Early reports from various outlets have begun to describe Asus’ entry into the phone market. The ROG Phone, which shares a name with Asus’ gaming computer line, is set to boast powerful gaming performance. Razer entered the mobile market last year with their aptly-named Razer phone. However, Razer hasn’t quite managed to capture the attention of gamers. Most who prefer gaming on the go have stuck to their gaming laptop or Nintendo Switch. They instead opt for using their phone as, well, a phone. But Asus seeks to change that, and it looks like they might do just that.
Air Buttons
The first innovation worth noting on the ROG phone is the Air Button technology. While the phone sports a normal large touchscreen display and has no physical buttons, it does have Air Button sensors. Those sensors can tell when a finger falls as though it were mashing a button, giving haptic feedback and sending the input. The Air Buttons are programmable, allowing gamers to program key actions, like pulling a trigger, to the handy input.
TwinView Dock
Another fascinating addition that Asus is bringing to the smartphone market are gaming-related peripherals. The TwinView dock is one of them, turning the phone into something of a Nintendo DS-like gaming apparatus by adding a second screen. The dock also sports two physical shoulder buttons in lieu of the Air Buttons, which makes the phone feel more like a dedicated gaming device.
AeroActive Cooler
A peripheral set to be included with every ROG phone, the AeroActive cooler seeks to combat a common criticism of long gaming sessions on phones. Mobile devices don’t have any room for a cooling system, meaning that long sessions of Fortnite or Pokemon Go will cause the phone to heat up and have worse performance. To remedy this, the ROG Phone will come standard with this cooling device to help maintain a stable temperature. The option to keep the phone cooler for longer will make it a more attractive phone for serious gamers.
ROG Phone: A True Gaming Smartphone?
The ROG Phone has all the design choices that could make a phone desirable as a gaming platform. It even sports a side-mounted charger, in addition to the bottom-mounted one, to allow for gaming while charging. Asus has also promised a dock to allow your phone to be displayed on a monitor or computer screen, sort of a reverse game-streaming.
If gaming smartphones are ever going to be a viable market, the ROG Phone is set to be the phone to make them so. If this one underperforms, it likely won’t be the fault of the phone, but instead the hard-to-predict whims of gamers. For now we’ll have to await further details, as Asus hasn’t even floated a release date yet.
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