Is Steam Deck Better than Switch? – Steam Deck Games Trending At The Moment
While Sony PlayStation 5 and Xbox One S may be most people’s recommended home gaming systems, the Steam Deck is arguably one of the best handheld consoles and mobile gaming companions you can have today.
Is Switch Threatened by Steam Deck?
Nintendo has dominated the handheld market since the release of the Game Boy in Japan and North America in the second and third quarter of 1989 respectively. The Game Boy took the mobile gaming world by storm at the time and served as a blueprint for Nintendo’s constantly evolving and technologically superior handheld consoles.
Over the years, the financial success of Nintendo has been directly tied to its mobile games which millions of fans around the world just can’t get enough of.
In time many companies have competed with Nintendo’ handheld gaming devices and fallen by the wayside. Only Sony PlayStation with their PSP and PS Vita mobile devices would compete on about the same level as Nintendo.
But as they have done on many occasions in the past when it seems like a new handheld game brand is about to dethrone them, Nintendo comes back swinging with a knockout punch reply, this time by way of Switch. The Nintendo Switch is a perfect example of how the company is able to revolutionize the gaming industry with the release of this hybrid console, but this time around, there is a new bad-boy in town making waves and threatening to upstage the longstanding king of handheld consoles, this bad-boy is Steam Deck.
What Exactly Is A Steam Deck?
Well, Steam Deck is the handheld PC – gaming computer invention of Valve. Running on SteamOS 3.4.2 with an AMD Zen 2 w/ 4-cores/8-threads CPU,
16 GB LPDDR5 @ 5500 MT/s memory, and 512 GB internal storage capacity for the top model, this handheld console looks set to give Switch a run for its money.
Steam Deck also offers a lightweight body weighing only 669 grams, a 40 Wh Lithium-ion battery and 7-inch touchscreen IPS LCD (1280×800). This device was released by Valve in the first quarter of 2022.
With barely a year into its release in the US, Canada and EU, Steam Deck has steadily slipped into the psyche of gamers as the next big thing in the world of handheld gaming systems.
While this console has a higher price tag than Switch, it offers greater power and an almost entirely open platform. In addition to this, the hundreds of games available on the Steam library make Steam Deck a seemingly cheaper option in the long run.
It must be mentioned at this point that not every Steam game has been tested for portability to the handheld. However, here is a short list of five highly rated games that you can play on Steam today.
The Disco Elysium
The Disco Elysium (The Final Cut) is considered a genuine classic in the RPG genre. You can explore and rule a whole metropolis as a detective thanks to your access to a cutting-edge system driven by investigative, detective skills and gameplay.
In this game, you will have to investigate crimes, the good old-fashioned way, by meeting and quizzing people to derive answers. The game also explores real-life scenarios experienced by police departments around the world like in-house corruption and the taking of bribes from suspects.
You can basically leave a lasting impression in the world of The Disco Elysium (The Final Cut) by becoming either a hero or villain, the choice is ultimately yours which we found to be really cool. Fortunately, Steam Deck allows you to play this game amongst many others from their extensive library.
Hitman 3
In Hitman 3, Agent 47 comes back as a ruthless expert, ready to take on his most important job to date. 47 and the world in which he lives in will both be significantly changed after the smoke clears.
In the tactile, immersive game world there’s a lot of room for creativity, players have a lot of in-game options to explore while the game itself is so adaptive that you can literally play the game over and over again without getting bored. Our crew member assigned with the task of testing out Hitman 3 on Steam Deck is still playing to date.
Spiritfarer
Spiritfarer is a sad seafaring adventure game where you have to help dead souls lost out in the vast open seas to move on to the afterlife. A bit melancholic, but don’t let the storyline deceive you, as the visuals, sound effects and overall gameplay is superb. Spiritfarer is one of the best independent games we have come across for so many reasons.
For starters, the game is both fun to play and highly addictive which is always the catch even for the most picky of gamers. What makes Spiritfarer even more worthwhile playing on Steam Deck, is the level of fluidity, interaction, resolution, and high level interface available on the console.
Half-Life 2
Half-Life 2’s story mode is as thrilling as ever, thanks to innovative levels of both world design and physics-based gameplay. A groundbreaking FPS, it established the bar for subsequent titles in the genre. Playing Half-Life 2 on Steam Deck proved to be an exhilarating experience with smooth graphics and sound with no bugs or glitches to report. This game is definitely worth playing on Steam Deck.
Elden Ring
As you venture into the vast open world of the Elden Ring’s Lands Between, you are faced with many untold challenges on your quest to find the ring shards that could make you the overlord of Eldendom. There are hidden dungeons, uncharted areas, and hard to kill minibosses to make Elden Ring a thoroughly enjoyable, but difficult game to play. Playing Elden Ring on Steam Deck is really worth the experience, the controls are perfect and there’s seamlessness with the gameplay that only the very top consoles can provide albeit Steam Deck is a handheld device.
Indeed we were greatly impressed by Steam Deck and the talk of this handheld being arguably better than Switch was not wide off-the-mark. But we’ll let you decide for yourself. Currently Steam Deck goes for a high price range of US$649 / €679 / £569 and a mid-range of US$529 / €549 / £459.
