Mercador
Member
I'm thinking getting Disco Elysium to play on the Deck so I wish the pads work great.
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Valve introduces "Steam Deck Verified"
- Thread starter jshackles
- Start date
rofif
Can’t Git Gud
So what? There are outlets that review a game and other that review the technology.
Unless there is something wrong, I don't feel like game reviewer needs to focus too much on tech. Especially on console review
darth.shrimp
Member
They all work great on a controller, trust me.
Shouldn't be issues with on-screen text either; are you even reading those?!
mcjmetroid
Member
Very interesting.. could also have the intentional side effects or getting developers to improve their games that otherwise wouldn't.
SoggyBiscuit
Banned
I wonder how the process works. Surely it's nigh-on impossible for Valve themselves to verify potentially thousands of titles.
Maybe there will be a community sourced effort surrounding this too.
Either way, fantastic initiative from Valve here and hopefully takes the hassle out of potential Steam Deck headaches. I assume they set the baseline for performance at 30fps @ 720p?
Maybe there will be a community sourced effort surrounding this too.
Either way, fantastic initiative from Valve here and hopefully takes the hassle out of potential Steam Deck headaches. I assume they set the baseline for performance at 30fps @ 720p?
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
By the time they verify the whole library we'll be due a Deck 2 to keep up and then what will they do, add a Deck 2 verified thing on top? And when do they stop dealing with 1 as too far outdated then? Considering indie and other games will likely keep being playable on it just the same long past its expected lifetime will they leave the Deck verified deal visible but outdated or just say screw it and remove it altogether? Seems like a bit of an ill conceived plan for such devices like PCs but Idk, maybe they'll make it work. Or it'll just be there like the "play together" optimized deal.
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Kupfer
Member
There is absolute 0 reason not to love it.
This is really good, and look at that ratio. People sure love the Deck!
Looking forward for december, I want this.
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KormaChameleon
Member
I hope we now see more Proton games thanks to the Steam Deck. Might have a reason to ditch Windows once & for all!
Fake
Member
Just saying they should. No big deal going on twitter asking for gamers to change if they don't.
Steam reviews are doing an amazing job in this regard. They don't get paid, they need to pay for the game and play some before review.
CuteFaceJay
Member
Actually fucking hyped for this thing! These guys aren't joking around.
ArtHands
Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
I mean he's got a Playstation avatar. You expect him to watch the video?
Sean Mirrsen
Banned
There won't be any games that work on Deck 1 but don't work on Deck 2. The screen will only get better, Proton will only improve, the APU will only get more powerful. So there will be only limited testing necessary, and only for specific games.
On top of that, the actual scale of testing is great, but it's not that insurmountable. How many testers do you think it realistic for Valve to hire? Let's say a hundred. Now let's think of how many games a given tester will be able to test per day, on average. For most titles, an hour of play will be sufficient, and in case some longer games get issues later on they'll be reported on by the community. Shorter titles might make do with half an hour, and the majority of games on Steam aren't very complex. So working an eight-hour day, a typical reviewer might get through ten games a day. A hundred reviewers, around ten games a day each. A thousand games per day. With 50 thousand titles on Steam now, they'd be done with the backlog in two months. If they started last month, they could be done by launch.
Maiden Voyage
Gold™ Member
I'm glad Valve are doing this. If memory serves, I think they do something similar with Big Picture mode.
Thaedolus
Gold Member
I’ve had every PlayStation outside of PSP and I manage to not herp a derp in threads that apparently don’t interest me
MasterCornholio
Member
Isn't that just to mock PlayStation though?
EverydayBeast
thinks Halo Infinite is a new graphical benchmark
I like the steam deck design steam is the greatest pc game distribution we have ever seen it’s done what no one has done in the history of pc gaming when it’s brought it it’s because it’s going against Nintendo and the switch steam has a very limited sample size right now going into the Christmas season steam looks better than Sony Nintendo and Microsoft combined.
Lupin3
Targeting terrorists with a D-Pad
I truly hope so. I'm still going to wait for initial impressions since I'm a little bit worried about fan noise levels. But if it's silent enough, I'm gonna be all over it asap.
Mr Branding
Member
My only concern at this point.
