They know none of the competition are anywhere close to as good since they don't use Linux.
this post was submitted on 20 Feb 2024
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They also don't have the thumb touchpads that Valve has put so much effort into. That's a huge form-factor advantage.
A lot of them also prioritize high resolution displays, which hurts performance and battery life. I've said before and I'll say again: IMO the 720p display is the Steam Deck's killer feature
Steam Input integration with the touchpads is so underrated, mode shifting between a keypad and game commands is something that literally nothing else can replicate. Not to mention the dual haptic feedback, and accurate pressure sensing. Really opens up a world of possibilities
Wish Valve considers a Steam Controller 2 with the game guts as the controller in the Deck. Despite the Deck taking heavy inspiration from the OG controller, the difference in experience is night and day
I wouldn’t even consider another handheld if it doesn’t have those touchpads. So much of my library would become unplayable without them.
I own the Lenovo Legion Go, which runs Windows 11 and has one thumb touchpad. It also has removable controllers, one of which turns into an ergonomic mouse.
I needed a new computer for photo editing and my cousin wanted me to start playing Star Citizen with him so this ended up being the perfect solution for me.
I'm super psyched seeing more competition in the market, though. I'd love to see how comprehensive yet portable PCs can become.
How often do you actually use the vertical mouse?
Depending on what I'm doing, not at all or religiously.
If I'm just doing edits in Bridge, Camera Raw, or Lightroom, I actually mapped my controller's buttons using JoyToKey so that I've now got an incredibly fast workflow for those. If I'm using Photoshop, Illustrator, or playing games, that vertical mouse is my best friend and an absolute game-changer.
I used JoyToKey for years, but I'll add that you can make a desktop binding for steam, if you keep it on in the background anyways
It's a bit more complex macro system and you can use on screen menus and such if that'll improve your workflow. I used a gamepad as my mouse for almost 5 years in everything I did.
Yeah, I'd really have been far less picky about which handheld I bought if it weren't for getting Adobe CC for free through work and my cousin wanting to play Star Citizen. I'd instead be rocking whatever flavor of Linux made me feel good, just like I am on my home server and my old Chromebook.
All that being said, I really do love the vertical mouse. There's something incredibly satisfying about having a pistol-grip and using my trigger-finger to pelt the opposition in Halo followed by a middle-finger-activated melee. Plus, the thumb placement for the scroll wheel just feels superb in any situation.
I'd give the Lenovo Legion Go a solid 9/10 if it were running Linux, lol. For now, it's gotta settle for my 7.5 since I gotta deal with Microsoft popping up some ridiculous alert every other 30 seconds because I don't wanna log into stuff.
I ended up getting a steam deck after being an owner of multiple GPD products and dealing with windows on those. I considered a Go, but I'm done with windows handhelds. I hope either steamOS catches on as a mainstream or all the other hardware manufacturers get together and decide to all use Linux.
I tried Linux on a GPD Win 2, it was a such a nightmare that I'm not interested in any handhelds that dont COME with Linux either. I want proper driver support and not be forced to spend hours and hours diagnosing why my screen is either sideways or only showing half
That's a very fair point. And to your credit, the screen on the LeGo is natively portrait, which really screws me over in some highly specific scenarios.
also, competitor or not, they are still (mostly) portable Steam machines, propagating Valve's storefront.
Sure, they probably can use others, but... still?
I'm pretty sure Valve would rather not have to build hardware at all, they just want to sell games. The Deck was Valve declaring "Fine, I'll do it myself" after they couldn't convince OEMs to roll the dice. Of course they'll give competition kudos, competition proves the technology and market conditions for handheld PCs is present and in demand.
they just want to sell games
It'd be nice if they went back to making games
Counter strike 2 just came out though! (/s)
i dont think its that its just to spur more competition imo. Handheld gaming PCs have been a thing since like 2015, but it was almost exclusively chinese conoanies only producing it over a kickstarter and some grew big enough to have a amazon presence (GPDWin). the lack of competition led to high handheld price costs that are reletively speaking, terrible (over 1000$ for what is essentially a handheld netbook).
the steam decks price was to garner interest and grow a market, which it will likely want other conpanies to take the reigns to. Valves decisions has ALWAYS been about growing a new market (steam machines(linux console pcs), steam link(porting pc gaming to the TV), VR(self explainatory), Steam deck(on the go linux gaming))
It's googles android plan, offer a small amount of hardware, give people the software for free, sell them the services
Here's the link to the official blog post: https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/4031353003322171824
And to save you a clock, the entirety of the portion referencing their competitors.
The More the Merrier
We’re not the only ones who introduced amazing hardware last year. Several other companies have seized the same opportunity to serve users with high-powered on-the-go gaming PCs, with products like the Asus ROG Ally, the OneXPlayer OneXFly, and the Ayaneo Air. All these choices provide users with a bunch of options and price points for portable PC gaming, and reward the investments game devs are making to support better gamepad input and smaller screen sizes. We hope to see even more of these handheld PCs in 2024.
Feels like the OP article could have been much shorter.
But then how would they get those sweet, sweet ad views?
Valve takes obvious PR win by saying something nice to competition.
Competition is good, and I belive helps innovation. I hope that we get closer to the ideal experience and don't get locked down into one choice. I would give someone other than Valve a look if they also committed to Linux as a platform (which really isn't that weird, historically). One of my complaints about the Deck is the D-Pad is kind of bad for fighting games. The left direction is obviously cut off some to make space, and strict left inputs tend to be down left instead. It's a bit of a nit pick, but I would like to see improvement there.
How about they release steam is for competitors
Edit: steamos
Considering all the competitors are windows based, they already have access to steam. And the open source holo iso(steam OS) is available if they want to use it.
I had a typo, I meant steamos
I don't think Holo iso completely open source. He's just imagining the steam deck os and runs into compatibility issues all the time
Holo iso is completely open source. The reason for the compatibility issues is that it is forked from software meant for a very specific device so there will always be issues on other devices if it is used as is