You buy Lenovo’s new Legion Go 2 handheld for the screen. The performance is secondary to how beautiful recent 2D titles look on the 8.8-inch, 1200p OLED display. The Legion Go 2 is otherwise a big, meaty handheld for gamers with big, meaty claws. You’ll struggle to hold it above your head lying in bed unless you’re a professional power lifter; the controls won’t be your favorite; it’s as wonky as its predecessor. And it’s hard to argue anybody should spend well over $1,000 on a gaming handheld rather than just buying a full gaming laptop.
Despite all that, I can’t help but enjoy the hell out of it. My initial hours spent rolling my eyes at everything Lenovo failed to fix from its first iteration slowly morphed into the kind of appreciation that can only occur when a device starts to feel personal. It’s what happened when I downloaded Hollow Knight: Silksong and Hades II to the device and had to hold back a gasp on a crowded plane for how gorgeous both games looked on Lenovo’s big, expensive, beautiful display.
Legion Go 2 It's thick, heavy, and so damn pretty. It's a shame it costs as much as it does. 4 See at Best Buy Pros Beautiful OLED display
144Hz refresh rate with VRR
New ergonomics
Low-wattage performance uplift Cons Annoying removable controls
FPS mode is pointless
Reflective display
Very expensive at $1,350
It’s the same feeling I get from Valve’s $550 Steam Deck OLED, which uses the same organic light-emitting diode screen technology to present deeper contrast and rich colors. Valve’s handheld maxes out at 800p on an older, custom AMD chipset. Even when you factor in performance and display size, the Steam Deck OLED is still a much, much better deal. My review unit version of the Legion Go 2 with the AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme processor, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage, costs $1,350. I could literally buy two Steam Decks for this price (more if I opted for the LCD model). For Lenovo’s inflated price, I could run out and buy three $450 Nintendo Switch 2 handhelds. You could nab a version of the Legion Go 2 that starts at $1,100 for a version with a AMD Ryzen Z2, but judging by my tests that chip will land closer in power to handhelds that are three years old and cost much less.
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