Glad I’m Q1 so I’ll see a lot of content for the thing before it arrives.
Thermals have already been covered by Linus and it looks promising.
Kupfer
Member
Never had an active cooled handheld in my hands. But I also never had a problem with my consoles / pc's being too loud. Maybe I am less sensitive to noise.
I guess, I'd play it with headphones mostly anyway. Is the Switch any loud ?
Lupin3
Targeting terrorists with a D-Pad
Some Switches have been somewhat "loud", or at least audible as far as I know. Mine has been dead silent most of the times. I once heard a faint fan sound when it was docked and I played BotW. Pretty ok, to say the least. But I'm really sensitive to it. Can't stand constant fan noise, like my ridiculous PS4 Pro that's been collecting dust for years now because of it.
Ev1L AuRoN
Member
Don't do that, you will bait the haters.. xD
This is really good, and look at that ratio. People sure love the Deck!
CamHostage
Member
Steam Deck Verified hasn't launched yet, but I would guess a Point-and-Click game would generally pass as Playable, if not Verified. They may play great on Deck right out of the proverbial box. (Also, a good number of classics or hits will likely be modified slightly for Steam Deck Verified, and/or some features may be added to Deck itself in the future to help get over some common pain points.)
The issue with listing them as fully Verified is that these PC games are not built for touchscreens, so they may or may not be easy to play. Take an old Broken Sword game, for example: you're imaging just mapping the mouse movement to the touchscreen, and that would make sense... except that when you go to double-tap or hold-and-drag like you would with a properly reconfigured touchscreen game, that might not work as you expect, depending on what Gestures Steam Deck has. (Similarly, a right-click or hover-over context clues you're used to with your mouse may not translate easily.) I could see transposing right/left click to the right/left Bumpers, but again, the Deck or the game would have to have that functionality remapped; it's not automatic, and it may not even be built into the Deck's feature set at launch. Or what if the pixel-accuracy system of objects is very, very specific (something that was a real problem in old pixel-hunter point-and-click games; they'd loosen that significantly when transposing those games to console or later DS/iOS), and a person's chubby fingers on the touchscreen might never zero in on the exact few actionable pixels. A 7" screen is nice and big, seemingly, until you need to do fine-detail work in a game and it cant tell which little bit in a dense scene you're trying to tap on.
None of this is insurmountable, but the Deck is not the primary device these games were made for, and there are a few things that could annoy if not outright reject a player from enjoying their purchases on this new type of PC game player. (I actually used to play games sometimes on my touchscreen netbook, and sometimes it worked great, but not all the time, and Deck is that experience but much more significant.)
Thus the Verified system, which lets you know if a game fits right on Deck, if it's compatible with some caveats, if it's incompatible, or if it's untested but available at your own risk.
Sure, but same situation. The Trackpad should work out well a lot of the time as a substitute for a mouse, but it could have similar drawbacks that a Touchscreen would have to deal with in trying to play a game not made for those devices. It might verify just fine, or it might be a real pain to play without adjustments.
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Steam Deck Verified hasn't launched yet, but I would guess a Point-and-Click game would generally pass as Playable, if not Verified. They may play great on Deck right out of the proverbial box. (Also, a good number of classics or hits will likely be modified slightly for Steam Deck Verified, and/or some features may be added to Deck itself in the future to help get over some common pain points.)
The issue with listing them as fully Verified is that these PC games are not built for touchscreens, so they may or may not be easy to play. Take an old Broken Sword game, for example: you're imaging just mapping the mouse movement to the touchscreen, and that would make sense... except that when you go to double-tap or hold-and-drag like you would with a properly reconfigured touchscreen game, that might not work as you expect, depending on what Gestures Steam Deck has. (Similarly, a right-click or hover-over context clues you're used to with your mouse may not translate easily.) I could see transposing right/left click to the right/left Bumpers, but again, the Deck or the game would have to have that functionality remapped; it's not automatic, and it may not even be built into the Deck's feature set at launch. Or what if the pixel-accuracy system of objects is very, very specific (something that was a real problem in old pixel-hunter point-and-click games; they'd loosen that significantly when transposing those games to console or later DS/iOS), and a person's chubby fingers on the touchscreen might never zero in on the exact few actionable pixels. A 7" screen is nice and big, seemingly, until you need to do fine-detail work in a game and it cant tell which little bit in a dense scene you're trying to tap on.
