My thoughts new Steam hardware as a fan of the Steam Deck

People seemed surprised by the recent Valve announcement of their 3 new devices. I am not sure why as it has been rumoured for a long time now and there have been leaks that have literally detailed the devices almost exactly as they have been revealed. Valve has been alluding to new devices in various ways for a while. Stating there will not be a new Steam Deck coming anytime soon was a hint in itself as what were they doing if they were not creating the Steam Deck 2?

I would like to start with a strong suggestion that I feel applies to any of these online discussions and comparisons. Do your homework and look at the device that fits your needs for the price you can afford. There is a Venn Diagram here where you need to accept that you will not get everything you want for the price you want. What can you accept not having compared to the things you absolutely have to have. Do you need PlayStations exclusives day one or can you wait until they come to Steam or go on sale (or more and more likely come to Xbox)? Do you need Ray Tracing and amazing graphics? Do you need the ROG Ally or Xbox variant or can you put up with the less slick and fiddleyness of the Steam Deck? How far will your money take you? You need to look at as many reviews and information pieces as possible and try to ignore the hype and fluff that is on the internet especially fanboyism. Right Dad job done, now here is my opinion in waffling form.

My main interest is in the Steam Machine as I have never got into VR so my opinion is second hand and based on what would make me move to VR and I never had the original Steam Controller but I recon I may be tempted to get the new one. On the Steam Machine, over all I believe this is a good move. There are many things that need to be said about this and a comparison to Xbox and PlayStation consoles are inevitable. There are distinct differences that need to be highlighted. I also feel this is a Steam Deck vs Switch 2 vs ROG Ally vs ROG Xbox Ally vs PlayStation Portal argument all over again and one that people drag out of proportion purely for the sake of an argument. There is also a discussion around the OS system on the Steam devices especially compared to the new Xbox OS for their consoles and handheld PCs. This is one of the major drivers in my opinion as this is what will make or break the next hardware. The specs are also important as a comparison between these devices but they are really apples to oranges and, like buying new PC hardware, will be down to your needs and preference.

I have said before that comparing the handheld devices is like comparing transport methods. The Switch is a bus. It is a proprietary device that has a very specific use case, as Nintendo does its own thing. It goes its own way and has a very defined path in the gaming landscape. It is primarily there to play Nintendo games. Yes, it has morphed into more of a multi use device that plays other games, but nobody is buying a Switch 2 to play Cyberpunk and the like. They buy it primarily to play Donkey Kong, Zelda or Mario. I am not knocking it in fact I find it incredible and a feather in Nintendos cap that they can create the best-selling console ever purely for people to use to play Nintendo games. I think PlayStation specifically as well as Xbox would love that kind of draw for their consoles. The Steam Deck on the other hand is the Prius of the car world. It is not incredibly powerful and runs a different system to other devices, but it is cheap and cheerful and gets the job done. You need to change your habits in order to use it, but it gets you from A to B with very little fuss and in an efficient way. Basically, it does what it says on the tin no more no less. The other PC handhelds are the sports cars of the world. For many people, overkill and the benefit you get from owning one on the whole is negligible but it is noticeable. It is brilliant at running games at an incredible resolution and FPS for a handheld (a fact that many people fail to mention). But realistically like a sports car if you are in specific cases this is over the top and very much for certain use cases. When deciding on these devices it is imperative you do your homework as it behoves you to understand what these devices actually do, and which one does what you want it to do at the price point you are willing to pay. This is why many people suggest the Steam Deck OLED as when you look at it the pound for pound value of the Steam Deck, it is a monster. But there are many other things to take into account.

