Valve Steam Deck - What Are We Expecting? - Adam Koralik

It's Adam Koralik here and today we're discussing the Steam Deck by Valve. Specifically, I want to know what is everyone expecting the impact of it to be? How much of a success can it be, is it a threat to Nintendo? What happens to the industry either way?

[nighthawk]

The appeal of the Steam Deck to me is that since it isn't locked down like the Switch, I can emulate all the games I've backed up to my PC and do it anywhere.

[akshatshah]

I think this could be great entry point into pc gaming. There are plenty of games on steam that switch doesn't have and for reasonable prices so I could see many retro gamers interested in this. I could see this feeling intimidating especially if the steam os is clunky to use but I think what's so exciting to me about this is the Versatility. I think even if this fails it will still be a great step for Linux gaming in general and may have the path for Linux to become on par with windows support wise which i'd absolutely love to happen.

[kip]

The Steam Controller had AMAZING functionality, so I'm super hyped for the Steam Deck, which is promised to have all the same great features but lets you play PC games on the go without a bulky laptop or streaming!

[ST]

The PSP sold over 80 million units, at the same time as the DS! That's one of the most underrated achievements in the gaming industry.

Such a shame they dropped the ball so hard on the Vita. I think if the Steam Deck can nail the marketing, they will defeat Nintendo. But its little to do with the quality of the product, and everything to do with marketing.

The Integra X1 is outpaced by mid-range phones from 2019, and yet the Switch has sold over 80 million units. If normies can emulate Switch games at 60fps on the Deck, its game, set and match.

But only if Steam market it right

[TheGamingCircle]

No Multiplayer games on the go that's for sure, Valve should've figured that out, strictly games on the go for single player experience, I'm cool with that but can't speak for others, they should of made it 5g/wifi like the PS Vita:-))

[timweenie]

A lot of pc gamers like myself got a switch because we wanted to play real games on the go. There are some indie games I got on switch instead of PC just because I wanted to play handheld. My switch is useless to me now. I can play all my steam games handheld on the deck and can even play more Nintendo games on deck (via emulation) than I can on a switch. I think the deck is still for a niche audience but this is my dream device and I can't wait to get mine.

[Ben-dobf]

It'll sell very well for a portable PC, but I doubt it'll affect Nintendo much. Best case scenario it pressured them into locking new hardware in for 2022 over 2023

[nacvam]

My hands hurt Just by looking at it. It seems extreemely unconfortable..

[aTron]

I really enjoyed your balanced perspective on the steam deck. You're one of the few that actually acknowledge the differences in demographics of each gaming platform. People get stuck in their own echo chambers for their consoles.

[chibicascade]

Good video. Think another point that you kind of missed is that the steam deck is an iteration of the handheld PC models already produced, such as the GDP WIN and the Aya Neo. They've already showed that this kind of thing is possible, albeit expensive. Steam is giving us the most powerful handheld PC ever made for hundreds of dollars less than the most comparable model from another company.

Well I think your point about the online connection necessity is true, I think there's a lot of games that won't need it. I'm super interested in one of these to play games that I bought and never got around to, Mike Shadow of Mordor, mad Max, and sleeping dogs. All of those will run fine with that internet connection and shouldn't need too many updates since they're so old. I'm really looking forward to this as a portable device I can play at work on my breaks. Right now I've been using the switch and Vita, but there's plenty of games I want to squeeze in to the little free time I have, but aren't available on those two systems.

All in all, the steam deck is going to be a niche product. For the people that fit that niche it's going to be huge. I think it's going to take two or three more iterations before it actually is ready to compete with Nintendo though. Steam is going to have to develop the software to make it as user-friendly as a console is, and I don't think they're there yet

[adammcguire]

Really enjoyed this hypothetical analysis of the Steam Deck. It’s a very interesting but confusing product to me. I don’t know why it needs to exist. I feel like Valve might see a lot of competition coming from GamePass on PC in the future and how that might pull customers from Steam but supplying a product that keeps interest in Steam high could help with that. I don’t think they are looking to compete with consoles but rather to secure their position on the PC going forward. So either way, we could possibly see gamepass on a future Nintendo handheld. Though it would benefit Microsoft more than Nintendo

[MrJakeTucker]

I didn't think about it myself, and Adam, you're the first person I know to bring it up, and that is the possibility that with a Steam Deck, and say you are not at home and can only get a wireless connection, and then you want to start a game but get notified of a large update/patch that needs to be installed first. Could be annoying.

[MediocreTCG]

Random comment before I watch the whole video:
As someone who LOVES console gaming but mostly plays on PC, I have no clue how to feel about this thing.
The idea is cool enough, but I have Steam Link on most devices and an Xbox controller. I'd much rather stream my games from my PC at full res with little to no lag. Yes, it is streaming, but the games look MUCH better and I've tuned it over the past year or so to make it quite stable. I even have the Steam Link hardware box in my room and I love that thing.
Point being, I'm completely numb to this thing because if I'm in a bad enough place internet wise that I can't play my PC on the go, I just pull out my Switch Lite.

[J-RichTalks]

One thing I forgot to mention and things I think everyone is missing is the read speeds on the storage. With no replaceable hard drives and only sd card support for expandable storage games will have a problem running on slow read speed sd cards

[ZeusWeus]

A few extra wee details about the Steam Deck, while it's running SteamOS Valve have made it clear that not only can you install competitor's storefronts onto it but if you wanted you could just install windows and use it like a PC especially since it's dockable like the switch.

Obviously there's no disc or cartridge slot but I am big into PC recently selling all but a few consoles, and I've a decently sized physical game collection for PC, it's entirely possible (and I intend to do so) to rip your games to your PC and copy them to the Deck's internal memory and play them.

I do feel like the Deck will do well, I know of quite a few people that have also sold their Switches to get one, it won't beat the Switch but I don't think Valve are really too caring about that, their CEO Gabe Newell has stated that Nintendo are great and have garnered a huge audience with thier content, but we're going for a different audience mostly.

Only time will tell but Valve have been very bold with their hardware in the past, creating not just for profit but because they see a problem to solve or a chance to innovate, the Steam controller really changed the game (pun intended) for control inputs on PC, the Steam Link offered great flexibility to PC players and both sold very well, they were partially mocked for looking werid but anyone who has them knows how incredible they were, and to be fair the Steam machine disaster wasn't their vault, they actually never made them, they pulled out close to release but companies like Dell decided to release over priced boxes to profit off the hype.

Sorry this was really long 😂

[SamSquids]

I reserved my Steam deck because yeah, I believe in the whole "playing my steam library on the go" thing, as well as the fact that it's a Linux machine with a Zen 2 APU.

[camomagic]

15:37 you are forgetting the 3DS wasn’t selling and they had to drop the price but your main point is still valid.

[jellyface]

Steam software wise geniuses, can maintain Zombies looking good for a good while if they need to. Hardware in the other hand... If they want to compete they'll have to go long run. One thing is the initial hype of the thing but we'll need to see if they can keep the platform alive with their own efforts and not depending only on what others do for them. Valve tends to be lazier than the regular platforms in that sense trusting that everything is going o work on their own without they putting too much effort.

[kilrosk]

I don't think we should consider the deck as a strict switch competitor, it feels like a new form-factor entry into the laptop space. For these devices content is king, the content on offer between the switch and deck is complementary rather then competative.

[ninetendopesaitama]

"Aces up in the hole." A. Koralik 2021