None of this is insurmountable, but the Deck is not the primary device these games were made for, and there are a few things that could annoy if not outright reject a player from enjoying their purchases on this new type of PC game player. (I actually used to play games sometimes on my touchscreen netbook, and sometimes it worked great, but not all the time, and Deck is that experience but much more significant.)
Thus the Verified system, which lets you know if a game fits right on Deck, if it's compatible with some caveats, if it's incompatible, or if it's untested but available at your own risk.
I would be using the track pad for these games not the touchscreen
Sean Mirrsen
Banned
People should remember that, in the case of the Deck, the touchpads and Steam Input are all part of the "controller". The game doesn't need to support controllers to get the Verified tag, it just needs to be controllable with the "controller" of the Deck, the entire thing, everything but the touchscreen because you have to let go with one hand to use the touchscreen, and that's not quite comfortable.Steam Deck Verified hasn't launched yet, but I would guess a Point-and-Click game would generally pass as Playable, if not Verified. They may play great on Deck right out of the proverbial box. (Also, a good number of classics or hits will likely be modified slightly for Steam Deck Verified, and/or some features may be added to Deck itself in the future to help get over some common pain points.)
The issue with listing them as fully Verified is that these PC games are not built for touchscreens, so they may or may not be easy to play. Take an old Broken Sword game, for example: you're imaging just mapping the mouse movement to the touchscreen, and that would make sense... except that when you go to double-tap or hold-and-drag like you would with a properly reconfigured touchscreen game, that might not work as you expect, depending on what Gestures Steam Deck has. (Similarly, a right-click or hover-over context clues you're used to with your mouse may not translate easily.) I could see transposing right/left click to the right/left Bumpers, but again, the Deck or the game would have to have that functionality remapped; it's not automatic, and it may not even be built into the Deck's feature set at launch. Or what if the pixel-accuracy system of objects is very, very specific (something that was a real problem in old pixel-hunter point-and-click games; they'd loosen that significantly when transposing those games to console or later DS/iOS), and a person's chubby fingers on the touchscreen might never zero in on the exact few actionable pixels. A 7" screen is nice and big, seemingly, until you need to do fine-detail work in a game and it cant tell which little bit in a dense scene you're trying to tap on.
None of this is insurmountable, but the Deck is not the primary device these games were made for, and there are a few things that could annoy if not outright reject a player from enjoying their purchases on this new type of PC game player. (I actually used to play games sometimes on my touchscreen netbook, and sometimes it worked great, but not all the time, and Deck is that experience but much more significant.)
Thus the Verified system, which lets you know if a game fits right on Deck, if it's compatible with some caveats, if it's incompatible, or if it's untested but available at your own risk.
So if you have a point&click game where you use the mouse, a typing game where you have to use a keyboard, or an old game that never heard of controllers, as long as it's playable with the touchpad, uses the SteamOS onscreen keyboard that is easily usable with the touchpads, and/or comes with a Steam Input preset that is configured for comfortable play with the buttons, sticks, and touchpads, the game will pass the Input check for the Verified tag.
akaFullmetal
Member
Thats very helpful. I hope for wide adoption.
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Obviously it's the reverse that can happen and was the point of my post, games playable on Deck 2 but not 1 thus different verification would be needed and/or announcing Deck 1 eol despite many new/upcoming indie/low fi games still being playable and only care for Deck 2 for the verification.
Hardly elegant in any scenario.
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CamHostage
Member
Deck Verification has essentially nothing to do with specs. It is not an assessment of quality or performance. A game could pass Verified and still run like dogshit.
You should still check the Min/Recc Specs of a game before buying it if you plan to play on Deck.
The four criteria for Steam Deck verification are:
The only potential problem point I could imagine where Deck Verified games would suddenly need to be re-Verified if a new Deck came out would be like if maybe Valve released a Steam Deck Mini, with a smaller screen and a change to the controls (no Trackpad or something like that, getting it into a pocketable form-factor.) That, or if in the far-off future a Proton 2.0 comes out to deal with some change in PC games, and it's not compatible with the original Deck, but that'd be a distant problem to worry about.
