It's not difficult to imagine that Valve really has met its stated goal of creating a new category of hardware here: the handheld gaming PC. With Steam Deck, the company seems to have found a balance between its desire to continuously improve a product or service in front of an audience while still providing a level of finish that won't make customers feel like they're part of an expensive beta test.

That program fizzled out, but Valve was still committed to making open source hardware using an open-source OS, and now we have the Deck.īut even compared to Valve's collaboration on the HTC Vive-especially the first version of Vive-the Steam Deck is easily the most polished hardware Valve has released to date. Skeptical game developers compared the Deck to the Valve's 'Steam Machines' effort, in which the company partnered with third-party hardware makers to facilitate a line of out-of-the-box Steam-friendly PCs that were meant to act more like consumer-friendly plug-and-play game consoles.

When Valve originally announced the Steam Deck last summer, the exciting concept was tempered by Valve's spotty history with game hardware.

Cyberpunk 2077 stream deck