I can honestly say the Deck has a lot of people gone into defensive panic mode all over the internet atm and most of them are Nintendo fans.

Makes me think Valve must be doing something right with the deck.

I agree 100% on this. It's going to hurt the 3rd party sales on Switch to a certain extent as well imo. For example, if you want to play games like Witcher 3 or their future games on a portable you no longer need a Switch for that. 

Meaning I agree, the comparison is silly.  People didn't buy a switch for the hardware, they bought it for the software.

I agree 100% on this. It's going to hurt the 3rd party sales on Switch to a certain extent as well imo. For example, if you want to play games like Witcher 3 or their future games on a portable you no longer need a Switch for that. 

Yeah, I have no reason to ever buy an indie or non-AAA third party for my Switch once I got into Steam Deck

Nintendo is already removing payment options for 3DS store, I have no faith Switch software will be sold for a long time once Switch 2 reach its mid-life

My indie on Steam Deck will be there as long as the Deck works, and once it stop working then I will buy Steam Deck 2 (if they release a Steam Deck 2) and will carry ALL my library, like... as long as Steam exists. It's a best value proportion than any console maker can offer because only god Knows whether they will be BC or not

Sure, but the Switch does a lot of things the Steam Deck doesn't. I actually have used the detachable joycons with multiple players on many occasions. It's not the best controller, but it's perfectly serviceable for most games. More importantly than being useful for the Switch in handheld mode is the fact that it is usable in docked mode. This means you can play two player games out of the box, whereas with the Steambox you will need to have a separate controller to play even single player games in docked mode. I'm guessing most people have something that they can use for games in docked mode (at least a mouse and keyboard), but it may not be ideal, may not be plug and play, and they may not have enough for multiple players. Particularly for less tech savvy people, it's going to be a far clumsier solution that the Switch's quick and easy transition from handheld to docked or one players to two.

It also does motion out of the box. Something like Ring Fit could easily work on the Steamdeck but would probably require a more expensive add on. Motion controls aren't huge on the Switch but I like them and I'm guessing I'm not alone.

Switch also is a closed ecosystem which obviously has some drawbacks but also has some advantages, mainly that you can be fairly confident it will run every Switch game, whereas it remains to be seen how well the Steamdeck will run things, and if it will be running modern games 3-4 years from now at playable levels. The Switch also can fit comfortably in a pocket (at least a man's pocket) whereas the Steam deck would likely require a carrying case. Switch also has better battery life, which is largely because games are targeted towards the Switch and run at lower quality.

Most importantly, the Switch has access to Nintendo's first party library. Maybe the Steamdeck will be powerful enough to run games smoothly. And that's probably the biggest reason people buy Nintendo systems.

Steamdeck may have access to it illegitimately, but we'll have to wait till its released to see if it could emulate Switch games well and how that impacts power consumption. The above video of Mario Odyssey running looks pretty rough and that's not the most demanding game, or even the most demanding part of that game. Even to the extent that it runs Nintendo games, there are drawbacks. Will you be able to play Splatoon 2online? I'm sure there's some way to make that possible but unless there's a really dedicated community like with Melee, there's unlikely to be a satisfying way to do that. And even though Melee matches online run better than Ultimate, it's still a bit of a chore to get to an online match, which is probably a bit too much effort for your average gamer.

So, yeah, Steamdeck does things the Switch doesn't. You can say that about more or less any two products that aren't identical or at least incredibly similar. The things it does probably aren't the things that are driving Switch owners. It may find its own market, but if the things Steambox did were that important to Switch owners, the Switch probably wouldn't be that successful in the first place.

It really on takes watching a 3-4 minute video on Youtube these days. I remember back in the day how widespread Playstation piracy was and you have to actually soder the mod chip onto the board, but there was a massive market around doing that but people in the 90s were making due. 

DS piracy being quite widespread as the device aged, I think that was a big part of the reason Nintendo wanted to move on to the 3DS. 

Piracy/emulation is inevitably a problem if you want to keep using tech that is very outdated as time goes on, it become easy for piracy to become a problem. 

So I wouldn't say it's so complex that you have to be some kind of computer nerd to figure it out, it's not that hard to install an emulator on a PC. 

I don't know if this one specific model is the be all end, but I can see this doing well enough that Valve keeps iterating other models and eventually starts selling them in major retailers. And I could see other manufacturers trying their hand too, making it kind of like its own product category (Switch like portable PCs). This model is more like the genie coming out of the bottle, but once the genie is out, it's hard to put it back in. 

My kids wouldn't know how to download illegal software. I could see teenagers knowing but not kids (5 to 12 years old).


And if I caught my kids illegally downloading software there would be hell to pay.

Pirates need to stop justifying their actions and just accept they are breaking the law, full stop.

I think people are missing the point in this thread and not watching OP's video.

Granted handheld PC gaming isn't exactly new, the Steam Deck is made and backed by the biggest platform on PC (Valve Corporation). And they are offering a mini PC from $399. That's big. And because they own the platform, they can take it hit in hardware costs and subsidize it by software sales (very much like consoles). This hasn't been done before yet on PC and is exciting to a lot of PC gamers especially those invested in Steam. I mean emulation is just one of the many things PC's.. its a multimedia device, a productivity device and gaming system on the go. It smaller than a laptop and easier to pick up and play.

On top of this Steam as a platform is absolutely huge and not to be overlooked. If we look at how many active concurrent people playing and online - https://store.steampowered.com/stats/. There are millions of active gamers on there at any given time.

