Review: Steam Deck OLED is a perfect antidote to the backlog of PC games

Last month, Valve surprised gamers around the world with the announcement and rapid release of the OLED Steam Deck. This promised to see the popular portable gaming PC receive some minor changes. In addition to the few updates shared by Valve, such as the screen and improved Wi-Fi 6E card, some players have noticed other improvements such as better performance thanks to faster RAM and more. I was extremely lucky to receive an OLED Steam Deck from Valve and you can find my thoughts below.

The timing for the Steam Deck OLED was extremely coincidental. I had been talking to a friend the weekend before about how I wanted a Steam Deck to help me tackle my backlog of games, but I was waiting for the potential incremental update that Valve had already hinted at (as well as my wallet so as not to damage it as much) . Then, less than a week later, they announced the OLED Steam Deck! Now my caveat: as previously mentioned, I’ve never had a Steam Deck before OLED and so this review won’t be a comparison or how the team updated their handheld.

I’ve been playing with the Steam Deck OLED for the last 3 weeks as of this writing and it’s been absolutely fantastic. I’ve already knocked two games out of my backlog! The screen is gorgeous. The operating system runs smoothly and the interface is easy to navigate. The community is thriving and available if you need it. And of course, it runs many of your favorite games well (varies from game to game). The games I spent the most time with during this testing period include 9 years of shadows, Baldur III’s Gate, Door of DeathAND God of war (2018) and serve as the basis for my performance review.

The four games listed above cover a wide range of game genres and performance needs. 9 years of shadows it requires very little power and, as expected, runs extremely well at high framerates and without stuttering or performance drops. Door of Death It’s a step forward and works perfectly. God of war It’s a huge step forward but still works remarkably well. I’ve had to set many graphics options low, but it’s typically around 45 frames per second. Finally, Baldur III’s Gate he is perhaps the most demanding of the four and runs the worst. It’s still playable and performance will vary depending on settings, but I was at around 30-35 frames per second with some dips into the low 20s. Baldur III’s Gate it’s the most extensive in terms of settings adjustments, so you might get by better than me. That said, I felt like it was also the hardest to make look decent and not like a load of crap.

The Steam Deck OLED is a haven for fans of older games and less demanding titles (especially 2D titles). However, it can still run many more demanding games as long as you’re willing to sacrifice graphics and/or performance. This is not all though. I remember hearing that Steam Deck users were finding that Steam Deck was getting hot, and I’m happy to report that I haven’t had any issues with the heat. The current cooling system seems to work great. Additionally, battery life varies between games as you would expect, but you can still get a few hours in less demanding titles or around 1-2 hours in more demanding ones. One thing you can do to help is adjust the refresh rate of the screen which is very easy to access and use.

Another great feature of the Steam Deck OLED is what appears to be a built-in RivaTuner overlay. You can adjust how much detail you want to control FPS, CPU usage, GPU usage, power consumption, and more. This can help you as you tweak the game’s settings to find your ideal balance between graphics and performance if necessary. It also estimates how long the battery will last on the current charge. By the way, it loads quickly. I haven’t explicitly tested the charging speed, but I found that it only takes a couple of hours to fully charge.

A surprise to me was that I didn’t hate trackpads. Ever since the Steam Deck was first revealed, I’ve been skeptical of trackpads. They seemed like a silly choice. However, my time with the device has proven that I have egg on my face. Trackpads are nice, especially with the tactile feedback, and in certain situations they are very useful. Particularly when trying to access non-Steam games.

As awesome as the Steam Deck OLED is, there are a few things I personally don’t like about it. First, due to the trackpads, the D-pad and the four main buttons are pushed to the extremes. That said, it didn’t take me long to get used to the layout. The other design feature I would change if I had the power to do so is the sheer size. Don’t get me wrong, I like how big the screen is. I know the size helps enable the hardware needed for the level of gaming Valve is aiming for, both physically and thermally. It just feels huge in the hands. However, the shape of the handles makes the Steam Deck comfortable to hold.

The last thing to discuss is game selection. First, you’re locked into gaming on Steam unless you make some changes. That said, the community is very helpful and makes it really easy to add other game launchers like Epic Games and Ubisoft Connect to expand it. The problem with these is that they don’t have the Verified Deck badge to help you figure out which games will work and which won’t. For example, even if you have Destiny 2 on Epic Games, you can’t really play it because SteamOS is based on Linux and Bungie fears it’s insecure. However, I’m sure if you look around you can find out which games work and which don’t. It’s important to note that not all Steam games will even work on the Steam Deck, it’s just easier to figure out which ones will and which ones won’t thanks to the Verified Deck badge.

It’s extremely hard for me not to love the Steam Deck OLED. Pricing starts at $549 for the 512GB model and costs $100 more ($649 total) for the 1TB version. If your budget allows you to purchase one, I highly recommend it. It’s really made me rethink how I’ll look at gaming computers in the future. For just $550, you can get a fairly powerful gaming device that is very portable and more powerful than a laptop for the same price. Heck, if your computer still works fine but is having trouble playing games, for some people it might be better to just get a Steam Deck instead of buying a brand new computer. I’ve found Steam Deck to be the perfect way to tackle my ever-growing backlog of PC games and highly recommend it if you can get it to work.