Why would battery life be worse if they are using a more efficient chipset with the same battery and nearly the same screen? 144 Hz can only be turned on manually for certain apps*, so it won't have any impact on regular use.
* from what I see, it can be turned on in Game Genie and every app I have installed is eligible (or at least the vast majority of them), but you still have to enable apps manually for Game Genie one by one, and then enable 144 Hz manually in Game Genie itself when running those apps. By default it seems to run at 60 Hz even in games where it can run at 144 Hz.
