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this post was submitted on 06 Jun 2026
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Steam Hardware
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A place to discuss and support all Steam Hardware, including Steam Deck, Steam Machine, Steam Frame, and SteamOS in general.
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I still got this one in a drawer. I just wasn’t big on the primary touch pads with only one joystick.
I bought it shortly after launch, excited for it. Then the amount of configuration to use it, suuuuucked. I've tried to love it. I get it out every couple years to try again, and remind myself again that it sucks.
I also have one and I hate it.
I loved mine but the 2026 steam controller is superior In every way.
Oh my god, I just googled this. It looks like the price was decided by Lucille Bluth.
Hours much can our controller cost, Michael? $100?
Meanwhile, 8bitdo has amazing controllers for a quarter that price.
Very true I would have liked to be cheaper but I have two 8bitdo controllers already the ultimate 2 and the pro 3 but I was missing the touch pads and active thumbsticks when the steam deck was docked. Didn't really have a choice.
The new steam controller sold out within minutes, so it seems like they priced it too low if anything.
Whilst pricing everything at "what the market will bear" is valid; it is a shitty way to do business.
Valve has traditionally taken a longer view of things; if they sell a controller that you will love and use for years. Their reputation grows, especially if they are not gouging their customers for everything they can.
Valve will make more than enough by selling games via Steam; having an "optimized for Steam Controller" tag somewhere will keep those who already purchased happy; and drive more sales over the long run.
Yeah I plan to get one at some point. So over messing with Xbox controller drivers and other BS on Linux.
Except it didn't look like an owl. Original Steam controller 1, new Steam controller 86.
What makes it better? I kinda ignored the new one because the old one was so below expectations
Not OP but a couple things:
Whether it's worth the price depends on what you value in a game controller, and how much. For me, the "extra" inputs (mainly back pedals, touchpads, gyro) and accurate sticks (TMR instead of potentiometers) are worth it.
This is 16-bit controller slander.
N64, Dreamcast and Saturn be like ðŸ˜
Its more a regular controller plus extra vs the old one was a good but you had to tweek your brain to make it work as the touch pads were a replacement for normal controls. Where as the touch pads are there own thing. Being able to create popup menus that only show up on touch and the gyro being enabled and disabled by touching the thumbsticks is a game changer. Its everything you love about the steam deck without the neck pain of looking down at the screen.
The Deck gyro is activated by touching the thumbsticks, the Controller has sensors in the grips to activate the gyro.
The controller actually has both thumbsticks and grip capacitance sensing, you can set it to be whatever you prefer to activate gyro.
You can reprogram gyro activation triggers too
The rumble and haptics also feel a lot better too
The main things for me are the dedicated D-pad and dual thumbsticks. On the original, the left touchpad surface was just sort of textured to help it act as a D-pad. And the right touchpad is positioned in place of where you might want a right stick to be, and can be mapped to act as one in software. But in practice, there are some situations in which an actual D-pad or actual right stick are much better than faking it with touchpads. The new controller just has all the different input methods so that it should hypothetically work great in any game.
I loved mine. I used it until it died. Took a bit to get used to it. But when it died on me it took even longer to get used to a regular controller again.