Steam Deck

I mean, I have a steam deck and a switch. Just beat Totk on the switch and recently started BG3 on the deck.

The trick is to put one console down and pick the other one up.

Vague and unpopular opinion incoming:

Despite the Steam Deck being better than the Switch at nearly everything, there is still something that keeps pulling me back to the Switch. The only things I can think of is how much thinner and lighter it is combined with the simplified software. I'm not saying the Switch software is good, because it's not. It's slow despite how slimmed down it is. Meanwhile the Steam Deck is much faster, smoother, and has many more features. But the Steam Deck still just feels clunky compared to the Switch. It might be due to the Steam Deck using a full desktop operating system with a modified UI while the Switch OS is made solely for playing games. Despite being very well designed and using optimized software, something about the Steam Deck makes it feel like a tech demo rather than a handheld game console. I still really like the Steam Deck, but I keep getting pulled back to the Switch.

Put simply: Weight aside, the Steam Deck is significantly better at every individual factor than the Switch. But there is still something about the final product of the Switch that I enjoy using more than the Steam Deck.

• maybe some games you don’t want to spend time tweaking the launch options, the graphics, the sliders, the mods etc and you just want to play the game as the devs intended. Switch is good for that.
• maybe there are times you don’t want to deal with all the hassles of a handled pc as a gaming system. Switch is good for that.
• maybe you want to play Nintendo games, but you don’t want to go through all the hassle of emulation (especially switch games). Switch is good for that.
• maybe there is an indie dev you want to support, and you know their game is more expensive on switch than on pc, but it’s well within your budget and you want to give them extra coin. Switch is good for that.
• while switch games are generally low fidelity and low frame rate, you know what to generally expect going in.
• maybe your group of friends mostly own switch and play switch online compared to steam.

Truth be told, once I got my steam deck, I sold my switch. Not because the switch was terrible by any means, but I realised that I missed my pc game library, I didn’t care for online multiplayer, and I didn’t care for Nintendo games. Also, I grew up with Linux and tinkering both Windows and Linux - it’s in my blood at this point, so getting a steam deck was just pure joy for me, even if I spent 90% of the time configuring the thing and 10% playing games.

Switch emulation is a bit hit and miss. Some games work fairly well, others underperform or have serious issues. Also, online multiplayer currently only works with a real Switch.

For me there isn't. I already had a Switch and since I bought the Deck, it pretty much just sits there. The only time I've used it is when we were in a plane and both me and my partner wanted to play, so we brought both Deck and Switch. If there was some cross-play, I'd actually find a use, but since no one gives a fuck about it, we mostly can't even play together (Fall Guys being the exception). And I'm very much over paying a fee for accessing servers with my console. I cancelled my Nintendo subscription because I don't use it and recently wanted to play some level on Mario Maker, turns out you can't do that without paying for subscription. So I just turned off the Switch again.

I've been using more my switch lately than my deck, but that's due to the fact I have a local library with many switch games available. While me and my spouse are super pro emulating we don't want to bother with emulating switch because:

• We're not willing to hack our Switches yet.
• I'm extremely uninformed on where to find another bios

In addition, the steam deck display isn't as pretty to look at as the OLED.

Steam Deck does feel like a superset of Switch. It offers almost all of what Switch offers in a bit heavier and a lot more comfortable package. You get absolute freedom to do what you want with the device (I buy almost all my games from GOG), the trackpads become pretty much mandatory once you get used to them. You have the option of playing AAA titles with shorter battery life, but don't actually compare that badly agaist a Switch if you play games that Switch can run. You gain access to a lot more games, a lot cheaper games.

People convince eachother that the two devices somehow serve different functions and audiences, but that just feels like unwarranted courtesy towards Switch. I don't have a Switch, to be clear, but it does seem like an obvious upgrade from what I can tell.