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Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Then it's useless to the casual user (and always near useless otherwise). But it has no bearing on what you quoted, that could still happen even within these parameters depending on what new tech advancements occur by then that games may require and Deck 2 may have in its specs while Deck 1 doesn't.
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CamHostage
Member
...How is it useless to the casual user to know if a game is compatible with their game system?
Valve isn't Digital Foundary. They don't analyze the technical specs of a product and report back performance results; they don't judge quality, only functionality. There are tons of other outlets for that, including user reviews and probably eventually Deck fansites/YT sites, for seeing test results of popular games with this hardware. Deck is essentially one simple range of hardware, so it shouldn't be difficult to find reports of how popular games run on it, even games that use new tech advancements. I'm sure, for instance, one of the first tests somebody will do with their Deck when it releases in December is to built an Unreal Engine 5 demo for it and see if it runs.
All Valve is doing is verifying a product meets the Technical Requirement Checklists (TRC) of the platform. That is a useful service.
We can worry about Deck 2 when that comes... right now, Deck 1 isn't even out yet. But as far as the Deck Verified checklist, a good TRC mark for a device now will pretty much be helpful to a device in the future, and Steam can add new Verified rules if/when a Steam Deck 2 or a Deck Mini or Deck VR or whatever comes to exist, if anything changes.
IFireflyl
Gold Member
CamHostage
Member
Hey man, he's just looking out for all of those casual users who are are saving up to pre-order Steam Deck 2 in the year 2029...
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Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
It's useless to the casual user if it's technically compatible, ie it boots and goes in game, but runs like dogshit no matter what as you said is possible because performance is a non factor to the verification, yes. And non-casual users can just tell by the specs as usual (and still have to manually delve on if it can perform well).
I'm not looking out for anyone, just discussing a topic, why are you acting like an idiot? If you don't think casuals are interested then just say that instead of respond with other stupid shit then revert to this and/or act like I'm making such a big deal out of it because I said what I think and you disagree, lol.
Deck is awesome, I want one, but still don't see them handling this verification meaningfully/in a way I care for. Which has no bearing on Deck's worth or quality to me regardless, I wanted it before any verification was announced, didn't you? Why are you acting like a fanboy that I offended its toy? It's all pretty meaningless.
Edit: Also, the /verified page clearly states if the "default graphics settings" run well so you're 1000000% wrong about how they don't assess performance or whatever DF bullshit you spewed to sound smart. So it's not useless because it's not as you said just an indicator that the game boots in SteamOS/text is visible etc., duh.
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IFireflyl
Gold Member
Wtf does "casual user" have to do with checking the recommended specs? How are you defining "casual user"? Where is your data coming from? You're talking out your rear. Your opinion isn't fact.
Lupin3
Targeting terrorists with a D-Pad
Sean Mirrsen
Banned
I'm guessing they'll handle that problem when they get around to it, but I struggle to see any difficulty. They'll keep evaluating games as things go on. Games that don't play well on the current Deck due to performance issues won't get the mark. When a new Deck is released, they'll re-review those games, and just add a modified mark to show for Deck 2 users and that'll be that. You'll click on the info button and it'll tell you that the title doesn't run well on the first-gen Deck, but runs well on the second-gen, and it'll be a different icon or a special icon denoting the generation gap, and it'll only ever apply to the next-gen games that the first-gen Deck can't run.
CamHostage
Member
Apologies if you took offense at me ribbing you for your Steam Deck 2 posts, I usually don't get personal like that but in this case, I really am surprised by and disagree with your complaints of how Deck Verification should work, or worry that some future Steam Deck 2 will break the Steam Deck Verified process.
This is a TRC check. Simple as that.
That's a good thing to have, on a platform that technically doesn't need it. They could have gotten away with not having Verified; all the hardware pre-sold up to now was paid for without assumption that games would have a verification check. They didn't do Verified for Steam Machine. But thankfully, Deck is getting better treatment than Steam devices of the past, and Verified is a good step to help build trust that they're really serious about Deck being a viable gaming platform.
