Asus ROG Phone 2 gets an official release window and high-profile gaming 'optimization' partner
After announcing a shift in focus around six months back and unveiling its incredibly affordable new flagship handset just a few weeks ago, Asus is finally ready to reveal the first official details on the company's upcoming sophomore gaming smartphone effort. Exactly as rumored, the ROG Phone 2 will be released in the third quarter of 2019 to follow in the footsteps of an original model that made its global debut in June 2018.
More specifically, we can expect the Asus ROG Phone 2 to see daylight in July, at least in China. That's according to a Weibo post published earlier today that also confirms the Taiwan-based PC and handset maker will closely work together with Tencent Games to optimize the future mobile device for the latter company's content. The video game publishing division of the Chinese giant that also owns multiple crazy popular social media and music services has in recent years contributed to the success of global hits such as PUBG and Fortnite.
Obviously, that makes Tencent an extremely valuable partner for Asus, although it's worth remembering the same company signed a similar collaboration deal with Razer back in March. That means whatever hardcore gaming "optimizations" are in the pipeline for the Asus ROG Phone 2, we should probably expect them to come to the Razer Phone 3 as well... eventually.
Unfortunately, we don't know much about the hardware specifications of the Asus ROG Phone 2 or Razer Phone 3, but their 2018 predecessors should give you a pretty good idea of what to expect. State-of-the-art Snapdragon 855 processing power is definitely in the cards, along with hefty memory counts, large displays sporting industry-leading refresh rates, and hopefully, improved cameras.
It's also important to keep in mind the first-gen ROG Phone took several months to expand to the US, so there's a good chance its sequel will only be made available stateside sometime in the fall.
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