'This is Their Hardware': Xbox Boss Says Ally X Handheld's Eye-Watering $1,000 Price Was Set by Asus

Xbox has addressed the ROG Ally X handheld's arguable $1,000 terms constituent — and said it had been hardware shaper Asus that yet decided however overmuch to charge.

While released arsenic Xbox-branded devices, with entree to your Xbox room and Game Pass built in, the $600 ROG Ally and $1,000 ROG Ally X are yet Asus-made handhelds — and due to the fact that of this, Asus acceptable the price.

That's according to Xbox president Sarah Bond, who told Variety that Asus had utilized its "insight into the market, into the diagnostic set, into what radical want, to find the eventual prices of the devices."

Despite the price, effect to the Ally X successful peculiar has been positive. IGN dubbed the instrumentality arsenic "the caller handheld gaming PC to beat" successful our Asus ROG Ally X review, though noted that its outgo was "the elephant successful the room."

"At $999, not lone is it much costly than the $799 ROG Ally X, but it’s doubly the terms of the Nintendo Switch 2 oregon the Steam Deck," IGN wrote. "Everything is getting much costly lately, and portion the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X is surely blameworthy of this — it’s really beauteous reasonably priced compared to different akin devices that’ve launched successful the past year," comparing it favorably to the Lenovo Legion Go 2 and MSI Claw A8.

And past there's the contented of tarriffs to contented with, an constituent extracurricular of Asus' (or Microsoft's) control. The interaction of these added costs to U.S. imports pb to a lengthy hold for Microsoft to formally corroborate the handhelds' pricing, months aft it revealed a merchandise date.

With the handhelds present available, Bond has suggested that income of the devices — astatine launch, astatine slightest — had not been impacted by concerns astir its cost.

"The absorption was overwhelming request for the device," Bond said. "We sold retired connected the Xbox Store. We sold truly rapidly astatine a fig of different places astir the world. I consciousness truly bully astir the worth that we’re giving gamers for the price, based disconnected the reception to the hardware."

Will immoderate of this interaction Xbox's ain plans to motorboat a first-party handheld of its own? It's unclear. While Microsoft's gaming brag Phil Spencer has antecedently confirmed his involvement successful specified a device, consequent reports person suggested the thought has been sidelined. We asked Jason Ronald, Microsoft's vice president of Xbox gaming devices and ecosystem, astir Microsoft's interior plans to marque a first-party Xbox handheld backmost successful August.

Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You tin scope Tom astatine [email protected] oregon find him connected Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social