Valve’s 2021 Steam Deck hardware can circle Nintendo’s 2017 Nintendo Switch, but there’s one point of comparison where Nintendo dominated last year. it’s the screen. The Switch OLED model debuted just six months before Steam Deck. With OLED in TVs, phones, or gaming handhelds, it’s pretty hard to leave behind its rich colors and deep blacks. The Steam Deck just celebrated his one-year anniversary, and this past year, his one question about Deck has been asked more than any other. Will Valve make an OLED model?
Short and polite answer from Valve Pierre Lou Griffe (opens in new tab)Valve “understands the limitations of current technology on deck when it comes to screens.”
“We want to make it better, too. We are looking at all means,” he says. But the longer answer is that there’s a lot more to screen replacement than just screen replacement.
“I think people see something like an incremental version and assume it’s easy to drop in,” says Griffais. “But really, the screen is at the center of the device. Everything is fixed to the screen. Basically, if you’re talking about a device this small, everything is designed around everything. More than humans would also be a large amount of work, assuming that […] I don’t think we are discounting anything. But the idea that you can just swap in a new screen and be done with it requires more than that to come to fruition. “
When Valve was designing the Steam Deck, the flexibility of the LCD panel was actually one of their top priorities. Preserve battery life. According to Griffais, as far as he knows, it should be possible with OLED as well, but it requires a specific configuration.
“It’s something you have to plan ahead for. When we were working on this screen, we made sure these would be supported even though refresh rate switching wasn’t ready at release. It was really important to us that it all comes down to this.You have to keep this in mind when evaluating and choosing the possible options. Differences don’t solve the problem. It’s how you design the whole system.What’s between the screen and the SOC (system on chip).”
I think the eventual successor to Steam Deck will likely use OLED, but after speaking with Griffais, I wouldn’t expect an incremental update from Valve like Steam OLED. If so, Valve is definitely playing near their best.
In the meantime, Steam Deck owners who miss the OLED color can at least try it. vivid decka nice little plugin that allows you to boost the color saturation of your display without turning the game on full lisa frank paintingOr you can go completely wild with it. I’m not a color police.
