn’t have the instant resume that makes handhelds great. I feel both the Steam Deck and Switch would be limiting in what I can play. Has anyone tried the ROG Ally? What are your thoughts?
Yeah man. It’s a whole ass PC. Plug in m&k, monitor, speakers, the whole shebang if you wanna
Gaming laptops are really just portable PCs. If you’re playing on them on in the usual “Keyboard and Mouse” way then you need to put it on a table to make that work properly. Maybe you could do it on a sofa but it’s very quickly going to get uncomfortable.
Handhelds on the other hand are extremely portable and happily usable anywhere. They’re also a lot cheaper than a gaming PC! I’m a big fan of my Steam Deck and recommend it a lot, but I should admit I also have a Gaming PC which I use for multiplayer stuff with my friends
I should preface this by saying I didn’t try any of the handheld gaming PCs, I watched a review of the AyaNeo 2S, it uses the same APU as the Ally and still outperform it, especially at low wattages and if I remember correctly even the steam deck at the same power level maybe you wanna check that out!
I would choose a gaming laptop over a handheld just for the versatility and upgradability, I have my eyes on the framework 16 it is very intriguing, to say the least
The Ally is what you’d want. Laptops aren’t really all that portable if portability is the goal. The Deck would be better from a “pick up and play” perspective but if you use Game Pass it’d be worth it to pick up the Ally instead, obviously.
Don’t sleep on the Ally. I fucking LOVE this thing. I haven’t had any issues running anything I’ve asked it to at impressive specs (med to high for most). That includes Diablo 4, Cyberpunk, Witcher 3, No Man’s Sky, Dying Light 2 just to make a few.
I was saving up for a steam deck but then I heard about this bad boy and Best Buy offered financing and I was sold.
No regrets.
Does the Ally work as a standard PC if you plug in a mouse+kb? I’ve heard steam deck can do that.
Looking to replace my ancient PC, which is slowly dying. Cyberpunk, Diablo 4, and Baldurs Gate 3 are the big games I’m looking to play. If you factor in my huge backlog, anything that cam run those 3 smoothly could last me years.
My office space is tiny, a small shelf and the smallest desk IKEA had. Currently thinking of an intel nuc, but I kinda like the sound of a portable I can play on the train into work or a coffee shop. If it can double as a low paper desktop, ot may be a winner.
