A place to discuss and support all things Steam Deck.
Replacement for r/steamdeck_linux.
As Lemmy doesn't have flairs yet, you can use these prefixes to indicate what type of post you have made, eg:
[Flair] My post title
The following is a list of suggested flairs:
[Discussion] - General discussion.
[Help] - A request for help or support.
[News] - News about the deck.
[PSA] - Sharing important information.
[Game] - News / info about a game on the deck.
[Update] - An update to a previous post.
[Meta] - Discussion about this community.
Some more Steam Deck specific flairs:
[Boot Screen] - Custom boot screens/videos.
[Selling] - If you are selling your deck.
These are not enforced, but they are encouraged.
Rules:
When it originally launched, I feared it would go the same way as Valve's previous inventions in the VR
What the hell is she talking about?
Index still gets regular updates and it still doesn't really have any competition at its price point (Quest with its ridiculous account requirements doesn't count).
Just because Index was not a massive success due to its significantly higher cost doesn't mean it's a failure, and it's far from abandoned.
How is the index? I’ve been thinking about getting one but I feel like there’s a new version right around the corner.
It's great, especially the controllers - there's nothing else like it.
And, well, it's the only headset making any claims about Linux compatibility, which is also a big thing for me.
But your concern is the exact reason I'm not sure I can recommend it.
Of course, Valve works on Valve Time, so the chances Deckard will release next month are basically the same as it releasing anytime in the next decade.
I actually spend a lot more time on PSVR2 than Index these days, and when I do switch back to Index, I kinda miss some of the features.
If money is no object, I think the current best arrangement is probably something like a Bigscreen Beyond with Audio Strap, Index controllers, and the requisite lighthouses. But that’s about $1600 compared to the PSVR2, which was on sale for $350 over the holidays. PSVR2 games are generally more polished, but you also don’t have the bonkers modding scene like PCVR does. You can run PSVR2 on the PC now, but most of the best features stop working. So there really isn’t a perfect solution.
Bigscreen Beyond
Yeah, it does look pretty nice, but no Linux support, especially at this price, makes it a no-go for me. :(
edit: well, shit, apparently it doesn't do any proprietary bullshit and uses generic protocols, and reportedly works fine on Linux.
Might have to consider it after all...
I love mine, especially that I could custom fit lenses, so I don't need to wear glasses. Because that will damage the internal lenses over time.
It's great! Mine is five years old and still working just fine.
I have needed to replace the cable (was getting weird green static), but that was really easy to do myself and Valve directly sells replacements.
Also my right speaker is a bit loose so I have to adjust it occasionally during gameplay.
Otherwise it's been solid. Easy recommendation.
They barely did Steam Link (the little physical streaming box from like 2015) and ended production quickly and the remaining units were heavily discounted, and they still send updates for it.
It's one of many reasons I like Steam and have moved more towards Steam gaming and away from Playstation.
Steam link moved beyond its hardware quickly.
The link hardware is no longer required.
AppleTV, nvidia shield, chromecast ultra, he’ll even LG webos all have apps for streaming stream games.
They discontinued the hardware because it’s no longer needed.
In fact, when I switched to my appleTV for steam, it became even better quality and less dropped frames. It also seems to be lower latency.
I think she means it will be unpopular, unknown, or not relevant. I am a gamer with a Steam Deck and I had no idea what the Index was or that it even existed until just now when you mentioned it here.
I soooo wish I had a use case for one. They’re completely amazing devices and in my more mobile days, it would have been the perfect device for me. But now I’m home all the time and my partner and I have desktops set up next to each other, so I don’t have a use for one.
The biggest thing for me is being able to put games to sleep and pick them up later. Being able to instantly stop playing a game, and then instantly start playing back at that same spot later has really freed me up to play in a lot of small sessions.
I've majorly cut down on how much time I spend on my phone, and replaced it with bite sized chunks of playing real games.
That is an awesome feature! I don’t find myself playing short sessions nowadays. That would be super useful if I did though!
It helps me play games that I would otherwise avoid on my desktop (usually low-requirement games like Vampire Survivor-likes or action platformers). If I gotta pick up a controller to play it, the Deck is probably better. I can also play in shorter bursts, so if I have ten minutes of nothing to do, that's ten minutes I can make progress on a game.
And because of that I've finished a lot more games than I did with only my desktop.
Ask me how I have several Steam games with over 4k hours logged.
I'm home constantly. I have a nice gaming PC with a comfy chair AND a nice big screen TV.
I got the original asap and then upgraded to OLED asap. Both were absolutely worth it. I almost play on it more than anything. I even stream the more graphic heavy games from desktop to Steam Deck, and stream PS5 or PS Plus Streaming games to my Steam Deck.
Handheld gaming is just nicer for me. More comfortable. More personal. I can see everything better. Everything looks more crisp on it.
I have no real use case for one and am basically never mobile yet I use it like crazy.
I had a fairly opposite experience. I bought a Steam Deck when it first came out and had to return it during the refund period because of a software bug making it basically unusable with my account.
A year later, the bug was finally fixed and I rebought. And... I like the fact that it runs Linux and the efforts done to make windows games playable in Linux in general. But I've found that i actually don't enjoy the form factor of the Steam Deck at all.
