There's a profile I tried on my desktop during update 8 that wasn't terrible on an xbox controller, it's surprisingly playable imo, works well with action groups, probably be way nicer on the deck with something like rotary menus on the trackpads and using the back buttons for modifiers.
I'd give it a try anyhow, just probably going to need some fiddling to get where you want.
You could, but there's no official control scheme. My experience wasn't great, but maybe yours will be better. I just think that since there's so many buttons (multiple toolbars, multiple menus and build modes, etc.), it's hard to make it all work.
Maybe I'll try my hand at a new control scheme, but it just seems built for a M+Kb. It plays well, though, so the limitation really is only the controls.
It's been mostly Isaac as usual but I picked up Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate yesterday and I like it a lot. It's a fast-playing roguelite with a neat idea that's implemented well. The game mechanics remind me of Hoplite on mobile.
The game is currently on sale and has a free demo. It has good controller input and low resource use, a great fit for the Deck.
Shotgun King is definitely a fun game. The worst part about it is how I've played enough to where I'm stuck on one of the higher difficulties and and bored of it.
ryujinx literally minutes before it was shut down. on steam deck at least it seems impossible for the audio to stay in sync and occasionally you have to pause emulation and resume after the sound stops to bring it back in sync. Maybe a spot of lag or frame drop when some things happen for the first time, but mostly stable 30fps. I'll probably switch to desktop once I have space to set it up if the audio desync doesn't happen there.
Who would've guessed a hand drawn 2D side scroller runs amazingly at 90Hz.
That sound of parrying attacks coming out of deck's speaker is just so satisfying.
It is. I've been away from it for a few years, and these new Geometry Nodes and hair systems are pretty incredible. So long particle system. It's really come a long way since about 2.9 when I last played with it.
And the deck handles it pretty solidly, but it'd be nice if GPU rendering were supported.
Haven't been playing it much recently, but I've gotten to a point in Pokemon Unbreakable Ties where I'm stubbornly bashing my head against a wall to win a battle, so that's off the table for a while.
And the only other games I've actually played recently are Yooka-Laylee (only 2 levels in due to exploration and a lot of goofing around), Baba Is You, and Dungeons & Degenerate Gamblers. But I've only been playing a little bit since I've been busy enough.
Thronebreaker, Hogwards Legacy. I also started Bayonetta and recently finished (and real enjoyed) Hotline Miami 1 and 2. I tried Cyberpunk 2077 as well but my fps skills on a controller are so bad that it's just too stressful.
Game updates did break the startup process once before. That was fixed after one or two days. In game the graphics are set to the lower settings but I don't mind. I only notice slow loading textures from time to time.
When it comes to the content: I think the world building and the castle are well done. Missions and dialogs are quite dull though, aimed more at children. Still fun to play from time to time.
went back in cyberpunk. restarted with the mod to make ability checks static to get rid of the. not enough tech, level to increase tech, check is now higher and not enough tech thing. Man I wish they would make an update where you could skip the whole shard memories playing as silverhands in arasaka bombing thing. It would help a lot in replayability since no matter what you do its the exact same experience.
The thing about zomboid is...it just makes me want to play cataclysm dark days ahead with the sky island mod and I get itchy without that brilliant anarchism and freedom cataclysm brings to the entire experience.
Zomboid will get there, and it isnt bad by any means.
7 days to die also runs great on the deck (tho it is 3d fps/tps) and has quite a few good modpacks that use it as a base, easy to underappreciate the game because development has been all over the place.
Another game to think about, dayz (modded and vanilla) actually runs decent on the deck.
Alan Wake's American Nightmare. Just finished the story mode. It’s Steam Deck Verified, so it runs and plays well, and it’s easy to play with a controller because it has a bit of auto-aim/aim correction.
I did enjoy it. Not a must play by any means, but it does add to the lore of the Alan Wake series. If you are a fan of that game series, I recommend playing this. And if you aren’t, you probably should play the other games in the series. 😉
Currently I'm playing through Ready Or Not, the engine update and them adding FSR3.0 made the game playable at the best of times! However the Deck still freezes and crashes occasionally sadly.
This week has been a bit of UFO 50 and Terra Memoria.
UFO 50 hasn't hooked me with a single specific game yet, but the entire package together is incredibly compelling and fun. It's just neat to hop in, play half an hour of a game that makes me think back to playing on my dad's NES, and then put it down for something else, much like how I played when I was 5 or 6.
I'm still very early on in Terra Memoria, but I think it's pretty neat! I like the combat system as they've introduced it so far, and it looks like there will be a lot of depth and choices to make in combat or team-building (maybe). Something about turn-based RPGs feel perfectly suited for the Deck.
I just got a deck last week and I'm loving it so far. Been playing Castle Crashers again (here's hoping the new update comes out soon!) as well as Baldur's Gate 3 with my wife, which runs incredibly well surprisingly.
In my first month with the Deck, I have mostly played:
Death Stranding
Red Faction: Guerrilla
GRID (2008)
And the hilarious tech demo of course!
I'm really happy with how well Death Stranding works and really see myself finishing it now that I can play it on commute. Love that game but it never fit my schedule (at the desk, I always played flight sims in VR or just a very quick shooter session).
Red Faction and GRID are easy enough on the battery, especially at 40 fps, and not too fussy about controls so they feel good with a controller (I felt a bit handicapped in Dirt Rally 2 and Project Cars 2).
In terms of emulation, I installed RetroDeck and tried Gran Turismo PSP but found that hard with the large stick and no analog controls for accelerate/brake Just putting some PS1 and PS2 games on it now, let's see if those will be able to bump GRID and Red Faction from my frequented list:
I'm playing EDF: World Brothers 2 with a friend, and also bouncing between Cyberpunk 2077, Baldur's Gate 3, and Monster Hunter Rise.
I'm looking forward to getting back into Shadows of Doubt. It just came out of early access, and recent updates included a ton of steam deck optimizations and major improvements to controller support. There are some great user control profiles already available, but I look forward to being able to play it docked as well with a standard controller.
I tried starting Control last night. I've played it like 4 times on PS5, but it was on sale with Disco Elysium recently. But Direct X 12 seems to be a no-go, and then when I tried 11 it just crashed immediately. But the second I'd get to the mail room it just shits the bed and grinds to like 1.5 fps.
That's odd, I played Control on my deck and it ran great. You should definitely be able to run it on DX11, maybe try a different proton version if it's refusing to launch.
Another thing, did you have a problem with your graphic settings not sticking after loading the game again? I got it to work eventually, but it's definitely a glitch.