by Valve has shared new information about the advancements that will be made with the Steam Deck 2 – including improved battery life – and further expressed a desire to create a Steam Controller 2.
Valve has made no secret that there will be a sequel to the Steam Deck – indeed, multiple iterations of the portable gaming PC – and in an interview with The Verge (opens in a new tab)Steam Deck designers Lawrence Yang and Pierre-Loup Griffais touched on a few priorities for Steam Deck 2.
When asked about the major sticking points that needed to be fixed with the next incarnation of the handheld, the two said it was longer battery life and improved performance. the screen.
So what about faster performance and smoother frame rates? Apparently that’s not in the cards, as Griffais told The Verge: “Right now the fact that all Steam Decks can play the same games and we have a goal for users to understand at what kind of level of performance to expect when you’re gaming and for developers to understand what to target…there’s a lot of value in having that spec alone.
He added: “I think we will choose to keep the performance level a bit longer and only change the performance level when there is a significant gain to be had.”
As we mentioned at the start, the topic of a Steam Controller sequel came up, and Yang replied, “Yeah, we want that to happen. It’s just a matter of how and when.
So there will be sequels to both of these pieces of hardware, although the Steam Deck 2 is clearly Valve’s focus – but the Steam Controller 2 will be something that will likely be explored, Yang notes.
Valve employees are also helping with the company’s major efforts to get games working properly on the Steam Deck and fixing issues like fixing stutter with Elden Ring. Apparently Valve spent about six months launching Halo Infinite, including implementing new Vulkan features for the game to support; impressive lengths indeed.
Efforts to make games with anti-cheat systems compatible with the handheld are another area of focus, and engineers noted that Halo: The Master Chief Collection and Fall Guys are a few examples of games on which we are actively working on and which should be playable on the Deck (eventually).
Analysis: Boosting the battery would clearly be a major boon
When it comes to the Steam Deck 2, battery life is an obvious goal to aim for. Obviously, any laptop literally lives and dies by its battery life, which can be especially problematic for demanding games. Therefore, getting a decent extra life will be a big step forward. Of course, a better screen is another obvious target that will make a major difference to the overall portable gaming experience.
It’s interesting to hear that the performance boost is apparently not on the table for Steam Deck 2, although it’s clearly something that will happen in future iterations. Either way, while it might be tempting to imagine that a more minor dent than expected for the sequel could mean Steam Deck 2 is closer than expected, that probably won’t be the case. There’s probably still a long way to go to give Steam Deck buyers enough leeway to profit from their purchases (and don’t forget that Valve struggled to supply all of these folks like it did).
The comment about working on new Vulkan features for Halo Infinite is also very enlightening, and elsewhere in the interview is an even more eye-catching snippet. Namely, Valve “directly pays over 100 open source developers” who work on Proton, Vulkan, the Mesa graphics driver, and more. Serious stuff.
As far as the Steam Controller 2 is concerned, this prospect – as vague as it may seem in this mention – has been met with enthusiasm from some, as there are certainly fans of the original controller, while also asking questions. questions about, well, why bother? Considering the original was canned and a bunch of leftover stock was more or less given out in 2019. We’ll just have to keep our eyes peeled for more news on that, because we’re really intrigued to see if that’s really something. Valve could sue.
