While there were a few unconfirmed leaks circulating online, little was known about the mysterious Black Shark, except that it is a gaming smartphone from Black Shark Technology, a Chinese gaming company backed by Xiaomi. The veil was finally lifted yesterday when the whole device was revealed, complete with specs and accessories:

The Black Shark comes in two flavors: Polar Night and Sky Gray
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Some of the new device's specs are as follows:

• 5.99” 18:9 IPS LCD with Full HD+ resolution
  
• Snapdragon 845 chip
  
• Adreno 630 GPU
  
• 4,000 mAh battery
  
• Up to 8GB of RAM
  
• Up to 128 GB Internal Storage
• An integrated multi-stage liquid cooling system that brings the CPU temperature 8° C down
• Android Oreo OS with JOY UI custom launcher
• Dual camera on the back: 12 MP f/1.75 + 20 MP f/1.75 with 6P lens and a dual-LED flash
• Front camera: 20MP sensor but slower f/2.2 lens
• 109g weight

Unfortunately, the Black Shark does not feature a microSD slot but comes in two versions: 6 GB RAM + 64 GB internal storage or 8 GB RAM + 128 GB storage.

To stand out as a gaming smartphone, the Black Shark has a few dedicated features to back its claim. The gaming phone's most striking feature is its dedicated detachable gamepad. The latter is somewhat akin to the Nintendo Switch's joy-con as it attaches on one side of the phone. The gamepad itself packs a 340 mAh and can connect via Bluetooth. While this peripheral will be sold separately, the first 50,000 buyers will get it for free. It is a quite peculiar gamepad as it is only one-sided, offering only one analogue stick and a shoulder button but no directional keys nor any A/B/X/Y buttons.

Another "game-y" feature is its "Shark" key located on its left side. This will allow the phone to go all out, dedicating all resources for optimal performance.

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Gaming smartphones might sound like a niche market but they are slowly picking up. That's especially the case in China where online mobile games are a huge hit. There is even a growing competition among hardware companies to bring gaming smartphones to consumers. Razer recently unveiled its Razer phone and another gaming phone, the Red Magic, is in the works. The smartphone gaming market has also been welcoming console titles like PUBG and Fortnite that will soon follow suit and might attract more gamers worldwide.

The Black Shark is now available for pre-order on JD.com, with the 8GB RAM/128GB storage version costing CNY3,499 (€452/$557) and the 6GB RAM/64 GB version priced at CNY2,999 (€387/$477). The Black Shark Gamepad is sold separately at CNY179 (€23/$28).

Black Shark Official Website

 

[Deleted User]

yay a phone to play all your shitty micro$ games on

While I won't deny that 95% of the Google Play store's game catalog is shit, there are some serviceable ports and games hidden in there.

 

[Boured]

If it wasn't for the shipping price, this thing would be a steal in america I mean

 

[CMDreamer]

Myself, I don't like playing on a smartphone or tablet, because I miss the feeling of a button being smashed with my fingers.

 

[Jayro]

I'll stick with my Galaxy S9+, thanks. With the SFC30 by 8bitdo, I'm covered.

 

[Jonna]

I'll stick with my Galaxy S9+, thanks. With the SFC30 by 8bitdo, I'm covered.

This is what makes me wish Sony could make a sequel to the Xperia Play. I have a Note 8 and an NES30 Pro, but having to carry both separately, plus try to find a place to stand my phone (and also get a case that actually has a stand) is not ideal for mobility. The Play solved that with the PlayStation-like controls on a slider, it was beautiful.

Ultimately, a phone case with sliding Bluetooth controls would be the best, but there are way too many phones for that to be viable to a business as a profitable product.

 

[TotalInsanity4]

If it wasn't for the shipping price, this thing would be a steal in america I mean

Chinese Yen, not Japanese

 

[spotanjo3]

Yes I am

Why?

 

[QCLasky]

A chinese phone named black shark and they used a black guy as background in "about us".
Not that it really mater, they sure could use any people as background, I just found it funny

Btw this phone looks like Matrimax Iplay

 

[Xen0]

Why?

