Valve announces the SteamDeck

chrcoluk · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:00

Kautya said:
Looks decent but not so sure about the button placement near the top.

yeah thinking about it, seems way too high.

Defy Belief · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:05

grudas said:
Think you have 48hrs to pay it before your reservation expires.. just FYI.

Is that right?

Edit just looked and reservation is refundable within 30 days and after 30 days it'd be refunded to Steam wallet, so I assume not.

Jae-So · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:27

Defy Belief said:
Is that right?

Edit just looked and reservation is refundable within 30 days and after 30 days it'd be refunded to Steam wallet, so I assume not.

I thought not was 48 hour window to make a reservation before the open market.
Haven't seen anything about paying within 48 hours.

jonneymendoza · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:32

Needles said:
Got a 256.

759 in the queue out of 4442. (At time of checking)

https://store.steampowered.com/reservation/ajaxgetuserstate?rgReservationPackageIDs=[595603,595604,595605]&rgDepositPackageIDs=[595598,595601,595602]

This should reveal your queue and total orders.

Ahh I'll give this a go

McBain · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:37

{"success":21}

:/

Quixote · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:41

opethdisciple said:
I did a quick google and unless the switch comes in different flavours a switch is £280 which is quite a bit cheaper than this valve device.

Almost £70 cheaper than the cheapest valvedeck.

I don't see how it could possibly be cheaper & deliver a good experience. It's plus point & minus point are the same - it really lets you play most of your existing steam library, because it's a general-purpose machine running general purpose games. But by the same token, those are less optimised to it's specific hardware & it needs more grunt to deliver acceptable performance as a result. Plus it offers many control options & a decent screen. I imagine they are selling at a loss for every unit.
I'm a big switch fanboy but I rarely play handheld - I basically have it as the latest Nintendo console, the portability is a small bonus. But if I wanted portability, the prospect of tapping into 90% of my steam game library for just the price of the hardware would be pretty compelling, I think.

Moothead2 · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:41

Very interested to see how this plays out. It looks very good in theory but I can foresee a few issues with weight and UI scaling being the main two outside of the storage/price issue. Switch games designed for the switch still have issues with small text on it's small 720p screen and it's supposed to weigh 2.7x as much as the original Switch, something I already feel is pushing comfort.

Quixote · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:44

Moothead2 said:
Very interested to see how this plays out. It looks very good in theory but I can foresee a few issues with weight and UI scaling being the main two outside of the storage/price issue. Switch games designed for the switch still have issues with small text on it's small 720p screen and it's supposed to weigh 2.7x as much as the original Switch, something I already feel is pushing comfort.

I think these are very important points. And it brings up how much this is supposed to draw new players into PC gaming vs how much this is supposed to sell existing PC gamers a handheld. Seems to me the 2nd proposition is much stronger, as they may have 100+ game libraries ready to go just for the cost of the hardware. At the same time, Valve are pretty ambicious & I imagine they'd want to expand the PC gaming userbase if at all possible. And if someone who can't afford a gaming PC is told they can play most of the top PC games on a £350 machine - that has some appeal, right ?

Moothead2 · 16 Jul 2021 at 22:57

Quixote said:
At the same time, Valve are pretty ambicious & I imagine they'd want to expand the PC gaming userbase if at all possible. And if someone who can't afford a gaming PC is told they can play most of the top PC games on a £350 machine - that has some appeal, right ?

It definitely does but it will depend massively on the faff involved. With a Switch you simply put the cartridge in, maybe download an update and play the game. Even using a Steam Link in the same room as my PC was a huge faff at times with things like launchers messing things up. I can't see the deck being a seamless experience like the home consoles are, PC gaming never is. The storage is a huge issue too for the casual market, the higher capacity models are pretty expensive and the lowest tier will barely fit Doom 2016 on it's own.

Quixote · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:02

Moothead2 said:
It definitely does but it will depend massively on the faff involved. With a Switch you simply put the cartridge in, maybe download an update and play the game. Even using a Steam Link in the same room as my PC was a huge faff at times with things like launchers messing things up. I can't see the deck being a seamless experience like the home consoles are, PC gaming never is. The storage is a huge issue too for the casual market, the higher capacity models are pretty expensive and the lowest tier will barely fit Doom 2016 on it's own.

If you restrict yourself to Steam games (let's be honest there are so many) it *should* be pretty plug & play *I guess?*. I'm not really sure, that's how it is on a desktop but that's native windows.
I also won't downplay the appeal of the switch, I'm a huge fan & I think it's seamless hardware software experience is so good. Just the universal pause with home button, suspend any game while paused with sleep - it makes it so fluid & seamsless to start & stop playing. I doubt this will equal that, although I'm not sure it needs to in order to have a market.

Jay85 · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:02

Got locked out of my steam account trying to pay lol, what a faff!! Told to wait a few hours before trying again wtf?!

Preordered anyway, no idea where i am in the queue.

grudas · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:08

Defy Belief said:
Is that right?

Edit just looked and reservation is refundable within 30 days and after 30 days it'd be refunded to Steam wallet, so I assume not.

Ye you're right! I misread

danoliver1 · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:10

grudas said:
Think you have 48hrs to pay it before your reservation expires.. just FYI.

Sod that then will let you early adopters be the beta testers.

XeNoNF50 · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:34

haszek said:
It doesn't seem to work now but last time I refreshed it there was 8k+ orders it also said allocation 1, if that means anything.

What time did you get your order in?

hyperseven · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:44

my order is still pending since 18:30 :confused:

random_matt · 16 Jul 2021 at 23:59

UK must have like half a dozen units for Dec. My order completion is 18:05 and expected Q1 2022.

TheRandomGuy7 · 17 Jul 2021 at 00:23

Seems like a no-brainer to reserve one for £4 even if you aren't sure about it yet.

No commitment to actually buy one, and we can make a more informed decision as more info, reviews etc come out.

Needles · 17 Jul 2021 at 00:46

random_matt said:
UK must have like half a dozen units for Dec. My order completion is 18:05 and expected Q1 2022.

Mine was 18:07 and I am showing as Q1.

I was able to see my queue position (if accurate) and it was 759.

Rroff · 17 Jul 2021 at 01:14

Like others have mentioned think I'd rather just have a GPD device - even my old GPD Pocket (1) holds up reasonably well and the newer ones much better.

feck199 · 17 Jul 2021 at 01:25

I just got my steam account is too new to place a preorder. It’s 15+ years old I think. can’t be sure now but maybe even when steam first launched and I added my half life keys.....