That brings me to the OS. Both Microsoft and Valve have been working on their paired down version of their OS. Valve’s is Steam OS an incredible and actually user-friendly version of Lynx running with a compatibility layer to enable you to run Windows games. This is a game changer and as incredible as people say it is. BUT it isn’t perfect and still needs work. There are still many games and programs that will not run on this OS that run on Windows. This IS a problem despite what many will tell you. Yes, I know there are many distros and you can use many different comparability layers to get games to work but it is not an out of the box user friendly solution and is certainly not plug and play. Even saying ‘distros’ and compatibility ‘layers’ is enough for many people to check out even though seasoned Steam Deck and PC users know it is not rocket science it is another barrier to overcome. Even with all the amazing work they have done so far, Valve has a lot of work to do to make this plug and play and allow you to play all your Steam and other launcher games straight out of the box. Microsoft is doing a similar thing. People are complaining that the next Xbox is a PC. All consoles are PCs. They have many sections of the device sealed away via the OS and it is a user-friendly plug and play don’t have to do anything to it device sure, but for all intents and purposes it is a PC. The new Xbox will be the same as they have just shifted their development from a bespoke Xbox OS to a paired down Windows version. I will state very clearly this is not ready. It is the biggest gripe I have with the Xbox Ally devices. Steam has Big Picture mode and really the Xbox app on these devices needs to be that at the bare minimum, and it is not. Valve needs to be able to run games and programs flawlessly and with little input from the user. Whether this is a kind of compatibility check that runs the first time you boot up the game that automatically picks the best compatibility layer for that game (using previous user experiences). This could be something similar to the shader cacheing that we get when we start a new game on PC. Programs or apps like the PC Game Pass app need to run natively on the Steam Deck and not through some weird hack to get it to work. Xbox has a lot of work to do to win over the console user base to what they are doing. The app just needs to be better. They have the compatibility functionality over Valve and the Steam Deck, but the app needs to be smoother and more user friendly and let’s be honest here need to be better looking. Microsoft also needs to have a dedicated Xbox backwards compatible emulator that when needed runs all people’s old Xbox console games flawlessly. This is I think non-negotiable as so many people have stated this to be a major hinderance to them buying the new Xboxes of any variety and of course it fuels the ‘This is not an Xbox’ argument as silly and as purposefully inflammatory that line of argument is. One of Xbox’s main selling points is almost complete backward compatibility. People will not care if it is a PC or not if they don’t realise that it is a PC. It will become an Xbox that has Steam and other launchers on it.

Then there is the power of these consoles and the parts that make them up. Again, this is the whole Steam Deck vs Xbox Ally vs Switch argument all over. There is always a trade-off between power and price and the more expensive the less of a gain you get. This is a curve where the pound per pound gain you get as you increase the price is less and less. The Steam Deck is perfectly priced to catch that space where majority of people are willing to pay for the level of power you receive and where it seems a good deal. The Switch and now the Switch 2 are not the most powerful devices out there and more so than the Steam Deck is outdated hardware, especially when compared the sports cars of the handhelds like the ROG devices. But the ROG devices (including the Xbox varieties) as well as the MSI Claw and the Lenovo Legion Go are all powerful handheld devices that walk a tight line between power and battery life. If you are emulating games, playing indie or AA titles there is no need to buy the more expensive handhelds. The juice, as they say, is just not worth the squeeze if that is your use case.

Now I will finally get to the point as all of the above is exactly the same as the conversation around the new Steam Machine. I speak about this specifically as the Steam Frame VR device I feel I don’t know enough about the VR space to comment on this but by all accounts, it will sit in there to rival the Meta Quest so dependant on pricing this could be a good option for VR. It is also useful to play non-VR games which I think is a smart move. There needs to come a tipping point where there are enough VR users to create more VR games but where there are enough users to make it economically viable to do so. The cheaper it gets, the more comfortable the device is and more playtime you get out of the battery will all lead to this point. But until then many people will just not see the point. Apparently, Half Life Alex was a good example of this, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there was another one for release.

The Steam controller was a funny one. Again, I never bought one, although when they went to £5 I had one in my basket on Steam for ages and never pulled the trigger regrettably. There seem to be mixed responses to the original. People seemed to love it or hate it. It was either brilliant or downright weird and just not wanted. Valve has iterated and moved all the things people liked about the Steam Deck controller configuration, removed the screen of the Steam Deck and scrunched the controller together. There are now 2 sticks (the original only had one which many people disliked) and the trackpads from the Steam Deck which many people love. I have seen people comment that the D-Pad could be better as they don’t really like the Steam Deck D-Pad, but it is described as serviceable. Overall people seem stoked they are making a new controller as many have asked for it for a while.

