A Review That Nobody Asked For: I Made my Phone A Great Game Console for $10 and then the Steam Deck was delayed and depression hit so ok · 2:48am Nov 20th, 2021
Alternate Clickbait Titles:
"Stadia -- The In-Depth Return",
"The Steam Deck is Going to Change Gaming As We Know It",
"My Two Year Old Phone is better than the Vita",
"I think I'd rather play on my Phone than on my Switch",
"The State of Mobile Gaming before the Steam Deck"
"Priest hates video games and having fun"
"You Can Take Your Console On The Go!"
As a gamer, I'm sure you've heard this more than a few times. I for one, am Damn Tired of hearing it. Yes, my Switch can be taken on the go. Yes, I can pull the two controllers off, use the kick stand, and play Smash with a random stranger.
But why in the HELL would I do that?
First off. I got trust issues. But let's say this is a person I trust. A Friend, even. Playing Smash.etc on switch controllers (horizontally) is hardly a great experience. And the kickstand on the original switch was TERRIBLE. Sure the OLED switch just came out but that thing is EXPENSIVE and I already have a switch.
If I take things out of the house, I ask myself "Will I be okay if this gets stolen?" -- and that guides a LOT of what I take out for fun/travel/music gigs.etc. I don't want my switch to get randomly stolen by some dude. So, my switch sits comfortably on it's dock, ready for company to come over or to play pokemon snap in bed. I could take my switch to work to play some games during my lunch hour -- but playing 30 minutes of "Zelda" or "Metroid Dread" doesn't really seem great. Console games are usually designed with hour or two hour long "sessions" in mind. They aren't great for "Take a bite here" and save the rest for later. I think it's getting better at it -- Smash and Pokemon Snap are great examples -- but I could hardly boot BoTW, Metroid Dread, Fire Emblem.etc and only play 10-15 mins at a time.
So enter: Your Cellphone
Chances are, if you're like me, your phone is essentially your pacifier. You don't leave home without it. You've got a mild addiction to it that you swear you can quit whenever you want. And, well. It's your lifeline to facebook, phone calls, texts.etc
You've always got it.
So, why not just carry a controller with you that lets you play with your phone?
ENTER THE RETURN OF GOOGLE STADIA
Oh did you guys think I was just going to drop this failed Google experiment that I bought into and not write about it? I NEED PRAISE FROM THE INTERNET. IM GONNA MILK THIS SUNK COST AS LONG AS I CAN
My stadia has been literally gathering dust. But, I found that (as i unburied it recently) The controller is actually good. I mean really good. So, after playing with it for a few rounds on pc -- I decided to try plugging it into my phone
L I F E C H A N G E D kinda
I found I had something really awesome on my hands, and with a $10 "Claw" holder for my phone from amazon -- I had a portable Game console on the go. So -- I decided to download some popular game titles and do a full rundown for you guys. So, here's what I've got!
So, for this Halloween, I've decided to post something special and give you a full, in-depth review of playing games on a phone, with a controller. lol
Android Play Store:
Stardew Valley -- 5/5
If you played Stardew Valley on PC, You know exactly what I'm getting into here. The only difference being that this is being played on a phone, and with a controller. It's the exact same experience if you played on PC, but with a controller. Is that cheating? Maybe.
Minecraft -- 5/5
90% of my time away from writing this blog has been either writing music or playing Minecraft on my phone. I can't even really say it's a better experience than playing on my PC. I mean, my PC is right here. I'm typing on it. The Minecraft launcher is right there and I could play it, with mods, with friends, on a strong public server, and have a grand old time.
But I want to play my android minecraft way more.
And I think I cracked the code. What I enjoy from Android Minecraft is that feeling of being able to pick it up and put it down whenever I want. I like playing in servers when we're all working on a common goal -- but big Minecraft projects are exhausting and can take up a lot of time. Android Minecraft -- especially in the early stages -- are focused on building your base and getting your first equipments, farms, loadouts.etc and it's relaxing to crack it open for 15 minutes before you have to do something else, or on a bus ride. or a plane ride. And playing it Mobile AND on the go? is just so much better,
Sonic 1 and 2 -- 1/5
Well HEY! Everyone can get behind Sonic, Right? The classic Genesis games were ported to Android and have some paywalls to add features like save states, additional levels, time trials and more. But it starts free. Which fits the need for today. The game plays wonderfully, and playing it on a controller just feels right. Except... It just feels gross that the whole game has microtransactions baked in. like. If only there were a way I could get some retro games TRUELY ported without throwing in paywalls and-
NES/GB/GBC/SNES/Genesis/Atari/Retro Emulation -- 5/5
Okay. You saw it coming. Of course I threw an emulator or 5 on my phone. My personal take is that if you own the physical game, you can download the rom. Boom. So, I paid for some decent emulators forever ago and redownloaded them. I genuinely didn't like emulating games on a phone because pressing touch buttons on a screen. It just didn't have the same tactile feel as pressing buttons on a gameboy. Which, honestly, is 90% of my issue with games on the phone. I didn't attempt anything newer than an N64 just because I assumed it wouldn't work, and I didn't want to hassle with it. Except, there's one port I wanted to give the Real App a true shot over any console port.
