Do you know that Steam has snazzy-looking Deck-focused landing pages for video games which are “Verified” on the machine? The pages have existed since a minimum of 2023 however, as Steam Deck HQ notes, Valve could also be ramping up the diploma to which they encourage builders to advertise them. Earlier than a recreation even will get one, although, it must safe that coveted “Verified” score. Valve really has 4 standards to find out whether or not or not a recreation ought to earn the badge. A recreation ought to: haven’t any points with middleware (equivalent to anti-cheat software program), launch with out hassle or compatibility warnings, be absolutely playable by way of a gamepad, and, lastly, ought to “have good default settings, and text should be legible.”
What defines “good default settings” might be open to some degree of interpretation, however any means you slice it, for all their smooth visible enchantment, these pages are deceptive. The issue is that these touchdown pages characteristic the trailers for his or her respective video games embedded into a picture of a Steam Deck, which for my part offers a very misunderstanding of how some video games run. Positive, as developer datablob notes on BlueSky, in principle this offers a good impression of how a recreation may look on the Deck, however simply observe Final Fantasy VII Rebirth’s Steam Deck Verified landing page.
The web page performs the default trailer from the Steam Web page which is clearly operating on a way more highly effective PC than the Steam Deck. Sure, there’s a tiny disclaimer on the backside that claims the footage was “Captured on PC” and never Steam Deck, however nonetheless, the context makes it straightforward to think about the sport operating at such excessive constancy and framerate on the Deck.
To make sure, I double-checked and spun up Rebirth on my Steam Deck and, nope, it nonetheless doesn’t look that nice. And Rebirth isn’t the one recreation responsible of this. Avowed’s Steam Deck landing page additionally exhibits the sport acting at a degree of constancy that it merely can not on the Deck.
The not too long ago launched Ninja Gaiden 4 additionally has this drawback, and the subtitle textual content within the recreation isn’t what I’d contemplate legible sufficient on the Deck’s smaller display. It does run at a decent framerate, nevertheless it positively doesn’t look as sharp on the Deck because it does on this simulated expertise on the game’s landing page.
I’m certain sooner or later, when the Deck will get its inevitable improve, it could run these particular video games in a means that matches how they’re portrayed on their touchdown pages. However at that time, will there be new GPU-melting video games which are past its capabilities, which are incomes these badges and being featured in deceptive methods on promoting pages? The Steam Deck deserves much more honesty.
