Mobile will win
For once this is not yet another click bait title advertising an app development business claiming the web is dead. We are past this point, now AI is coming for our good, old HTML pages. This time it is about gaming. I do not just see it as a trend but as a natural evolution forced by economics.
There was a big outrage about the Nintendo Switch 2 costing $449 or whatever your local currency, exchange rate, tariffs etc brought the price to - let us just say $500, hopefully with Mario Kart. What did not help was that a game that should teach you how the Switch works now costs money.
Game prices are also on an upwards trend with rumours that we will soon see AAA titles sit at $100 or more. Considering that game prices did not go up for 20 years or so it makes sense that an adjustment is needed, if we like it or not. Production costs are also not going down.
The one silver lining I see in AAA titles increasing the prices drastically is indie developers being able to also up prices a bit, making the business more sustainable. I might be wrong, but I think as long as the perceived difference in price stays the same indie games can go up in price without a major outrage.
Switch 2
Nintendos pricing for the Switch 2 is in my opinion highly relevant. Nintendo consoles for a long time have been the cheapest way to play video games. Hardware prices alone usually have been in a range where you could even hand your child a Nintendo system while being slightly less worried than handing them a $700 playstation or a $2000 gaming PC.
And the lower the price for the hardware, the easier it was to get started. You could rent games. Ask a friend to lend you one. As long as you had the console you were good to go. To Nintendos credit they try to keep this spirit mostly alive with the Switch 2, even if it is in a slightly bastardized way that requires Nintendo to keep their servers running if you have a "license only" cartridge - something they have not shown to be very good at.
With the Switch being priced in the realm of most consoles or entry level (read: used) gaming PCs this option is gone. If we ignore the desire to play Nintendo exclusive titles for a second I would actually argue to just get a SteamDeck. With Steam sales, indie games and all of the fun stuff it should be the most cost effective way to get into gaming. Plus you have a proper PC in your hand. Arrrr!
All that being said - with traditional gaming getting more expensive using a phone you already own is a really compelling way to play games. It is right there in your pocket.
Phones are the cheapest way to get started
The number of games available is growing, slow but steadily. Capcom releasing the Resident Evil series. Square porting Final Fantasy. But it is not just single player games. Wild Rift and Call of Duty have actual leagues and tournaments. Mobile gaming tournaments where people sit on a stage playing on phones for price money. Not even tablets (there is a good reason for this when you compare viewports)! As someone who carried a computer and CRT screen to LAN parties for years this does not even sound real to me. This is so far beyond casually playing Flappy Bird or Candy Crush.
Just looking at these two facts it is clear that mobile gaming can and will become even more relevant. No need to buy hardware and the game library keeps slowly growing. Plus you can get a lot of gaming done for free. Just because you play an anime waifu gatcha game does not mean you have to fall for the dark patterns and spend money.
However, these two points alone are in my opinion not a compelling enough argument for the thesis.
Growing up with touchscreens
What I have seen a lot is small children - we are talking two to three years old - already knowing how to click on the YouTube for Kids icon to play their favourite show. They grow up interacting with touchscreens.
There is a considerable number of children who are completely lost when you present them with a keyboard or mouse. They might only be in elementary school right now, but they use iPads in the classroom, not computers. The need for them to learn to interact with keyboard and mouse as input device is getting less and less relevant.
And the same can be said for controllers. A friends 10 y/o loves playing on his phone. He was lost when his dad got a Switch 2. He tried to click on the screen and using the controller did not feel natural. He ignored the console and went back to his phone.
We are still a decade or so away from seeing how the generations growing up with touchscreen devices readily available will interact with technology on a day to day basis. But convenience, availability and learned habits growing up in my opinion suggests they will be touchscreen first.
Game engines and hardware
If they get old enough, start earning disposable income and game publishers see the trend (they already do) and start porting more AAA titles to phones and tablets, then the need for them to buy dedicated hardware to play the games everyone is excited about will simply not exist.
Considering that many companies standardize on one of the two to three major game engines, by now porting games should become easier the more game engine and asset pipeline optimize for this scenario. And easier means cheaper, adding to the game publishers incentive to do it. It might not be the absolute best experience, but it also does not have to be. You are paying a few dollars to spend some time with it. No big deal. When you pay $500 for hardware and $100 for a game you expect a lot more.
We are also not seeing any significant improvement in the gaming hardware department lately. 4k, 60 - 120 fps is what most people consider perfect for gaming. That's PlayStation 5 level, established in 2020. Sure, enthusiasts might disagree, but I also do not see them pushing for 6k or 8k. Esports wants more fps, but for other reasons than looking at pretty scenery.
Nvidia has to make up frames to make benchmark numbers go up. A decade old system with a $50 second hand GPU can run a majority of titles at 1080p with good enough graphics. Phones are not necessarily getting a lot faster either, but they are fast enough for most AAA games if ported with some optimisation. Just compare raw hardware performance between an Xbox, Playstation and iPhone 16 Pro. (Thermals are still a problem for phones though.)
Taking the power of the PlayStation 5 as a baseline and looking at what a game can look like pushing Unreal Engine there is not a lot left to desire. The Witcher 4 technical demo was simply amazing. I do not have my hopes up the final product will resemble the demo 100%, but even if we get 80% there I am here for it.
Old man yelling at gaming
I am personally not a big mobile gamer. I do not think I will ever be. I do not enjoy dragging my finger over glass for an extended period of time. Chances are I will end up old with a big grey beard, playing emulated SNES games, having my glass mousepad destroy teflon glides and complain that new games are all gacha garbage with no story. Except for the "Skyrim ultimate new anniversary edition" they will release in 2041, that will be a masterpiece.