I find it to be too big and heavy to hold comfortably without resting it on something. The buttons are tiny and too close to the edge. The d-pad sucks, at least on mine. Staring at the little screen gives me a headache and text/icons are too small in a lot of games. The Wi-Fi is really slow (at least in the original LCD model) and downloading/installing takes absolutely forever. I've literally spent more time installing games and downloading updates than actually playing games in it.
It has been months since I last turned mine on. In hindsight, it was a poor purchase for me.
I do still like it as a concept and an happy to see it is successful. I welcome the new Linux users. I follow the steam deck communities and read the news.
... But it's just not for me, apparently.
I find it fantastic for games with lot of side quests like jrpgs so I can utilize the suspend feature to make better progress with the portability and being able to stop whenever I want without losing progress. And then when it comes to the more cinematic main missions I might go and play on my PC with the TV display.
I have this problem... I ended up getting one anyway and do kind of regret it. It's a great machine and I've enjoyed having it for the occasional flight or train ride, but when I'm at home I'd rather just be hooked up to my desktop or TV. If I was still commuting an hour to the office everyday I'd probably get a lot more use out of it
Here we have desktops set up next to each other but since we work remotely we don't want to spent our time on the office all day, so we play things on the couch/living room and the steam decks are used almost all the time. You can basically run the game on your desktop and play it remotely on the SD, on hand-held mode or docked plugged on the TV.
It is also the perfect companion for travel. We had a 5 hours flight in November which passed very quickly playing Balatro, lol.
I used to think I didn't have a use case for one either but you know how sitting at your desk takes slightly more than zero effort? Well, that tiny amount of effort made it so whenever I actually sat my ass down, I would end up only playing "heavy" games like Skyrim while ignoring stuff like Bastion, Cuphead, Hollow Night, the LEGO Games, Pacman World, etc. Like, I'm not gonna drag my ass to my office to play Thimbleweed Park. Having a handheld got rid of that mental block and I've finally finished several games I otherwise wouldn't have, like pretty much anything that needs to be emulated. I even started buying games specifically because I wanted to play them on it.
In way way did valve stop supporting streaming? Did they mean in-home game, remote play, friend remote play?
I think they mean how they stopped selling Steam Link devices. They still support the software side of streaming, they just don't sell dedicated hardware for it anymore.
Didn't they stop selling the hardware because most users already have a phone, computer, or TV which can run the Steam Link app?
I think that's the logic behind it, but I get better stream quality using the dedicated box vs the app. Plus, can't do the Moonlight thing over the app, as far as I'm aware.
I guess it's very dependent on what you're running the app on, and what else that device is running
Yeah I'd expect a high end wifi 7 phone on a 6ghz connection would blow away a steam link with even a good 5ghz wifi 5 connection.
You're aware that there are Moonlight apps for these platforms, too right?
Nope! Good to know should the steamlink crap out tho
Ngl I really love the Steamlink. I loaded Moonlight on it and it lets me play Xbox gamepass games on the couch from the PC too.
You gotta either hardwire it with ethernet cables or set it to run on dedicated wifi channels to get a good stream quality, though, and it's better suited for turn-based games, though I've played plenty of platformers and shooters on it too.
I really like the steam link in theory, but I had too much trouble getting a reliably good picture quality through it.
I used Google Stadia for awhile before it died, and it had better video quality when streaming games over the internet to a wifi connected chromecast. I even ran ethernet drops through my house to get my PC>router>Steam link connections hardwired, and it still had worse streaming quality than Stadia.
Had a link in college, it worked perfectly on our 5GHz network and let anyone play their PC games in the living room. Many hours of Ultimate Chicken Horse were played!
When I got it I wasn’t sure why exactly. I have fast PCs, and my Switch is under a mountain of dust too. Now It’s one of my favorite machines. So versatile. My wife hates sitting at her desk for gaming so it has reignited her passion for it. And it gets me out of my office so we can hang out more when we’re winding down after a day.
I sometimes use a steamdeck out and about but most of the time I use it at home streaming my desktop using sunshine/moonlight. I don’t notice the lag, just enjoy the high quality visuals and extended battery. You can even use wake on lan to wake up your PC from moonlight on the steam deck.
Man, moonlight/sunshine was a gamechanger for my PC, I can play on my TV then on my phone then on my desktop, it's awesome!
When I got mine originally (pre ordered like 2 days in so I got mine 6 months after launch lol) I was doing a TON of travel and it replaced my switch
It then sat mostly unused for almost 2 years because I never gamed away from home and fuck paying for their dock
Finally got the JSAUX dock a couple weeks back and now it's almost fully replaced our entire main TV entertainment center
Me hooking up my PC to the TV. 🤮
Me using Steam Deck to play on my TV. 🤩
So fuck paying for the official deck, but … unfuck? paying for a 3rd party one? I don’t get it
The official one is more expensive
It comes with a 65W USB-C power brick, the same that comes with the Deck.
The 3rd party ones don’t.
I like that she came around. It’s really nice to be able to game anywhere and some games are just better on a handheld.
How can a game just be better on a handheld? That sounds highly subjective.
Yeah, you’re not wrong about it being subjective. I certainly never intended to speak for every denizen of the multiverse.
There are just a lot of games, like Balatro for example, that just don’t compel me on PC.