Valve will review Steam games for compatibility with Steam Deck handheld

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Valve introduces its Steam Deck Verified program. With this, the company says it walks through the Steam catalog, and games are provided with a quality mark that shows whether a game is playable on the handheld console.

Valve is introducing the Verified program on the Steam Deck website. The company states there that it “reviews the entire Steam catalog” for use on the Steam Deck. After a game is rated, it is categorized according to “the degree of compatibility” with the handheld, the game giant writes. The company will display these categories when Steam Deck users browse their own collection or purchase games through the handheld.

For the time being, the company maintains four compatibility levels. Games with the Verified quality mark work well on the Steam Deck without any modification, the manufacturer reports. That means, among other things, that the game offers full controller support, supports screen resolutions of 1280×720 or 1280×800 pixels, does not display compatibility warnings and offers full SteamOS support, whether or not via Proton. That includes middleware, such as drm and anti-cheat software. Games that meet these requirements are marked with a green checkmark.

The Steam Deck manufacturer also displays a category of “playable” games. Such titles are marked with a yellow icon. Such games will work on the Steam Deck, but gamers may need to make manual adjustments to play them. Valve writes that those games must, for example, download a controller configuration from the community, or navigate a possible launcher via the touchscreen of the Steam Deck. Games that are not supported on the Steam Deck will have a gray icon and games that have not yet been tested by Valve will have a question mark.

Valve indicates it has already started reviewing Steam games for use on its handheld. The company states that it is an ‘ongoing evaluation’ of the entire catalog. A game’s rating may change over time, such as when developers release updates or improve the Steam Deck software.

Valve announced the Steam Deck earlier this year. The handheld console features a semi-custom apu from AMD, which features four Zen 2 cores and an RDNA 2 GPU with eight compute units. The handheld also gets 16GB of Lpddr5 memory and up to 512GB of storage, although this can be expanded with a MicroSD card.

The Steam Deck runs on SteamOS by default, which is based on Linux. Many games that do not run natively on Linux can still run on the OS via the Proton tool. This tool does have some caveats. For example, it currently does not work with all anti-cheat software, although it is currently being worked on. The makers of BattlEye and Easy Anti-Cheat have already indicated that they will support the Steam Deck. BattlEye is used in games like Escape From Tarkov, PUBG and Rainbow Six Siege. Easy Anti-Cheat is used in games like Fortnite, Apex Legends and Halo Master Chief Collection.

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