I just gave up totally on my Shield TV and got a used PS4 Pro. Not sure if I'll ever really play games on it (got Steam?) and it is massive overkill for a Plex client but my experience with media devices is overkill beats underkill -- it also replaces a trash Sony Blu-Ray player that takes 30 seconds to boot even if all you want to do is eject a disc.
Allegedly the Shield was a game console but the only games I put much time in on it were Pac Man 256 (maybe in 20 years we get that with procgen) and Idea Factory's port of Record of Agarest Wars because Idea Factory will always make a deal to colonize a new platform -- they made one of like 15 exclusive games for the PS5 and it's not enough reason for me to get one.
I agree it’s not particularly attractive as a console in 2025. But as a Geforce Now streaming box with all the latest tech (AV1, Reflex, 120 Hz and 4k upscaling, etc), i’d buy it in an instant. Been waiting to pull the trigger on the 2019 model for 2 years, but not worth it if they will use the leftover chips from the switch for a refresh soon. I can wait a few more months.
