Definitely a definitive decision: The Steam Deck OLED is definitively the best one!

Valve thinks the Steam Deck OLED is the definitive model. But do I agree?

Hi, and hello there!

First of all: I launched a new newsletter called overkill spotlight. Every other Wednesday (for now, I might change the cadence), I'll review one smaller game, be it an indie or a 'double-A' game. The first game I reviewed is Have a Nice Death, a great roguelike in the style of Dead Cells:

Signing up is free, and you can easily do so here. Thanks for considering! <3

Valve thinks the Steam Deck OLED is the definitive model

The Steam Deck OLED is now officially on sale, and I have – obviously – bought one. However, the buying experience went anything but smoothly, as it took me over 90 minutes to finally buy a 512 GB Steam Deck OLED. I had all kinds of error messages, from timeouts to the Steam Deck being marked as sold out to my account being temporarily blocked because I tried to purchase too many products. It was a nightmare, and I would have expected that a company that primarily runs a store would have figured this out.

Alas, I hope the Steam Deck OLED will be worth it (hasn't shipped yet), but going by Valve, this OLED version is "the definitive model". In an interview with Axios, Valve designer Lawrence Yang said "We actually see this as the definitive first-generation Steam Deck. If we could have shipped this originally, we would have." I don't doubt that. Valve is a newer player in the hardware space, after all (yes, I know about the Index), so they might have lacked the experience or the resources to release an OLED Steam Deck from the get-go.

But I have to admit that the statement feels a bit unlucky to me. If the OLED version is the definitive first-generation Steam Deck, what is the LCD version? A beta? An experiment?

I believe the LCD Steam Deck is still perfectly fine for those who own one, but going forward, it isn't a model I can recommend to new buyers. So yeah, maybe the new OLED model is indeed the definitive Steam Deck, but if I hadn't bought one myself, my buyer's remorse would kill me because of that statement.

But on a related note: I plan to set up my Steam Deck from scratch following our starter guide. So if I come around any passages that need changing, I will definitely update the post to create the definitively definite starter guide.

In other news

SteamOS 3.5.5 is live with a metric sh*t-ton of new features.
Half-Life, yes, the 25-year-old game, got an update making it Steam Deck Verified. And we've got a documentary of the development, too.
In less than a month (Dec 7), we'll get another edition of Geoff Keighley's Game Awards, and the nominees for 2023's Game of the Year are Alan Wake 2, Baldur's Gate 3, Marvel's Spider-Man 2, Resident Evil 4, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. I expect Baldur's Gate 3 to take this one home.
I reviewed the AYANEO Pocket Air, AYANEO's first Android-based handheld. It's excellent hardware, but I don't get Android.
Macstories' Federico Viticci detailed in a new post how he uses the iPad Pro as a screen for his Nintendo Switch. If you need a guide, we got you covered, of course.
But if you don't want to get an iPad, here is a portable monitor that Chris reviewed this week.
Apparently, Nintendo held one of their Indie World Showcase presentations (I completely missed that), and here is everything that was shown. Of course, most – if not all – of these games are also available on Steam.
If you can't get enough from The Witcher 3, don't fret, we're getting a mod editor in 2024. So the chances for DLC-size mods are climbing exponentially.
Nvidia GeForce Now now supports PC Game Pass games. I'm currently testing the service (among other reasons because a 3070 is apparently not enough to play Alan Wake 2 at its fullest), and so far have liked the service. More thoughts soon, of course.
Analogue Pocket launched in new colours, but of course, they are sold out now.
The Last of Us Part II Remastered is coming to PS5 on January 19th. This version will also probably be the one that will get the Nixxes-port treatment for PC later in 2024.