When the Steam Deck debuted in February, we called it our new favorite console. The appeal is easy to understand: what if games in your Steam library were playable on the go, via a portable device with the processing power of a gaming PC? Valve has since pushed over 90 updates for the Steam Deck, fixing bugs and improving the player experience. The real question, now, is what future updates Steam Deck owners can expect.
In a recent interview with The VergeSteam Deck designers Lawrence Yang and Pierre-Loup Griffais detailed which features they prioritize, as well as what a second-gen Steam Deck could look like, noting that they would focus on upgrading the screen and battery life.
Valve called the Steam Deck “multigenerational product“, stating that he plans to “create new versions to be even more open and capable than the first version of Steam Deck was”. Yang and Griffais told The Verge that the improved screen and battery life was a priority in future hardware revisions.
As for potential power upgrades, Griffais highlighted the benefits of maintaining a consistent focus for developers, suggesting that at least the next Steam Deck model won’t offer improved performance. “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,” he said.
The Steam Deck updates currently underway fall into two categories, according to Yang: “things we want to fix and things we still want to do.”
Currently, the Steam Deck’s battery is difficult to access. In the current design, it is glued. Valve is already working on “a change in the geometry of the adhesive, making it easier to loosen the battery,” Yang said. As batteries tend to wear out faster compared to other hardware components, making the battery easier to access and replace would be a welcome update.
Additionally, Valve is working on a feature to adjust the audio mix between various apps, which would let gamers, for example, lower the volume of a game to make it easier to listen to friends on Discord. Valve would be interested in adding mobile games to the Deck, but Griffais and Yang noted that it would be important to communicate to gamers that these games are touch-only experiences.
Now that Valve has had success on the hardware front, what about a follow-up to the unique, but sadly discontinued, Steam Controller? “We want that to happen,” Yang told The Verge, but added that the company is currently focused on the Deck.