To me it just seems overpriced without any reason, in fact other cheaper phones are superrior. People buy it to be 'cool' and nobody in my school can give me a reason why they bought one. Some come up with "it's security is way better", and these people share all their personal data on Facebook, sign in on various sites their real Email and Name etc and don't even have an anti virus on their PC.

 

[WhiteMaze]

Anyone remember the NGage? It was bad-ass for about 5 minutes. I see this going the same way .

The sad thing is the fact that the N-Gage actually had buttons integrated.

For this you need to purchase a controller if you want to use it properly, and even then it's only half.

 

[Crimson Cuttlefish]

a good gaming smartphone will not be achieved until we bring back physical keyboards, change my mind

 

[LightyKD]

The one advantage this phone has is that everything is saved to the internal storage and the internal storage seems beefy. That said, anything less than 128GB is not sufficient for a decent Android game collection. A big issue with Android gaming is that many games and phones fail to understand what adaptable storage means. I'm tired of games with 100mb or less APKs only pushing the APK to the SD card and leaving the damn near 2GB worth of game files on internal storage. Seriously, WTF?! Why even bother buying an SD card if app developers keep refusing to include PROPER support for adaptable storage?

Seriously, the OUYA - Fire TV2 days were the height of Android gaming. Developers cared about controller support and proper use of storage. Now they just don't give a shit and try to push out as many cash grabs as possible.

 

[spotanjo3]

To me it just seems overpriced without any reason, in fact other cheaper phones are superrior. People buy it to be 'cool' and nobody in my school can give me a reason why they bought one. Some come up with "it's security is way better", and these people share all their personal data on Facebook, sign in on various sites their real Email and Name etc and don't even have an anti virus on their PC.

Thats true. I totally agree with you. I have an IPhone and I noticed that it just overpriced for what and nonsense. I loved iPhone but sometimes I hate it because of overpriced.

 

[Foxi4]

I *really* hate the new trend of calling phase change cooling "liquid cooling", and it's all Microsoft's fault. It's a heatpipe, call it a heatpipe.

 

[ganons]

Is it able to run Dolphin?

It uses the Snapdragon 845 like some of the S9 variants. It has a very capable GPU and can play most games in Dolphin

 

[Medveitsi]

so the only controller thing is an analog stick and a single button? srs touch controls for gaming are awnful and a single analog stick wont change that...

i know right. why haven't any major phone company made xperia play like phone?

 

[zeveroth]

The sad thing is the fact that the N-Gage actually had buttons integrated.

For this you need to purchase a controller if you want to use it properly, and even then it's only half.

I know. It looks like those cheap controllers found with Walmart be headsets only even less . Quite sad really.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

F**K THIS! Who the hell needs these beefy ass specs for Android gaming?! There aren't even enough PS360 level PC game ports on Android. If this was a x86 Windows device, that would be awesome but this shit is not needed? Don't even get me started on the "gamepad". It's just a damn add on analog stick. You wanna make a gaming phone? Give me a damn phone with a slide out gamepad like the Xperia Play. As of now, this game will be good for PS2 and GameCube emulation but 80% of Android games will be wasting the added horsepower. If I could add a rolling eye emoji to this, I would!

Aside from the surface, I haven't seen anything running windows that is worth a damn. Also here are the Rollin eyes.

 

[LightyKD]

I know. It looks like those cheap controllers found with Walmart be headsets only even less . Quite sad really.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

GPD Win 1 and 2?

Aside from the surface, I haven't seen anything running windows that is worth a damn. Also here are the Rollin eyes.

I know. It looks like those cheap controllers found with Walmart be headsets only even less . Quite sad really.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------


Aside from the surface, I haven't seen anything running windows that is worth a damn. Also here are the Rollin eyes.

 

[ATofix]

Not a bad price imh

 

[KevinLSX]

So ps2 and wii/gc emulators on android full speed?