The World of Handheld Gaming

In the past, the major console makers with the exception of Microsoft, have all attempted to have both a home console and a handheld on the market at the same time to try and cater to everyone. The idea of being able to play actual video games on the move that aren’t something along the lines of what Tiger Electronics produced, was pretty amazing.

However, they had their drawbacks. Both Sega and Atari attempted to sell the idea of their handhelds idea having the power of a home console on the go. Both the Sega Game Gear and Atari Lynx struggled with being big, bulky and requiring plenty of batteries on hand due to the constant need to replace them. In addition, both handhelds were far more expensive than Nintendo’s Game Boy. 


Nintendo went for the tried and tested hardware that although older was also far cheaper to mass produce and sell to the consumers. The Game Boy was also far smaller than either the Game Gear or Atari Lynx. All of this allowed Nintendo to create a handheld that could run on the same set of batteries for several hours at a time. In addition, Nintendo included Tetris with each handheld which helped catapult the Game Boy into the lead where it stayed until its eventual demise.


Sony are the only console maker to date to have come close to challenging Nintendo’s dominance in the handheld space with the PlayStation Portable. Despite the failure of the successor, the PS Vita, Sony went back to focusing on their PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. However, after the runaway success of the Nintendo Switch and the changing in people’s lifestyles, both Sony and Microsoft have announced they are researching their own dedicated handhelds. This will be in addition to the streaming device, the PlayStation Portal. 

One of the greatest things about handheld consoles, which is true to any system, was their exclusives be it first party of third party. For much of the existence of dedicated handhelds, developing games was cheap enough, required small enough teams and quick enough that publishers were willing to invest in games for handhelds even when it was becoming increasingly expensive and time consuming for home consoles. It is in fact because of this that eventually forced Sony to abandon the PS Vita in order to focus on the PlayStation 4.

Nintendo attempted to still create games for the 3DS as well as the Wii U. By this time, despite having teams split into home and handheld, the challenges involved were too much to overcome resulting in the shift in direction we see with the Nintendo Switch. It’s one system that Nintendo can focus their entire efforts on but it also acts as both a handheld and when docked, a home console. 

Right now, it seems that depending on what Sony and Microsoft launch in the future as their handheld, we won’t see exclusive games coming to them but instead ports of what is available on the home console counterparts. In a way this is a shame as discussed earlier, exclusives were a great part of the experience. 

With all this in mind, we need to look at what great exclusive games came to the various handheld consoles over the previous generations. One game that immediately springs to mind was Uncharted: Golden Abyss which was a launch title for the PS Vita. It showed the huge potential that Sony’s latest handheld console had but unfortunately the excitement would be short lived due to Sony giving up on the PS Vita fairly soon after launch. On Metacritic, Uncharted: Golden Abyss has a 80 score. 


Although they didn’t stay exclusive, the PSP had two fairly decent Grand Theft Auto games. First was Liberty City Stories and second was Vice City Stories. Although both did eventually get a PlayStation 2 port, they removed the online modes. I still consider both GTA titles as PSP exclusives. 

Though neither Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories were as good as the original PlayStation 2 games they based their settings on, for a handheld game during the early 2000s, these were pretty amazing experiences. The PSP was pretty close to a portable PlayStation 2, and these two games from Rockstar Games were a great way to get a similar experience when on the go. 


There are so many great games on so many handheld consoles, we are going to need to start looking into discussing them on a regular basis. So expect plenty of discussions about a lot of handheld games. 

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