While Xbox boss Phil Spencer stopped short of officially confirming the existence of an Xbox handheld, he did not deny it when asked by IGN’s Ryan McCaffrey after the Xbox Games Showcase.
The long-rumoured portable console, which would be Xbox’s first foray into the handheld market, was referenced in leaked internal documents last year. However, there has been no official announcement about the console’s existence.
Per IGN, McCaffrey asked Spencer about the rumoured device – and his response was quite telling.
“The future for us in hardware is pretty awesome. The work that the team is doing around different form factors, different ways to play, I’m incredibly excited about,” Spencer said. “Today was about the games… but we will have a time to come out and talk more about platform, and we can’t wait to bring it to you,” responded Spencer.
McCaffrey then asked Spencer if the device would be a cloud-based system or a dedicated platform where you can play locally.
“I think being able to play games locally is really important,” explained Spencer.
None of this is official confirmation of the hypothetical handheld’s existence; however, it’s noteworthy that Spencer did not shut down the rumours and, instead, responded excitedly about form factors, different ways of playing, and the idea of playing games locally versus through the cloud.
No timetable has been given for the as-yet unconfirmed handheld, but it seems that an official announcement of such a device is on the horizon.
While there was no announcement of a handheld at the showcase, three new Xbox consoles were unveiled: the Xbox Series X and S All-Digital, and the Series X Special Edition.
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