flavadabadavab
Published
SteamDeck needs to emulate a keyboard and mouse setup to play the game, and controlling the mouse elements did not feel good using joystick or trackpad. I switched to docked mode and used a keyboard + mouse, nothing wrong thereafter.
protontricks 269330 dotnet20 dotnet40
I might be doing something wrong but following those steps doesn't work on SteamDeck.
A handful of slowdown hiccups, maybe a little overheating before fan kicked in? Otherwise stable 60fps.
Battery was ~5 hours from full with no changes. Strangely I did not get any of the starting splash screens until finishing the game (previously I just got the "TV test screen" until the Doom 2 title ).
Very much a gold standard for what should be considered "Verified" for SteamDeck. Flawless use out of the box
I didn't bother changing any performance settings, but I was only getting about 2 - 3 hours from full charge, which seems a bit lackluster for a Unity game.
Only real critique as a SteamDeck user is that the character is so small on screen that you can hardly make out animations and details that might be important in combat.
NOT what I call Verified, but Very Playable for someone who only has a SteamDeck to play this
I targeted framerate with my graphics settings and left the SteamDeck plugged most of my playing. But when it was unplugged it estimated 2 hours from full charge.
Text is a litttle small for my eyes when keeping the SteamDeck about 2 feet away (in my lap), brought it closer to read sometimes.
Connecitng to another player's world would crackle the audio.
A couple crashes, probably the game itself.
Hangs during startup (in several different ways...), frame drops during cutscenes.
Connectivity was honestly better than when I played on PS4.
I dropped my settings to 540p and low preset. Was able to get mid 40 fps most of the time, some areas were 55-60 fps, others could drop all the way to 30 or lower. Certainly a way to play Elden Ring if you have no other, but even playing on a PS4 with a large TV would likely do you better than the SteamDeck screen.
Moved aiming from half-press R2 to L3 click. Re-mapped d-pad with some combat hotkeys.
Subtitles do not scale.
Audio samples were affected during framerate drops.
Control scheme was not maintained throughout. Some buttons lost functionality temporarily (usually the back grips).
Momentary framerate drops when SD overheats, also during some intense combat moments
Virtual keyboard text entry only needed for profile creation and save file naming (can be ignored altogether if you dont mind all your saves named identically and using the timestamp to tell them apart).
Game was made for 4:3, 1024x768x32 is highest intended resolution.
Set your gamma to match the 'barely visible' text (I increased mine by a lot).
Screen brightness at 11 steps from lowest, I got 5+hours battery.
All max settings, very steady 60fps except during the occasional drop for a second.
Mapped right arrow key to a back grip to comfortably advance text without returning cursor on-screen
VN, so dropped all settings to lowest / best battery. 10fps, with 8+ hrs at full charge.
Did not default to fullscreen on first boot, game requires mouse navigation with trackpad but works fine
Dropped thermal power to 3W and maintained 60fps. 4-5 hours battery
Some inputs would not register, often got the cursor 'lost' on the UI with invisible targets. I once got stuck in the options menu and only left after a seemingly random series of inputs reset the cursor. Not sure if any of this is Deck related.
Whether my issues were related to SteamDeck, the native Linux build, or the base game itself, I cannot say. Very fun and very enjoyable as a portable, casual, and quick gameplay loop. Still gets the thumbs up in this review because it's a fun game that might run great for you, but personally, my playthrough didn't meet my technical standards for 'a good SteamDeck game.'
TDP 8W, GPU Clock 700, was getting 5+ hrs from full with constant 60fps
Looks great on portable screen with default resolution.
I haven't tried handheld mode for SteamDeck (doesn't seem like the right game for it at this point).
at 1080p it stays between 30 and 50 fps, but loading into an area drops the frames competely and it takes a few seconds to recover.
But yes it runs and plays on SteamDeck hardware. This is just an initial report after an hour of playtime.
Docking and playing this game on a 4k TV looks so cool! Also great on the portable screen.
Mapped right stick to send inputs as another left stick for using either hand to move character
I made no changes to framerate, but turned on Half Rate Shading and set Scaling Filter to FSR 0 Sharpness. The game sprites are small and low detail, so I noticed no degradation to visuals from these settings. I average 4+ hours from full charge with low screen brightness.
Some entries in Bestiary. This text is optional / lore
The game chugs at sub-15fps in lategame, but it didn't seem like a big, noticeable problem when I wasn't strictly watching the framerate graph. The gameplay is hectic enough aside from that.
