Steam Deck initial thoughts
I just received my Steam Deck today and messed around with it a bit this evening. Below are my very rough thoughts on the onboarding and game playing experience.
Tangentially, I've been researching personal knowledge management and Obsidian. A concept I came across in that research is “learning out in the open”. One of my interpretations of that is posting rough drafts of blog posts as soon as I have them so you can kind of see more of my regular thought processes, rather than the more polished stuff that takes longer to write up (not that I was ever super-polished). Of course as I continue using it and playing around with accessories, perhaps messing with installing Windows or other “mods”, I'll write up those experiences, too.
- Nondescript charging brick is meh. Cable is not braided. It is also shaped inconveniently, with the non-foldable plug and cord sticking perpendicular out of the opposite end of the brick.
- Button placement seems good even for my small hands
- Initial boot screen with logo is static and has no progress indicator 👎
- Non-glare screen looks great, but using it as a touchscreen is mixed. Responsiveness is OK. Fingerprints and smudges are not easily wiped away with the included microfiber cloth. Best not to use touch. 😒
- Touch responsiveness on keyboard seemed good when entering Wi-Fi password, but afterwards was inconsistent
- Button labels on the device should've been engraved or something; look like they'll rub off easily
- Secondary download had good progress indicator with time estimate and download speed
- Clock and other icons in the status bar look like old Android text and icons
- I don't get what the Steam Deck logo is supposed to be. It looks like a very stylistic D, but 🤷♀️
- Would've liked right stick to be page up/down, left stick line up/down, like on Switch
- Speakers sound good. Default level at boot time is a little loud... Sounds startled me, since initial onboarding is silent.
- WTH, scrolling through the store is so janky...
- When I scrolled through my wishlist, opened a detail page, then backed out to the wishlist, I lost my place 🙄 (I realized that this is just normal behavior in the Steam store on desktop (and in any browser, I assume). You will always lose your place in a list. Smh)
- Using the store is just a terrible experience. Best to buy on another device and install to Deck afterwards. 🙄
- The UI for current downloads is very easy to miss. I tried downloading a Peglin demo and wasn't sure if it successfully completed, since the details page itself doesn't change except for the download button changing to white. I finally noticed the small downloading icon I could tap in the status bar and see the download list and progress.
- Backstack issues: If you hit back (the B button) from a screen, like the home screen, or search, you can travel through all the previous screens you've opened. This is super messy, especially since buying a game from the Steam Deck requires set up of a payment method. You'll back up into those screens and get stuck (or at least I did when I hit the PayPal setup screens).
- Sleeping logo when putting the Deck into sleep looks cute
- Device is big, but not as heavy as I was expecting. I played a short demo and didn't feel like it was tiring to hold the weight of the device. I can't remember if I had it propped up in my lap or not.
- Once I started playing a game, the device faded into the background, allowing me to immerse myself in the game, which is what you expect. I haven't played a longer gaming session yet, since my brain is too tired for that at the moment.
- It would've been great to have a built-in kickstand on the back. (It's hard to get away from the Switch's shadow...)
Overall am I happy I bought one? Yes, because I’m very much a handheld gamer. I could never really get into PC gaming because I didn’t like the form factor. This feels a lot more comfortable. I look forward to finally exploring more PC games.