Since I got my Steam Deck, I use my Switch for playing local-multiplayer Mario Kart and... Yea that's it

I don't really bother with emulating Switch on my Steam Deck because my Switch is lighter, quieter, has better battery life, and a far better (OLED) screen. I do love my Steam Deck as well though.

I have both. I had the switch long before the steam deck was available. I will say that I have not touched my switch to play games since I received the deck. I got my deck in the second big batch of deliveries when it first released, so I have had it for more than year at this point.

When I want to play Nintendo exclusives, I purchase them and then use my switch rip them to play using yuzu on my deck.

I'm in a similar boat, I have a steam deck and a modded switch that I can transfer games/saves over to my PC and deck.

The switch still gets use for the following reasons:

• online play (when the deck is not booted into custom firmware)

• some games don't run well when emulated. This is getting better all the time, but is still an issue, especially with newly released games. I wasn't satisfied with ToTK performance on release for my deck so I ended up playing it exclusively on my switch. Also you need shader caches for games to run well, and the games stutter and hang a lot while generating those in new areas.

• the games that do run well still aren't very efficient in terms of power consumption, and you'll get longer battery life out of the switch for most emulated titles.

The Deck does have significant advantages over the switch, like bigger screen, bigger storage, more comfortable to hold, PC games, etc. If there's a PC port of a switch game it will run better on deck than on switch, with comparable battery on comparable graphics levels.

I have both. I haven't tried emulating Switch games on the Steam Deck yet. I use my Switch for Nintendo exclusives and local multiplayer games since it's less of a pita to set up

I have both and use both of them more than I used the PS3, PS2, and Dreamcast.

Emulation can be ok but often you spend as much time fiddling as playing. Switch just works.

Steam Deck mostly just works for most Steam games, and can do a lot more if you want to tinker. It's a computer and supports normal computer things like keyboard and mouse. Basically no restrictions.

I started tears of the kingdom on an emulator on my desktop PC, and wanted to see how it would work on my steam deck. After setting it up with autosync using NextCloud for saves, not only is it a better experience than the switch because I can sometimes play on my desktop at 4k with frame rates consistently higher than what the switch can do, but playing on the steam deck has comparable performance to the switch albeit at the cost of shorter battery life. I loaned my switch to a friend who doesn't have one so he could play totk, then I moved across the country and just decided to let him hang on to it until he's done. The only thing I miss is Tetris 99, but that's not a big loss.

Yeah my wife is playing animal crossing right now, while I am playing bg3

I have both.

I've had my switch for many years at this point, while my SteamDeck is barely 1 year old. I probably wouldn't buy a switch today if I didn't already have one but since I already have one I still use it very occasionally for exclusives I'm excited for (well, actually used it a ton for TotK recently). I don't have my Switch hacked and would just rather not go through the hassle of finding clean roms to download. The only Switch game I played on my Deck was Diablo III (because the PC version has no controller support or controller-friendly UI) but with Diablo IV now it's unnecessary.

All that being said, there's very few Switch exclusives I'm interested in for $60 anymore, even on the horizon, Zelda was probably the last one unless Mario Odyssey 2 is released before the end of the system's lifetime. And Zelda TotK was honestly the first game I bought for Switch in probably the last 2+ years... my wife played a few things on it but I had switched to PC exclusively (+Steamdeck) and PS5

If you'd like to play Nintendo games without emulation whatsoever. Tracking down a Switch that is easy enough to hack, and dumping all your games and saves can be a big ask for your average Switch/Deck fan. I only use my Switch to dump new releases I buy to play on either my Steam Deck or main rig. I beat ToTK fully through emulation, though that was on my main rig. I also could absolutely not live without the massive backlog that is the Steam library.

I find playing connected to a television far easier with the Switch. But, TBH, I don't find much worth playing on the Switch.

The only use my switch has now is for my girlfriend playing animal crossing, I haven't used it myself since I bought the steamdeck. I was tempted to buy TOTK when it came out, but I've got too many games in my backlog already