Lastly there is the Steam Machine. This is the device that most interests me, but one I don’t think I will be an early adopter of. Not because I think it is bad, on the contrary this is a great move by Valve and unlike their last set top gaming box, the timing for this one is right. Many who used the original Steam Link and Steam Machine that Valve released loved it. The easy of use and the ability to play many of your Steam games on your telly from the sofa instead of sitting at a desk was welcome. Needless to say, the devices never took off in any great way and many said it was before it’s time. Steam OS was Lynix but not as refined as it is now. But the idea that was put forth by these devices stuck with PC gamers. There are many posts around online where people highlight how this device wasn’t right, but it made them create their own PCs to sit under the telly. There have been rumblings from Steam users for years for Valve to release a new one. Then the Steam Deck released, and people were blown away. Steam OS on the device was far from perfect and required some fiddling (and still does to some extent) to get everything to work, but overall, the number of games and programs that just worked out of the box surprised everyone. The OS was sleek, and the UI worked and was nice to use. Almost as soon as the device came out, people started rumbling again about an under the telly device. The Steam Deck can be used as this, with the official dock as well as many good third-party devices but they are not as smooth as the Switch’s docking.

Now that Valve have announced another set top under the telly device, I feel this will be a marked improvement on the initial one as well as the Steam Deck. With Valve you never know. They are a little like Nintendo where they seem to do what they like. I don’t think Valve want to compete with Xbox, or heaven forbid PlayStation, but rather are just about making a device they would like for, people like them. I doubt they have thought about competing with the other console manufacturers. They are fans of Lynix and want to make it feasible for people who want an alternative to Windows and Mac OS. I think the popularity of the Steam Deck surprised them. I imagine they expected enough sales for them to make a profit on it, but I doubt they ever expected that people would be suggesting it over the more powerful handheld devices. It seems they were more enthused and delighted that people wanted to use Steam OS.

Having used the Steam Deck for so long I am always shocked at what you get for the price. The device just seems to take whatever you throw at it as long as you are realistic. I played most of my Baldur’s Gate 3 playthrough on the Steam Deck and it was a dream. I have played numerous other games across the Steam Deck and PC, and I was constantly pleasantly surprised by the performance and the ease of use, again as long as you were realistic and didn’t try to run it at max settings with Ray Tracing on. Overall, the Steam Deck experience I had would be enough for me to suggest this to anyone day one if it was something they were looking for. Valve have built up enough good will it seems to where people are excited for this device. There is also the knowledge that Valve have a proven record of updates and changes that are for and often driven by the consumers of their products. For example, they have just added the ability to download while the screen is off in the latest update for the Steam Deck that people have been asking for since the beginning. This update highlights for me where Steam OS is and how it still has a way to go before it would become many people’s daily driver.

The last factor is the price. It is interesting that they never released prices. Now this may be because of the ever fluid tariffs in the US, and the US pricing is often a yard stick used for other territories. Valve has a history of keeping costs reasonable but that was then and this is now. Everything is expensive and all the good intentions in the world will not make this less of a factor. It will be interesting to see what price they go with, and this is the one comparison that may actually affect the other console makers. Although I doubt the Steam Machine will be close enough in power to the new Xbox and PlayStation, nor will it have the uptake the other console makers will be expecting from their devices, but there will be a direct comparison of the value proposition of all of the consoles. When the new Xbox and PlayStation consoles are released, the price was already going to be scrutinised, but now it will also be weighed against this machine’s perceived value, and I think that will pose a problem to the other two entities.

I have faith that this will be a good device for anyone looking for a way to play your Steam games on your telly or even a new person who passed on the Steam Deck but would like a console like device with the benefits of PC gaming. But people need to do their homework and ensure that they are willing to put up with the fact that not all games work. You will not be able to play your games that require anti-cheat at least until Valve get them to work with them to make it playable on Lynix or specifically Steam OS. There may be a big update for Steam OS in time for the release of these devices and if that is the case then there might be a case for them to make serious inroads into the console space as I think people are slowly becoming less enamoured with the likes of Microsoft and Sony. Even with all the coverage this is receiving, it would take some amazing shift to get people to leave the well-trodden path of the current consoles in favour of this device. I just don’t think Steam OS is there to capture the masses, but it will be welcome for your average PC gamer who would like a console experience with their Steam library.