As the mobile division at Nintendo continues to bring more of its major franchises to phones and tablets, some fans have wondered if the company might come up with its own mobile hardware. Right now, there’s no proof that the acclaimed game developer is committing resources to this purpose, but a report from DigiTimes suggests that Nintendo could be a potential player in the gaming phone manufacturing market in the future.

According to this report, Nintendo might be one of those companies (alongside the likes of Vivo, Nubia, and Xiaomi) that are either planning to enter the market or looking to empower their presence in it.

The report also talks about the upcoming Razer 3 phone, which is going to be the third attempt from Razer to convince gamers to buy a gaming phone. It seems that even though Razer recently laid off 30 people from its team, it still intends to continue working on the Razer 3. The phone is expected to come out within this year.

Meanwhile, on Monday Xiaomi announced the Black Shark 2, a sequel to its own gaming phone series. The phone is advertised to have incredibly high specs, including Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 CPU and 12GB RAM. On the other hand, while the iQOO from Vivo is not specifically categorized as a gaming phone, it certainly has enough hardware powers to rival one.

The report claims that there were “speculations” that Nintendo is planning to release a new gaming mobile gaming device that supports integration with the Switch. However, Nintendo has not made any comment about these speculations.

The Nintendo Switch came out just a little bit over 2 years ago, and the company’s focus right now is clearly on supporting this platform.  As a result, it’s unlikely that it will launch any new hardware (except maybe a Switch refresh) in the foreseeable future. Still, moving forward mobile will play a key role in Nintendo’s plans, so a gaming phone from the company might not be out of the realm of possibility.

Last month, PUBG Mobile surpassed all other games on the Play Store to win Google’s Best Game Award, and recent statistics show that this battle royale title is currently raking in over 30 million daily active users.

There is no questioning that PUBG Mobile is one of the biggest mobile titles in the world right now. So if you want to jump onto the bandwagon and grab some chicken dinners but don’t have the means to do so, here are three suggestions of reasonably-priced phones that you can get for just under Rs 20,000. Despite their relatively cheap price, they are still perfectly capable of delivering a very solid gaming experience.

Xiaomi Poco F1

Xiaomi Poco F1 is the most powerful smartphone on this list. This is understandable, considering that it has a price of Rs 19,999, which is basically the limit we have here. Still, you will not find a better phone for the same price. The Poco F1 uses Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor, which is one of the strongest processors currently available for smartphones.  This processor is accompanied by Adreno 630 GPU and 6GB of RAM, which is more than enough to run PUBG Mobile seamlessly. What’s more, it also has a liquid cooling system to further enhance the user’s experience. Note that the phone does get a bit hot if you play for long hours, but it shouldn’t cause any inconvenience.

Realme 2 Pro

In term of specs, the Realme 2 Pro comes with a 6.3-inch full HD+ display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 chipset, and Adreno 512 GPU. There are three versions currently available on the market. The first one, which has 4GB RAM and 64GB internal storage, will set you back Rs 13,990. The 6GB RAM & 64GB Storage version, meanwhile, costs Rs 15,990, whereas you’ll have to spend Rs 17,990 to get a 8GB Ram/128GB storage version.

PUBG Mobile is a fairly resource demanding game, so it is recommended that you go for at least the 6GB RAM version. The cheapest version with 4GB RAM will still be able to run the game with no problem, but if you play for long sections, you might experience some issues due to the limited volatile memory space.

Asus Zenfone Max Pro M2

Like the Realme 2 Pro, the Asus Zenfone Max Pro M2 also uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 - Adreno 512 combination. Another similarity is that it too has 3 variants: 3GB RAM/32GB storage, 4GB RAM/64GB storage and 6GB RAM/64GB storage; which costs Rs 12,999, Rs 14,999 and Rs 16,999 respectively. They are all capable of running PUBG Mobile smoothly on medium setting. The Asus Zenfone Max Pro M2 is a cheaper alternative if you cannot afford the more expensive phones, and its wide price range gives you further options to pick the one that is most suitable to your budget.

We have already seen companies such as ASUS and Razer trying to break into the market of gaming smartphones. However, I am quite sure that not a lot of people know about Xiaomi’s involvement in this market. Granted, it’s involvement is not under the Xiaomi identity. A startup called Black Shark has been receiving Xiaomi’s instructions on manufacturing smartphones as well as investments. The first product of this cooperation is a bold gaming smartphone released in April. Today, the company is back already with Helo, a beefier model. After some testing, this phone is shaping up as a greater package both internally and externally.

Just like the previous model, Helo has the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 along with cooling by vapor-chamber, making gameplay smoother. In addition, it has a 4000mAh battery and Quick Charge version 3.0. There are two speakers facing front, making it excellent for any sort of entertainments. The phone has a 20 MP and 1.25um f/1.75 12MP main sensor combination. However, they are now vertically aligned in the middle and above the fingerprint reader in the rear. The front camera is lum f/2.2 and 20MP. The “Shark” feature is present, too. You need to toggle the left switch and then be greeted by various settings for gaming.

All the other things have been given boosts, the phone memory is now 10 GB of LPDDR4X and 1,866 MHz, storage is now 256 GB. The screen is also upgraded to an AMOLED 2,160 x 1,080 panel of 6.01 inches.

We will not forget the updated RGB lights. This phone has a backlit and customizable logo on its rear. However, when we tried it out, we only had eight options, not the whole 16.8 million. I was at least be able to get some blinking patterns and control its brightness. Helo has stripes of LED on both of its sides, they are expected to react to our gameplay. However, the prototype can only light up when toggling to game mode.

The Bluetooth controller is the most appealing part of the phone. When the phone is placed in the protection case bundled along, you can connect the controller through its top side. This will give you better thumb control as well as more screen space to view.

I was trying the accessory through a quick PUBG match during the testing. It was quite a blast, at least until my character died. When you finished playing, you only need to slide the game controller out, you can keep the case on if you like. After comparing it to the other one, the Helo indeed has a better build quality and better grip.

At the moment, the Helo is available only in China. The price is at $460 for the 128GB storage and 6GB RAM version. The “Sports Edition” jumps to $605 due to the right-hand controller, 256GB storage and 10GB RAM. However, the Helo may not be the first device with 10GB RAM to go on sale as it will not arrive until the 12^th of December. It’s more likely the title will belong to Oppo Find X or Xiaomi Mix 3.