It was reported back in March that the Russian government wants to prioritise the development of a Russian game console as part of a socioeconomic development programme. The plans mentioned both a stationary console and a gaming handheld. Besides hardware, the operating system and the required cloud services are likewise to be developed in the country. Russian media outlets Habr and RBC managed to learn more about the two consoles in development as part of this project.
The Skolkovo Foundation has been tasked with the development and distribution of one of these consoles. According to information provided by politician Anton Gorelkin, the first console in this programme is based on a Russian Elbrus processor and an operating system built upon either Aurora OS or ALT Linux. The decision concerning software hasn’t been finalised yet. Since Elbrus CPUs aren’t able to compete with the performance of an Xbox Series X or Playstation 5 (approx. $450 on Amazon), the console should instead offer another “groundbreaking” feature, the specifics of which were not provided.
It is unclear which Elbrus chip will end up in this console. But for reference, an Elbrus-8SV delivered disappointing results in a gaming test carried out last year, sometimes managing to only churn out a highly choppy 30 fps even in older games such as The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Russian telecommunications giant MTS is simultaneously working on a streaming-focused game console with relatively basic hardware, designed to allow users to access the MTS Fog Play cloud gaming platform. This console is set to retail for less than $50 with a controller included. Details regarding its hardware haven’t been confirmed.