It’s no secret that Russia has been slowly working towards eschewing as much Western technology as it can and developing its own, and its latest effort seems to be related to video games. On December 25, Anton Gorelkin, Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Information Policy, revealed some information on a domestic video game console being developed by the Ministry of Industry and Trade, as reported by TechSpot. The theoretical console will have an Elbrus processor and be powered by either Aurora or Alt Linux, both Russian forks of the popular Linux operating system.
According to TechSpot, the Elbrus processor was developed by the Moscow Center of SPARC Technologies and primarily designed for defense, critical infrastructure and other applications. This processor isn’t up to what Intel, AMD and Arm produce right now, and it certainly won’t reach PS5 or Xbox levels of power. Despite the weaker chipset, Gorelkin stressed that the console isn’t designed to play ports of older games, but will play “domestic video game products.” Presumably, this means Russia will also need its own developer community to design these games.
There’s also another console called Fog Play in development, but it’s more of a cloud-gaming device. Users with high-end computers can rent them out to Fog Play owners, who play games on these computers through the cloud.
These potential consoles are only one aspect of Russia’s broader technological sovereignty plans. Ever since its invasion of Ukraine and subsequent Western sanctions, Russia has been trying to make this a reality — but digital isolation is making this difficult.
The adoption of Astra Linux in government, intelligence, military and even educational computers is another Russian effort to develop its own technology. To this end, Russia is also trying to replace file and website scanner VirusTotal (owned by Google) with its own Multiscanner platform in fears of US government infiltration.
Despite this progress, Russia is still heavily reliant on China’s technology. Chinese smartphones are popular there, and Chinese electronics and dual-use technology continue to enter Russia even as the Middle Kingdom no longer exports them to the US.
Russia is likely unable to achieve true technological independence, in video gaming or other crucial areas, as it relies too much on China and doesn’t have the capabilities to produce PS5 or Xbox-level chips. The two Russian video game consoles serve as a good example of the challenges the country faces given its poor relations with many of the world’s superpowers. Just like the Elbrus processor isn’t going to truly compete against the best consoles, Russia will likely continue to struggle for technological sovereignty.
