Valve Corp. is giving a little nudge to its Steam user reviews that it hopes will make it easier to find games that play well with its Steam Deck handheld console.
The feature took effect on Steam yesterday. In essence, if a user played a game primarily on Steam Deck, that will be called out with an icon to the upper right of the review text. (The icon is a representation of the Deck itself, not the circular Steam Deck logo.)
Good morning! We’ve just shipped a new feature on Steam that shows when a customer review was written by someone who played primarily on Steam Deck. Keep an eye out for the Deck icon to see how these players reviewed the game, and let us know what you think! pic.twitter.com/RYVa9wVGYi
— Steam Deck (@OnDeck) August 22, 2024
Supplemented with Valve’s own labeling conventions for Steam Deck — where a game is Verified, Playable, or Unsupported (or simply Unknown) — it should help fans steer their Deck catalogs toward games that are enjoyable on a small screen.
Some good games still have trouble on Steam Deck
Steam Deck is essentially a handheld representation of a gaming PC, capable of running the same games that a desktop or a laptop with a full-size monitor does — even Baldur’s Gate 3 or Cyberpunk 2077. But shrunken to Deck’s 7-inch, 1280-by-800 pixels monitor, text-heavy games become unplayable squintfests. That’s the most common obstruction to enjoying a game that wasn’t specifically made for Steam Deck or handheld gaming.
It extends to controls, too; though the twin analog sticks have the same range of motion as any gamepad’s, it can be hard to make precise motions or gestures when dealing with a much smaller screen, held at chest or lap height. Games that don’t depend on those movements are assumed to be more suited for Steam Deck.
In any case, it’s good to see Valve giving Steam Deck users more information, to help them curate their libraries for that platform. And if you’re looking for a good starter list of games great for the Steam Deck, we have information to share, too.
Featured image via Steam
