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Carmack: Phones may kill off handhelds

"There may not be much as developers we can do about that"

Id Software technical director John Carmack believes smartphones will soon replace dedicated handheld consoles.

Speaking to The Dallas Morning News, he claimed that the upcoming Nintendo 3DS and Sony NGP could prove to be the last of their kind.

"The smart phone may turn out to be 80 percent as good at gaming as a dedicated gaming platform. People are going to carry their smart phone, and if it's an 80 percent gaming device, how many people in the gaming market will be satisfied with that? That's the question that's in everybody's mind.

"If that's what the consumers are going to trend towards on there, there may not be much as developers we can do about that," he said.

In terms of future efforts from Sony and Nintendo, he reasoned that "You don't always get to build pyramids just because you want to."

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Alec Meer

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A 10-year veteran of scribbling about video games, Alec primarily writes for Rock, Paper, Shotgun, but given any opportunity he will escape his keyboard and mouse ghetto to write about any and all formats.

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