Valve ramp up Steam Deck compatibility testing, nearly 300 games get Verified status
With nearly 200 more rated as Playable
Fortnite might not make it to the Steam Deck, but anyone planning to pick up Valve’s portable PC won’t be short on compatible games. The Steam Deck compatibility review programme, in which Valve intend to test every Steam game for playability and usability on the Deck, appears to be upping gears ahead of the launch on February 25th. According to the unofficial tracking list on SteamDB, 294 games have entered the highest possible ‘Verified’ category, nearly tripling the count of Verified games that were listed a week ago.
As first spotted by Gaming On Linux, this list totalled 243 yesterday (February 10th), so that’s another 51 added overnight. And there are another 193 games in the Playable category too – there are games which run smoothly on the Steam Deck, they might just present minor issues like small text, or the need to stop and open up the Deck’s on-screen keyboard at certain points. Verified games, meanwhile, should work nicely as they are, and will appear in a separate ‘Great on Deck’ tab in the Steam library for easier access.
There’s clearly lots more testing and categorising to do – Steam is home to tens of thousands of games, so 294 is more of a scratch than a dent in the grand total. But like Steam itself, the current list of Verified games covers the full, glorious spectrum of PC gaming: there’s big-ticket stuff like God of War, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and Deathloop, indie fare like Hollow Knight, Death’s Door, and FTL: Faster Than Light, and hundreds more in between. There’s even several editions of The Jackbox Party Pack, though that’s doesn’t currently include Party Pack 3, meaning I’ll have to stick to my desktop when coming dead last again in RPS’s Tee K.O. matches.
Expect more to come, both Verified and Playable, in this last couple of weeks before Steam Decks start shipping out to reserve orderers. These categories aren’t a technical requirement for running on the Steam Deck, so you won’t need to wait until a particular game is tested and rated before you can try launching it – you’ll just be doing do without Valve’s assurances that it will fit the Steam Deck (and its Linux-based SteamOS) as snugly as a Verified game.
There will, sadly, be games that wind up in the Unsupported category, be it for low performance, anti-cheat compatibility, or a lack of affinity for the Deck’s controls. SteamDB is keeping track of these as well.
My own Steam Kit review kit finally arrived this week, after spending an uncomfortable amount of time in the customs queue at Stansted, so be sure to check in on the 25th for our review coverage (including some lovely moving picture content by new vid bud Liam).