The Asus ROG Xbox Ally is ashamed of Windows

"This is an Xbox," declare both Microsoft and Asus. But the fact that it's running Windows is a little obfuscated by both the promo material and the device itself.

- BY MICHAEL CRIDER

PlayALLYourgames, proclaims the first bit of marketing copy for the ROG Xbox Ally (fave.co/43YmgAg), the third-gen Asus handheld PC that's also borrowing Microsoft's Xbox brand. “This is an Xbox,” declares the very next line. The design even gets a new, dedicated Xbox button right on its face.

But between the bombastic branding (fave.co/3FAeVyX) and the lack of the familiar bottom taskbar on any of the promotional images for this redesigned gaming gadget, it's hard to tell that this is, in fact, a Windows-powered gaming PC. Asus and Microsoft seem far more interested in talking about a revamped full-screen interface for the dedicated Xbox app and the accompanying Game Bar than the underlying operating system that lets you play all your games.

It's the defining feature of most handheld PCs versus Valve's Linux-powered Steam Deck, which only just got its second official companion under the SteamOS umbrella (the Lenovo Legion Go S, fave.co/4jkwTnV).

Windows enables the ROG Xbox Ally—and all the handheld PCs that came after the Steam Deck—to play a wider gamut of games. The most notable among them are some of the most popular, including online multiplayer games that require proprietary anti-cheat software not available on Linux.

HANDHELD WINDOWS GAMING PC WOES

The fact that Windows 11 is hidden behind layers of optimized user interface might seem a little strange—unless, of course, you've actually used one of these Windows-powered handhelds (fave.co/4e098PS). A common—hell, practically universal—complaint is that Windows 11 just isn’t built for a screen this small, or an interface that leans more on a game controller than a mouse or touchscreen.