OP was looking this at a hardware level and to that point. The Tegra X1 in the Switch is getting a little long in the tooth and with the OLED announcement, and then the Deck, comparisons are going to made. The Deck really did come in the exact right time. Yes it won't likely won't affect Nintendo sales in any meaningful way and I don't think anyone on this site believes this so I'm not sure why this is echoed so much on here.

Except most aren't? I'm not seeing it anywhere except for some select Youtubers who are honeymooning over this for clicks or FOMO (or both). Everyone else that's preordered the Deck or interested in the Deck knows what it is and what they are buying. Straw-manning isn't helping anything except derailing. Plus OP even said it was going for clicks on YT with that headline, and just went to do an overview, comparing specs and highlighting the strengths of the Deck.

A large number of people (on this site included) wanted a Switch Pro and instead got an OLED model instead. Valve unveils a new handheld PC releaing in the same time frame. There is going to be talks of both regardless and comparisons made, on gaming sites forums etc.

Precisely why they aren't PCs at all, 'stripped down' or otherwise. They remain a closed platform with barely a ¼ of PC's functionality. Very little to no customization, couldn't run half the programs on them (including a few I use to create high quality offline renders), and the list could go on.

So, yes, the distinction remains. Despite how much I love my Series X, it is not even close to the PC just five feet from it.

As far as the piracy thing goes, I honestly don't think much is going to change. The people who pirate videogames have been pirating for a while, they've been pirating forever. The Deck isn't going to suddenly create new pirates who weren't already pirating.

So in other words, no, the Deck isn't going to hurt Nintendo as far as piracy goes. No more than usual, anyway.

That's not the whole dickture!

I find you pretty amusing and love turning your shows on :)

But remember that the Switch does also what the Steamdeck don't, and that's being a proper handheld. You see, it weighs almost twice as much as a Switch, it will probably be unconfortable over long playthroughs. Also, the switch is motion gaming ready, so games like Ring Fit and Skyward Sword (for those who want to play with motion, yes I am one such person), the steamdeck just won't work even as an emulator.

So you can take your handheld P n C and shove it up your.... dock! :'))

Good old WiiU gamepad. I liked that thing, wish Nintendo would make it backwards compatible with the Switch.

Sooo, first off... WHAT HAVE I DONE?!  Of course, after spending the last 30 minutes going through every page on here, there is one thing I want to summarily respond to on the whole.

- Emulation itself is a grey area, you could argue that all day and each side has valid points.  The one things that stands in the middle of the grey area is profit.  It's rare that a company goes after someone reverse engineering their things if said person is just doing it as a hobby, and you'll find that outside of gaming, people do all kinds of crazy reverse-engineering just because, well, some people love tinkering.  Emulating really is at your own risk, but the moment you start having a monetized YT channel or streams, or are in any way making money from it, you'd better start getting worried.  No one cares until money is involved, and that for me is the best reference point for emulation.

I'm not sure if you know this, but... the emulators also work with Wiimotes and Joy Con.  You can pair those up using Bluetooth, so the motion controls would also come along with the emulation because the dock has multiple USB ports.  There's virtually nothing the Switch can do that the Steam Deck can't other than the detachable Joy Con, and ends up compensating by way of full support for any input devices you use on a PC.  Good luck using a racing steering wheel or flight stick on a Switch lol

The funny thing about what you're saying is true: Nintendo's weaker hardware makes emulation just that much easier to do because virtually any mid-tier PC has more than enough power to do it.  And the fact of the matter is that it's easier to do than people realize, and most kids can figure this stuff out... which I later saw as posts lmao

Remember when we were kids and we got away with all kinds of things our parents didn't know about?  Ever been caught doing something and THEN your parents found out because you got caught?  Don't underestimate kids hahaha!

You watched it?!

Wait wait... I didn't say I was going for clicks on YouTube, I actually made a literal title that represented what I was talking about lol

The distinction is more software-based functionality, and even then, it's simply programmed that way.  He's got a fair point about a walled garden: the most custom thing about consoles is their form factor.  They ARE using parts that can be found in PC hardware: the days of purely custom built silicon, APIs, etc. are all-but-gone, including with the Nintendo Switch.  The remaining distinction is the OS in which, yes, it's a walled garden where there is far more control over the apps that can run on it (which naturally cuts down on bloatware).  Just because I CAN'T open up MS Word and type up an essay on an Xbox Series X doesn't mean it can't do it, the functionality is simply not allowed.  They are PCs, just with less functionality, not that they aren't PCs at all.  I mean, on the flipside, many apps are made for the consoles to allow functionality not built into the OS, so in theory if someone wanted to make an app for 3D rendering on the Series X using your controller, it would be entirely possible if allowed.

This!  Piracy is its own entire ecosystem on its own.

*hole dickture lol; glad to hear someone enjoyed the juvenile humor

I actually answered this above: emulators also allow you to use Wiimotes/Joy Con through Bluetooth lol... So really, there is virtually nothing left the Switch can do that the Deck doesn't except detach said Joy Con.  As for the weight... come on, man: 1 x 2 is 2.  Ergo, twice has heavy sounds heavy, but then it's 1.6 lbs which is easily still within "proper handheld" territory weight lmao

I know what you meant, but that would be forwards compatibility with the Switch lol... I do miss the Gamepad, though: way better ergonomics than the Switch as a handheld!  Sadly, I do very little handheld gaming, so it's not really a big deal to me, but for those that do, the Gamepad did such a better job...