Doom -- 5/5
Doom can be ported to anything. It's a persistent joke on the internet. But that doesn't mean it should. Did anyone really have FUN playing Doom on the Game Boy Advance?? No. Simply there weren't enough buttons to make it work well. Well, with a dedicated controller, that all changed. Doom felt buttery smooth, the difficulty and speed felt right, and features such as running, changing weapons, or circle-strafing just felt easy. As far as non-keyboard and mouse goes -- This may be the definitive way to play classic doom.
Fortnite -- ??/5
I really struggled to get Fortnite to work properly. It's a thing where I am pretty sure it's that my phone isn't strong enough to handle the game rather than it being a matter of internet connection. The controller was flawless. Milage may very depending on phone.
Did not get to
Sim companies / hidden dimensions xyth / dungeon crawl / stone soup / stick ranger
Does Not Support Controller, Phone Couldnt Run, or Doesn't Make Sense:
Arknights
League of Legends: Wild Rift
PUBG
Muse Dash
Pokemon Go
Pikmin Bloom
Magic Arena
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite
Angry Birds
Genshin Impact
Game Dev Tycoon
Bejeweled
Brick Balls Breaker games
"How To Loot" and logic puzzle games
Played With Stadia:
Dead By Daylight -- 4.5/5
This is it. This is Google Stadia's last shot at sinking their teeth into me. They gave me a $10 credit when I opened my account. Why? Hell if I know. but $10 is $10 and I used it to get an on sale copy of Dead by Daylight for free. I already owned DBD on steam and play it with mouse and keyboard. It allowed me to import ALL of my existing DLC and save data, and I'll admit.
This was way better than I expected. I had zero issues with the Quick Time Checks. Not bad for a streamed game. Once I got used to the controls, It comes back down to the strategy of how to evade killers/get survivors. I think a controller "view stick" is probably not as easy to use as a mouse -- but Im sure that changing sensitivities would help. The control scheme is weird, but not bad by any means. It really feels good. Genuinely good. I found myself actually playing DBD on the go. This is Google Stadia at it's absolute best IMO. I played an online game, on my phone, with a controller, on someone else's wifi. at 720p.
Destiny 2 -- 3?/5
The control and combat is great... I just don't like Destiny 2 as a game? Like, it's very unfriendly to a new player. You will like this if you wanna play Destiny wherever you go.
Stadia Exclusives:
Gylt -- ?/5 -- I dunno. I've been in a weird headspace lately. I couldn't get into it. I'm sure it's fine. But I couldn't give it my full attention
Thumper -- 4/5 -- Thumper is a fun game, and like my experience with playing it on projector -- IT was just as good playing it on my phone
So why did I write this?
And then not release it for several weeks
The Steam Deck is coming out soon(ish), and I've preordered this little experiment in gaming thinking that this will finally be my moment when I feel comfortable taking an expensive gaming peripheral out of the house to do gaming. As it's been delayed for several months, I think it's important that I talk about mobile gaming and what The steam deck is supposed to accomplish -- and what mobile gaming has become
See, When I took a big poll on my blog awhile back, Many of the responses didn't work with controller. And It was not only shocking for me, but in some ways... a little disheartening. See -- Most games are being moved to a touch screen element. Hell, even new games using hardware Like the Steam Deck, Switch, and Playstation have Touch screen elements. In general, the design of games has been simplified down and is relying on intuitive "press here" areas in order to control what the game does.
And then, think about it. If you're literally putting your finger on the screen, it doesn't matter as much what the game -looks like- since at any moment you're covering up the screen. It's an interesting design space that makes gaming in a really weird spot.
The Steam Deck is designed for you to play PC games on the go. Games that weren't designed to be played on the go.
Mobile gaming experiences seem to be focused on a few things -- The ability to pick up and put down in small bursts, easy to handle controls, and gameplay that has some degree of RNG so that you repeat gameplay loops without feeling stale.
Now, a PC gaming experience may not neatly fall into that. Sure, you may be interested in Playing Celeste, Geometry Wars, or Rouge Legacy on the go -- but do you really want to play Bioshock in 15 minute bursts?
Even after writing the majority of this blog (this second half is being written in the present, btw) and how much I enjoyed playing games on my phone using a controller -- I stopped carrying the controller with me. It was too bulky. I still use it to play games on my PC but in general, my phone is being relegated to relaxing "swipe gems" games or Idle games.
