It’s hard to believe it’s already been a year. The Steam Deck is my way to play PC games that I’ve missed over the years. I played well over twenty different games on the Deck so far. Fear and Hunger 2: Termina stands out as one of my favorites. Its artwork is fantastic and it does an exceptional job at setting a mood like the Silent Hill games do.
The Deck also allowed me to play some old console games I missed, including Final Fantasy XIII. FFXIII was worth trying simply to fill in the gap and understand its contribution to subsequent games in the series. Although it’s a good looking game with a decent battle system, the story wasn’t my thing. I was unable to defeat the final boss and don’t feel compelled to keep trying. I must have liked the game well enough to put about sixty hours into it.
I prefer to run games at settings that don’t cause the fans to run constantly. It’s a trade-off between pretty graphics and playing in a quiet, fan-free environment. Sacrificing framerates for more battery life seems like a no-brainer, especially for visual novels, turn-based games, and other titles lacking fast-paced action.
I always knew I wanted to use the Deck as both a portable device and as a gaming PC substitute, so I bought the Valve-made Docking Station. Some titles are more comfortable with a keyboard and mouse.
The Deck recognized my external monitor immediately and had no issues connecting. The Deck seems to run warm/hot when using a 2K resolution. Depending on the game, even running at 1920 x 1080 can tax the system.
Since I chose the mid-tier Deck model, I bought a 512 GB microSD card. It took less than two minutes to install the card, test it, and format it.
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| Everspace (2017) |
Miscellaneous Notes About the Deck
- The Deck occasionally loses its Internet connection. Selecting the network in the wifi list typically resolves it. It happens most frequently after waking from sleep.
- Browsing the store in Gaming Mode is easier than it was about a year ago. There’s still no way to see the system requirements for a game. While not strictly necessary, it would be nice to have an idea of what to expect in terms of performance.
- The “Back” button in Gaming Mode behaves in a confusing manner. Sometimes when I try to go back to the previous store page, it takes me all the way back to my library (or somewhere else that I was a while ago). It’s like the system forgets where the user was most recently.
- In about a year of using the Deck, the OS has crashed a handful of times. It hasn’t been frequent enough to be concerning.
- By default, installing applications through the command line (for example, using pacman) requires some tinkering to set up. Valve warns that every SteamOS update may erase applications installed in this manner.
More Game Highlights from 2023
- Endless Space 2 was exactly the kind of 4X game I wanted to play when I bought it. It’s an easy one to play handheld.
- Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising is a fascinating little game released over twenty years ago. Its setting is similar in spirit to the kind of possible future described in Star Trek: The Next Generation. It combines real-time strategy gameplay with third-person vehicle combat.
- Killer7 works really well on the Deck. Occasionally I found it easier to use a mouse for the aiming. It’s great that such a unique game is available on modern systems. Highly recommended.
I’m looking forward to everything else I can do with this device, like making 3D artwork.
Valve recently announced a new OLED model of the Deck with improved battery life. It’s more of a refresh than a full-fledged Deck 2. Seeing Valve continue to iterate on the device is a good sign that the company plans to support it for many years to come.