The ROG Xbox Ally and ROG Xbox Ally X devices are almost here. The family of systems, the result of an ambitious collaboration between Asus and Microsoft, are due to launch on October 16, 2025. That's locked in – the Xbox handheld can be yours before year's end. Less certain is how much either device is going to cost, with Microsoft telling me at Gamescom that "macro-economics" are the reason it's yet to announce a recommended retail price.
Given the almost farcical events which surrounded the Nintendo Switch 2 pre-orders, not to mention recent price increases for current-generation systems from PlayStation and Xbox, I understand the reticence here. Particularly as enduring rumors place the ROG Xbox Ally consoles as being more expensive than the Xbox Series X. Don't let overlapping cost of living crises spoil a good time.
And there is a good time to be had here. I have now had my hands on the ROG Xbox Ally X (the more powerful, streamlined, and impressive of the two systems) on four separate occasions. I've played everything from Hollow Knight Silksong to Doom Eternal, Lies of P to Gears Reloaded on the windows-powered handheld. I find myself continually impressed, with both form factor and the performance.
With a two month gap between my opportunities to get hands-on, my prevailing thoughts are:
- The ROG Xbox Ally X has a redesigned chassis versus the existing ROG Ally X, and while the changes appear subtle the results are clear in how comfortable the new system is.
- The ROG Xbox Ally X may be heavier on paper than the Steam Deck OLED, but the way weight is distributed means it feels lighter in your hands.
- The new Handheld Compatibility Program (which is Xbox's version of Steam Deck game verification) makes me confident that the new handheld platform will be properly supported.
- I'm still surprised by how great first and third-person shooters feel on the ROG Xbox Ally X, performance is smooth and graphical fidelity is crisp.
You can read more of my thoughts on the ROG Xbox Ally X here. That's a piece I published in June, following the reveal of the new consoles, wherein I was able to get an early look at the initiative and speak with some of the people driving it forward at both Xbox and Asus. I'm pointing you over there to dive deeper, because I want to take this opportunity to flag something that really surprised me about my most recent playtest – and it concerns some commentary around the use of AI.
How Xbox may use AI in the future
Xbox is going all in on AI. We don't really know how or why yet, but it is. An early example of this is what's powering the ROG Xbox Ally X, which is AMD's Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme. Given that Xbox recently entered into a multi-year partnership with the chipmaker, it's exceptionally likely that the next generation of Xbox home consoles will feature something similar. When I spoke to Roanne Sones earlier this year, the CVP of gaming devices and ecosystem at Xbox said that choosing the Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme was a "proactive decision on our part to put AI acceleration with dedicated silicon into a handheld form factor."
She also said that "fundamentally, it's hardware's job to push the boundaries of what could be possible," but stopped short of going into any greater detail. When I sat down with Xbox executives at Gamescom recently, I was told that AI-powered features will roll out over time to the ROG systems as the company continues to explore what's possible with the Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme. One example of this in action are Highlight Reels.
"There's nothing better than when you have that epic moment in your gameplay session, and then the frustration of realizing you forgot to grab a clip or screenshot of it," says Jason Ronald, the Series X architect who now holds the title of 'VP of Next Generation' at Xbox. "Using the power of AI, we can actually look at, say, a 30-minute gameplay session, identify what the most compelling and interesting moments of that are, and stitch that together into a highlight reel that a player can easily capture and then share with their friends on social media."
I find this to be an interesting application of AI systems from Xbox, particularly as both the Xbox One and Xbox Series X have legendarily poor game capture functionality. The PS4 set a benchmark in 2013, and Xbox has made no real moves to even attempt to compete. That's surprising, given that the ease in which players are able to capture and share moments of triumph and failure in their favorite video games has transformed the way we both discuss and consume them in the modern era.
Now, could Team Xbox improve the functionality of its internal game capture and sharing systems with a human touch? It would be easy to argue that, yes, it could, and probably should have in 2020 when the Series X hit the shelves. Can AI be used to not only create a system that is comparable to what PlayStation offers, or even potentially be more useful to players? That remains to be seen. But Jason Beaumont, VP of experiences at Xbox, indicates that this is the direction things are moving.
"The AI is a great example where, you know, my team could spend eight months building DVR controls, clip editors, and all this other stuff. Or you could say, you know what, I wonder if in the future AI can do this for us? If you're just shooting raw [footage], and this thing is going to assemble it all for me, it's going to make the good cuts, it's going to know the music that I like, the tone that I want. And maybe that idea is kinda weird now, but in the future we may be like 'remember when we had to splice all of it together ourselves?'"
There's a lot of noise around the use of AI in video games right now. Highlight Reels is the first AI-powered system that I could see myself actually using in the future, should it work as intended of course. It's worth paying attention to, as it'll be an early signal of the direction Xbox's hardware division is moving in the next generation. Highlight Reels is coming to the ROG Xbox Ally X in 2026, but I expect it to be a prominent part of whatever Xbox next releases in the home console space.
Increasingly, the ROG Xbox Ally X is looking like a way for Xbox to soft-launch some initiatives. The introduction of an Aggregated Gaming Library is key here, so too is the more open approach to collaboration with the Windows team with Xbox-themed OS improvements. This makes the incoming handheld such an interesting prospect. Not only the opportunity to play my favorite games on the go with a system that is comfortable, powerful, and optimised for Xbox – but an opportunity to see how Xbox is attempting to position itself for the future. I just hope that I can afford to actually buy the ROG Xbox Ally X, because I fear the question mark over pricing is going to transform into an exclamation mark.
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