NVIDIA’s SHIELD is Now On Sale: Prepare the Couch!

The time has come: NVIDIA’s SHIELD gaming portable is now available for purchase. The lead-up to SHIELD’s launch wasn’t ideal for NVIDIA, but it looks like all of the hassle is well behind it. SHIELD can be purchased through NVIDIA’s own website, Newegg, GameStop, Microcenter and Canada Computer for $299 USD.

As a quick recap: SHIELD is a 5-inch tablet and gamepad hybrid, built around Android. Out-of-the-gate, SHIELD will officially support 100+ games found on Google’s Play store, including a couple of Tegra 4-enhanced titles that have been released recently (Riptide GP2, Chuck’s Challenge 32, Blood Sword: Sword of Ruin and Arma Tactics). When not gaming, the device can be used for anything an ordinary tablet would – it runs “pure Android Jelly Bean“, after all.

One of the biggest features SHIELD offers is Play PC, the ability to stream select games from your GeForce-powered PC over to the SHIELD. While Tegra 4 is going to enable some killer mobile gaming, with Play PC it’s able to stream even greater-detailed desktop games, like Borderlands 2, Batman: Arkham City, Dishonored, Metro: Last Night, Resident Evil 6, Skyrim, BioShock Infinite, Half-Life 2, Tomb Raider, F1 2012 and more. We’ll find out from the initial reviews how this technology fares, but it’s important to note that it’s likely still considered a “beta” for a reason.

With SHIELD out the door, are you planning to pick one up?

NVIDIA SHIELD Reviews

• HotHardware
• PC Perspective
• Tom’s Hardware