Verizon has hinted that it is working on a 5G gaming portable alongside Razer and Qualcomm, which will be unveiled in full on October 15th at RazerCon. During a speech at MWC Las Vegas, the carrier revealed a few details about the gadget, which will be dubbed the Razer Edge 5G, adding that it would run Android and provide access to cloud gaming services such as Xbox Cloud Gaming. Unlike devices such as Logitech’s newly announced G Cloud, it seems that it will also be able to play games saved locally on the device.
While information is few, we had already heard about a comparable device: Qualcomm’s Snapdragon G3x Handheld Gaming Developer Kit. That gadget, which was unveiled late last year, was designed to demonstrate the company’s G3x platform, which would power Verizon and Razer’s handhelds. Qualcomm claims that its G3x chipset supports 4K external screens and has a GPU capable of running games at up to 144 frames per second.
According to the teaser video, the Edge 5G may contain some form of the adaptive trigger mechanism. It resembles the company’s Kishi V2 controller in appearance, but instead of a slot for your phone, the computer and screen are incorporated.
The Steam Deck, obviously, is the elephant in the room, capable of both streaming and playing PC games on its own. Allowing you to access a large portion of the Steam catalog is a significant benefit of Valve’s handheld, one that Razer presumably will not offer since it runs Android rather than SteamOS. However, the Steam Deck begins at $399 and only supports Wi-Fi, not 5G, so Razer and Verizon have some wiggle space here; if the handheld comes in around $250, it may be appealing to the same sorts of folks that purchased the Nvidia Shield portable.
Krista Bourne, Verizon’s consumer chief operating officer, said she couldn’t provide me any more information than what was previewed onstage, including price and Verizon’s actual position in the handheld. We know it’ll have some access to 5G ultra-wideband, which might allow for faster downloads and potentially allow you to stream more casual games, but it’s unclear if it’ll be limited to Verizon’s network. More information will most likely have to wait till Razer makes an official announcement.