The last Experiment I SWEAR
At the beginning of covid I built a raspberry pi handheld called a "Game Hat"
Which was fine and a lot of fun but ultimately it now sits in a bag in a drawer because I got an RG350M
A RG350M is a chinese handheld emulator that can play games comfortably and smoothly up to the N64 generation. It can do some PS1 emulation and some very basic PSP emulation too.
This console fits smoothly in my hands, plays every rom I throw at it. Has amazing build quality, I recommended it to all of my friends. Save states. Everything I could possibly want.
And it still sits in it's carrying case.
A part of me looks at this and it makes me wonder what in the world it is? Is it me? Am I the reason I don't like games anymore? I'll start a new copy of pokemon blue or maybe silver and get to the first gym and then just... stop. Do I not have the attention span for it? I can carry this thing anywhere. I have the majority of the greatest games of all time with the ability to save state Any time i need to. I need to leave right away? Save state. Come back later mid level. Literally the most mobile friendly possible.
And I still don't use it. Why?
Why?
Do I even like video games anymore?
Whats the moral of the story here? Is mobile gaming worth it?
also your formatting is terrible Priest what the fuck
why are there no pictures you piece of shit
Well, Stadia still sucks, so there's that.
But while the Steam Deck is a very exciting piece of hardware -- I'm concerned that we may have another Steam Link on on our hands. -- See, the Valve Index ended up dominating the world of VR -- the Oculus Quest 2 is selling extremely well and I'm sure is going to be a popular christmas item this year. HELL. I WANT ONE. Do I need one? HELL NO. But I want one! Do I even have many games to play on it? HELL NO. BUT I WANT IT.
And tbh it makes more sense for me to get a valve index because my steam library is massive at this point and i probably "accidentally" have VR games.
BUT MY POINT IS -- BECAUSE IM IN A TANGENTY MOOD.
Valve doesn't have a great track record for making hardware. By that I mean -- they began making Steam Machines -- and showing off SteamOS but ultimately the project was scrapped, because next to nobody was needing a Linux machine that ran steam games. if people were already on steam -- they had a computer that could use it. Great idea, but there's no market.
The Steam Link billed itself as a "Streaming machine" that would allow your heavy duty computer to run the game for you, and the steam link handles all the input resolution, lag and ensures a stable experience. It's execution? Hit and miss. I personally love my two steam links, but i know that not everyone enjoyed them. Thats why valve liquidated their supply, selling them for $5 each after selling them at a discounted $25, after initially releasing in 2015 at $50 each.
Google stadia is a Streaming Service that allows google heavy duty computers to run the game for you, and chromecast handles all the input resolution, lag and HEY IM NOTICING A TREND.
The difference being that at least the steam link allowed you to already use your existing steam library -- which, lets face it, most pc gamers are stuck on steam.
So will the Steam Deck be a waste of money?
I don't know. Even after having my favorite games at my beck and call on my phone using a controller that I could "Easily" transport as well as one of the most sophisticated emulators on the market, I still didn't play them. I think some people are going to get a lot of use out of the steam deck. And the steam deck is going to be less expensive and stronger than most "average" Gamer pc's you can get at that price point. So, If you're itching to play some steam games, but traveling all the time or are away from your main pc -- it probably makes sense. If you wanna go play at a bunch of lan parties (which was why I was planning to get one) -- I also think it makes sense.
But if you're sticking at home and only play games on your PC? I'd recommend trying to play some emulated classics on your phone with a controlelr and see how that feels for awhile. You might just save yourself from buying a $400+ dollar device that you find yourself not using
Says the person probably getting a $400+ device that he'll probably find himself not using.
TBH... if the Steam Deck is literally just a handheld computer, if one can use it like one... I think it would be interesting to think about how easy it could be to hack with it. Like, obviously, I'd never do that without permission (i.e., I'd only be really hacking myself or environments I created to do so, or take it to a hackathon), but it's so much smaller than a laptop, and hypothetically about as powerful as one, right? You could hide it much easier.
I love video games, but this has so much more potential than a tablet to me, if used right. Idk. I'm new to cyber stuff, so I may be way off base.
Moral of the story: play with ya boi, Shakes more. Let him host the games w/ zero risk. Just say'n.
If anything, just buy a good laptop.
You don't buy a console because it is mobile or got best graphics... at least I buy console for the exclusive titles:D I haven't seen a way yet to play breath of the wilde, smash (I mean the actual not the n64 :D) or Dread on my phone ^^
But yes, adding a blue tooth controller and an emulator to your phone turns it into a pretty neat mobile gaming device ^^
It's not a joke though? You can port it onto a pregnancy test, that's closer to "anything" than a clickbait writer needs.