Project Q leak reveals huge flaw with upcoming PlayStation handheld
Leaked footage suggests that the upcoming Project Q PlayStation handheld could run on Android, and that would be a major flaw.
There's been a resurgence in high-performance handheld gaming consoles in the past couple of years, with the Steam Deck and more recently, the Asus ROG Ally, now being available to the masses. Sony has now decided to enter the market, announcing its biggest fumble of the year back in May, titled Project Q. Although we don't have many details about Sony's PS5 handheld venture yet, some footage has leaked that could give away some details ahead of release.
The video, posted by Twitter user @Zuby_Tech, shows the PlayStation handheld device turned on with someone navigating through the home screen and app pages, with the device clearly running Android OS. No gameplay or cloud streaming is shown, so it's unclear how this will exactly take place, but it's worth keeping in mind that this video could be fake, as is the case with all leaks.
We can get a sense of some of the hardware specifications of the device from this video, including the fact that it has a touchscreen and that the screen itself looks incredibly thin, which will hopefully make for a relatively light device and contribute to the portability. Aside from the DualSense controller buttons present on Project Q, it looks like there are very few other inputs.
Last month Microsoft had a go at suggesting the price of Sony's unreleased device during its legal battle against the FTC, with the Microsoft Activision deal still awaiting completion. It stated in a footnote that the expected price of Project Q is under $300, which would roughly convert to £235 / AU$450. This feels extremely pricey for a device made exclusively for cloud streaming over Wi-Fi, but of course, is not a confirmed price as of yet.
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The handheld gaming market has always been an exciting one, with some of the original devices including the Nintendo GameBoy, Nintendo DS and PlayStation Portable being some of the most nostalgic gaming devices of all time. I constantly long for us to revert back to our StreetPass days.
Sony really had a gem in its hands with the PlayStation Portable, and subsequently the PlayStation Vita, which despite not being as popular at the time was a great device. When leaks about a new handheld Sony device were first reported earlier this year I was beyond excited about what the tech giant would be able to do.
But everything I've seen and read about Project Q so far feels like minimal effort was involved. Sony announced the device without actually giving it a real name, with the design literally being a screen stuck between two halves of a controller, and worst of all, the fact that it is exclusively for cloud gaming.
It will also apparently run on Android, which only contributes to this narrative, it feels like Sony has been too lazy to develop its own OS for the console. The Steam Deck runs on Steam OS, which despite being a version of Linux has been designed specifically to make handheld gaming experience smoother.
If Project Q actually runs on Android OS, the experience it offers wouldn't be too different from just using your mobile phone with PS Remote Play and a controller, so what incentive is there to buy an entirely new device? Project Q has not only fallen below my expectations, it has somehow been so much worse than I could have imagined. The only thing that could save Project Q would be an extremely low price point, but even that looks unlikely.
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