Mobile gaming has long since arrived on the scene and is by no means limited to entertaining games on cell phones.

Tabea Eckl / Yoshua Voigt

It started long before smartphones with the Gameboy and co., but until now it lacked the necessary power to make the mobile gaming experience appealing to die-hard gamers. The 3DS, PSP and Switch have also been unable to earn a place in the hearts of the self-proclaimed “PC Master Race”. So what has to happen to get even the most dogmatic PC gamer to grind on the go? Does an entire gaming computer have to fit directly into the bag? According to the American software and hardware developers at Valve, who are also behind the world’s largest distribution platform for games, Steam, apparently it does! And not in the already familiar laptop format, but as a handheld. The Steam Deck is therefore a direct competitor of the Nintendo Switch and also looks similar.

 

But what should the Steam Deck do differently than the known mobile representatives? The technical specifications speak for themselves: The Steam Deck is currently the most powerful handheld and is also compatible with all common peripherals for the PC. Thus, the experience of a mobile PC, which is fully dedicated to gaming, is to be brought to perfection. In addition to games, other programs can also be installed on the device, which means that the user also has access to common software from the gaming sector, which the competition often can’t offer in this way. Sounds like the small mobile gaming has finally become big!

All Hands on Deck – the Captain comes in person

For the launch of the Steam Deck, however, it’s first a matter of waiting. Because it can take quite a while until you actually have the handheld PC in your hands. The first batch, which could be pre-ordered last summer, was launched and delivered at the end of February as announced. Among others, by none other than Valve boss Gabe Newell himself. A nice idea, but it won’t be able to distract those who are waiting from the fact that we can’t expect any more for the time being. Or, to make it a bit more concrete, from the second quarter of 2022 at the earliest, even if the times can vary regionally.

Boundless gaming

The Steam Deck is not the first, but still the latest console that will lead the way for gaming as a genre. With the boundaries blurring even more due to the handheld PC, it begs the question: What does the common gamer really need? And what is slowly but surely going out of fashion in this new phase of gaming?