Hi, hello and welcome to a new edition of the overkill digest newsletter.
I'm currently in the woods in the middle of France with very non-good internet, so today's newsletter will be much shorter than usual.
I've received the XBOX ROG Ally X for three weeks. So far, I've only spent 2 hours setting it all up, and I got to give it to other reviewers: the Windows experience is still rough. One random example: I installed the Epic Launcher through the Xbox app (as it was offered as a simple one-click installer), but the installer basically froze. It turns out, the UAC prompt was hidden in the background, and I had to switch to the full-blown Windows experience to see it.
There are more rough edges like this, but I'm expecting this to get better over time, the same way the Steam Deck got much better over time. (The Xbox Full Screen Experience experience is also coming to the MSI Claw models first.)
That said, let's get to this week's news:
🚀 Big Moves
I’ve said it a bunch of times, I want AYANEO to make a phone, and now they finally listened.
Details are still limited, but judging from the design, it looks like this one has physical buttons (those bumpers on the left side), so it might actually feel like a proper handheld. It also has two cameras, but like I said in my X100VI review, that's something I don't really care about.
I just wonder how much it’ll cost.
🎮 Platform Updates
Windows game compatibility on Linux is at an all-time high. Close to 90% of Windows games now work on Linux. The remaining 10% are either games where the developers explicitly turned off Linux-compatibility for unknown reasons, or where Anti-Cheat gets into the way.
The craziest part to me is that games run much better on Linux than on Windows, even for devices explicitly built around Windows, like the XBOX ROG Ally X.
💻 Hardware & Software
ASUS' new eGPU supports Thunderbolt 5. It comes in two versions: one with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 Ti and another with an RTX 5090 laptop GPU. Both include a Thunderbolt 5 port (ASUS finally dropped their proprietary one), two USB-A ports, one USB-C port, HDMI 2.1, DisplayPort 2.1, Gigabit Ethernet, and a microSD card reader. Prices start at $1300 and go up to $2500, depending on the GPU.
Cloud-streaming might come to the PlayStation Portal. Sony might’ve just leaked a new PlayStation Store feature. Some Reddit users noticed a note on certain games saying they could be streamed over the cloud to a PlayStation Portal if you have an active PS+ Premium subscription. That would make the device way more appealing, since it wouldn’t rely on your own PS5 or home internet connection.
Sony has since removed the notice, but where there’s smoke, there’s fire.
Retroid redesigned the RP6 after community backlash. The new design is a big improvement (here’s what the original looked like). Retroid will also let users choose between two analog stick and D-pad layouts, as you can pick which one sits on top when preordering the handheld.
It runs on a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, comes with either 8 or 12 GB of RAM, and features a 5.5-inch 1080p display, all for $210.
🎲 Playthings
Arc Raiders is live and is breaking records. 328,434 concurrent players at its peak, and judging by some of the Discord servers I’m in, all my friends are helping push that record even higher. I’m a bit jealous, to be honest.
I haven't tried it yet, but Battlefield's free-to-play Battle Royal mode is live. As soon as I am back from this vacation, I'll be testing this out.
📌 Quick Hits
- Nvidia is officially a $5 trillion company.
- Affinity by Canva is now free to use. This is a good alternative to Adobe's software.
- Bazzite using Fedora 43 is out. The team added full support for the Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X.
Dig the format? Hate it? Hit those feedback buttons below and let me know what's working.
🔮 Looking Ahead
- Europa Universalis V releases on November 4.
- Football Manager 26 also drops on the same day.
- Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment comes to Switch 2 on November 6.
Ok, that's all. Thanks for reading!
See you,
Kevin