Is this Razer’s Steam Deck killer?

digitaltrends.com:

Razer has been oddly quiet in the burgeoning world of handheld gaming PCs. When I met up with the company at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) to learn about its new products, I was happy to hear it had an answer to the success of the Steam Deck.

But it was not the type of answer I was expecting.

It’s the Razer Kishi Ultra. Similar to the Kishi, it’s a telescopic controller — that’s a controller that wraps around your phone and turns a mobile screen into a handheld gaming device. It’s much larger than the original Kishi, with full-size sticks and buttons, and its big claim to fame is support for a tablet as large as the iPad mini.

The future of handheld gaming

By definition, it’s not a handheld gaming PC, but according to Razer product manager Joey Hanna, it fills a similar role. Hanna worked on the original Kishi and the Android-based Razer Edge, which is where the Steam Deck comparison comes into play. When meeting up with Hanna at GDC, the Kishi Ultra felt like an inflection point.

Hanna insisted that the Kishi Ultra actually had some unique advantages over the Steam Deck and devices like the ROG Ally. The ergonomics were a key point, with clicky face buttons that feel tactile and responsive, as well as curved grips that rest in your hand like an Xbox controller. The adjustable plastic back helps, too; it holds the two ends of the controller firmly in place, so you don’t get the awkward wobble you run into with the original Kishi.

In the demo, Razer showed me the Kishi Ultra set up with an iPad Mini — and I have to admit, even playing basic mobile games on an 8.3-inch Liquid Retina display was stunning. You’re not contending with fan noise, heat, and a couple of hours of battery life either, which are elements of a handheld gaming PC that I’ve become acutely familiar with.

The package is excellent here. Razer’s Mecha-Tactile face buttons and D-pad feel great, as do the Hall