Otherwise, Deck already has core functionality for most of what's on Steam today, so aside from rejecting games that require VR or isn't compatible with Proton, Valve could have just put this hardware out there and refunded the few cases where somebody couldn't play the game on their device of choice. Already, you could have Steam Launcher on a netbook or other portable PC device, and those games may not work with those hardware pieces without external hardware, but so be it. Steam for PC has few safeguards for performance (they might boot a game that bricks your GPU, but if a game somehow runs at 1FPS on Min Req specs, there's probably a policy violation somewhere in the TOC about that but as far as I know it's on the developer to justify that sale.) Android tries to have minimum version cutoffs, but software fails all the time on different devices.
These are downsides inherent when dealing with a semi-open platform, Valve is doing some work to smooth out the problems and this Verified system is the consumer notification process attached to that work. Steam is not a mystery box where you have no idea what you're getting; they tell you specs, they tell you how users reviewed it, etc. Steam is also not a controlled environment where everything on its marketplace fits into the same-size box. (Even Steam Deck is releasing in 3 different configs, and that's just the launch lineup.) You need to be a little savvy about the device you own to enjoy products from Steam, and even though Deck uses the simplest and most curated version of that marketplace, the need for some know-how is still there. Steam Deck is not a Game Boy (and BTW, even Game Boy had lots of games on it that ran like dogshit, but they still got the Official Nintendo Seal of Quality on the box.) Luckily, even the "casual users" putting down $400-650 for a Steam Deck are probably pretty aware of the Steam marketplace and the information it offers to help guide purchases.
So, are you talking about this part of the Display checkpoint?
"The game should support the default resolution of Steam Deck (1280x800 or 1280x720), have good default settings, and text should be legible."
Right, Steam doing any extra work to also assess or lotcheck some level of performance of a game for developers and thus for consumers while in the process of Deck Verification, that's great.
What that means of "runs well", of course is up to interpretation. Some consider anything that ever dips below 30FPS (if not 60 or higher) to be an abomination. Some might take a game that has to default to medium or low settings to be worthless. Some may find it outrageous if ever a game's default graphics configuration for this level of specs is not native resolution (albeit anything displaying sub-720P outside of a Switch or old console is questionable these days, and I'd be surprised if that's a tactic that any developers take when optimizing for Deck.) Some other people may not be so picky. Either way, "runs well" could mean a lot of things. It's unknown what standards Valve will use to assess "runs well", or if they will actually reject a game from Deck Verification if it meets all the bulletpoints for verification but looks like crap. (Going by the huge volume of games on Steam that look like crap because they are truly crap, that'd be weird... would they reject Starfield if it ran at 20FPS or at a low res but then let My Dream Girls fly through approvals because nothing about it could possibly cause it to chug? I guess standards are standards.) And then, if a game gets a patch and it runs much better (or worse, somehow,) does the game need to go all the way back through Verified, so that it can get that little mark greener? Without knowing what Steam means by "runs well" or what kind of rejection process there might be for Deck Verified, we don't know if that helps, and it's so buried in the Verified checkpoints anyway that it's likely not meant to be a proof of endorsement of performance. Thus, what I said, "Deck Verification has essentially nothing to do with specs."
All I care about is contributing my opinion and whatever accurate information I have to offer in a discussion group.
Your original post said, "By the time they verify the whole library we'll be due a Deck 2 to keep up and then what will they do, add a Deck 2 verified thing on top?" You and I may not agree if that is enough information for the type of consumers that Steam Deck will attract, but based on the the description of the service that's being provided, the Steam Deck Verified checkpoints are about fundamental accessibility verification. ⦿ Is it compatible with Proton; ⦿ Does the game work with buttons; ⦿ Is text resizeable to read on a small screen, etc. Even the "default graphics settings runs well" checkpoint is about verifying that it is accessible to play at a baseline level similar to other verified titles.
Maybe they will add new steps for future Steam devices, but these basic Verified checks that check what works for Steam Deck 1 today will be a benefit for Deck 2, Deck 3, Deck Mini, Deck VR... any device in the future could most likely benefit from games having gone through this level of simple TRC today.
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jshackles
Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
The video indicates that these tags will only be visible when browsing the store on the Steam Deck itself, and won't be visible to non-Deck users or affect web traffic or rankings in any way.
Maiden Voyage
Gold™ Member
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