Xbox and ASUS are rolling out a meaningful upgrade for the ROG Xbox Ally and ROG Xbox Ally X, introducing Default Game Profiles, a new system-level feature designed to optimise handheld performance without any manual tweaking.
It’s available now in preview and supports 40 games at launch, including major titles like Fortnite, Gears of War: Reloaded, Hollow Knight: Silksong, and Forza Horizon 5.
Default Game Profiles are tailored per title and apply automatically when you’re playing on battery. They balance target frame rate (FPS) with power consumption, adjusting TDP and frame limits on the fly.
If a game struggles to hit its FPS target, the profile temporarily increases power; if it’s running above target, the system caps FPS to save battery. Xbox says this can deliver big efficiency gains – for example, Hollow Knight: Silksong gains nearly an extra hour of battery life while still running at a smooth 120fps.
Players can toggle profiles on or off in the Armoury Crate Command Center Game Bar widget, but the idea is simple: less fiddling, more gaming.
Beyond profiles, Xbox is pushing a broader round of quality-of-life updates. The latest patches improve gamepad responsiveness after login, speed up library loading especially for players with huge libraries, boost Cloud Gaming page performance, and add a new Game Gallery filter showing how well each title fits the Ally’s performance envelope. Stability fixes round out the update.
Default Game Profiles sit alongside a growing ecosystem of features Xbox is building specifically for handheld Windows gaming. The Game Save Sync Indicator arrives next week, giving clear status updates when progress is fully synced to the cloud, which is useful for players bouncing between PC and handheld. Xbox’s full-screen experience, already live on the Ally Xbox lineup, is also expanding to more Windows 11 devices in preview.
And this isn’t the end of the roadmap. Xbox says it’s actively working on better sleep/wake behaviour, improved microSD formatting, and new AI-powered features early next year, including Automatic Super Resolution and automated highlight reels.
With Xbox increasingly treating the Xbox Ally as a first-party handheld experience, this feels like another significant step toward a streamlined, console-like Windows gaming environment and a much easier life for handheld players.
The Asus ROG Xbox Ally finally makes Windows handhelds as compelling as they should have been in the first place. The Xbox FSE UI is slick and easy to use, while the Full HD screen provides good detail and brightness. Battery life here is okay, and controls are comfortable. The Ryzen Z2A processor is certainly showing its age on a £500/$600 handheld, though.
Pros
Lovely, Xbox-inspired looks
Solid performance, as long as you’re happy to turn some settings down
Xbox UI makes this slick and snappy
Cons
Ryzen Z2A processor is beginning to feel dated
Some may prefer an OLED screen
The post Xbox is making 40 titles run better on its portable console appeared first on Trusted Reviews.
