Can you play Starfield on the Asus ROG Ally?

Bethesda’s Starfield has encountered mixed reviews, but still has a fanbase among people who enjoy hard sci-fi and role-playing games. But can it run on something like the ASUS ROG Ally, which puts PC games in handheld form?

Can the ROG Ally run Starfield?

Technically, but if you want to run it both natively and smoothly, you’ll have to scale down graphics settings. The GPU in the Ally is similar in performance to an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060, or possibly a 1650 — which is good for a device the Ally’s size, but doesn’t match Starfield’s listed GPU minimum, which is a GTX 1070 Ti.

Compensating somewhat is CPU performance. The top-end Ally model uses the AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme, a system-on-chip that exceeds the specs of Starfield’s recommended Ryzen 5 3600X or Intel Core i5-10600K.

We suggest following this unofficial setup guide. Note that the biggest change is forcing the game to launch in 720p resolution — while the Ally supports 1080p, and will upscale to that resolution, true 1080p makes for unpleasant framerates.

Is Starfield on Xbox Cloud Gaming?

Yes. You can play Starfield using Xbox Cloud Gaming, so long as you have an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription. In fact this should make the game playable on devices that would otherwise have no hope of running it, such as the Xbox One, and other Windows PCs with specs below those of the Ally.

Bear in mind that while the device requirements for Xbox Cloud Gaming are low, the networking requirements are actually pretty steep. You’ll need an internet connection rated at 20Mbps or higher, and more importantly, a stable one — there’s already minor input lag inherent to cloud gaming, so any extra lag may impact both gameplay and video quality. If you’re using an Ally on Wi-Fi, you’ll want to connect to your router’s 5GHz or 6GHz bands, and probably avoid playing at the same time someone else is streaming a 4K movie.

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