The original thumbstick of the Steam Controller was always a bit imperfect. I bought my Steam Controller on day one, but a few years in, the soft-touch material on the stick started to flake off. That’s gross!
Those flakes that rub off also don’t help with gripping the stick. It already has a convex-shaped top, which I like less than a concave top. It always feels like I’m pushing the stick in some direction but my thumb is slowly slipping.
After almost a decade of putting up with this, I had enough. I looked around online and found that people had figured out how to upgrade that part of the Steam Controller, and it’s actually decently easy and cheap.
The Steam Controller is held together with Torx T6 screws. I opened it up and carefully lifted up the mainboard, making sure not to harm the ribbon cable underneath. From there, I pulled the stock thumbstick cap off of the stick and slipped on the replacement one.
I now have a Steam Controller with a thumbstick that doesn’t rub off and is even concave for better grip!
Steam Controllers died for a reason. Yes, there are still some diehards but mostly it is people who never had one dreaming about how good it must have been because The Deck is REAL damned good. The reality is that it felt flimsy, had horrible buttons, and the touchpads instead of sticks (and d-pad) were god awful and basically only useful for games with no gamepad support and corner cases on stuff like Terraria or Stardew which took advantage of steam input.
Which was the big thing. Steam Controllers themselves, like Steam Machines, were a complete and utter failure outside of like five people. But it led to Steam Input (and SteamOS) which are genuinely amazing and play ridiculously well with games that don’t have a gamepad mapping or don’t have a good one.
Which is why Steam Controller 2 is going to be a challenge. Because touchpad instead of button or stick is bad. Touchpad in addition to buttons and sticks are godlike.
Eh, I’ve tried to like it and I don’t. It’s fine, but the buttons kinda suck and I never got used to the left touchpad. The main thing I miss is a second joystick.
The Steam Deck is way better, and I think I’d like a standalone controller designed that way, with a bit bigger touchpads (not as big as the Steam controller though).
The touchpads are great at replacing a mouse, but not great at replacing a joystick.
They took em away cuz there’s a patent troll on buttons behind controllers. All the cons you put forth are fairly solvable or up to user preference (I quite liked the touch pads myself)
It was filed in 2015. Valve discontinued the controller at some point between that and when they finally sold out in 2019.
That can mean one of two (main) things:
Valve was so afraid of the lawsuit that they immediately stopped production and still took 4 years to sell out of their inventory
Valve didn’t care and continued to produce units up until 2018/2019 when they stopped for whatever reason
Both are fairly plausible because 4 million USD isn’t even what GabeN spends on knives in a given year. Neither paint a picture of the Steam Controller being some wild success.
Because, if it were, they could have just as easily
Paid a licensing fee to SCUF et al. Which is what I assume 8bitdo, MS, and Sony all do? … Also Valve since the Steam Deck has back paddles too
Released a revision that got rid of the back paddles
Its great you like it. That doesn’t mean others did.
I guess I am one of those 5 people you mention. I have both a steam controller and a steam deck. The controller is slightly better than the deck, for me. It is the best controller I have owned, hands down.
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You REALLY REALLY don’t.
Steam Controllers died for a reason. Yes, there are still some diehards but mostly it is people who never had one dreaming about how good it must have been because The Deck is REAL damned good. The reality is that it felt flimsy, had horrible buttons, and the touchpads instead of sticks (and d-pad) were god awful and basically only useful for games with no gamepad support and corner cases on stuff like Terraria or Stardew which took advantage of steam input.
Which was the big thing. Steam Controllers themselves, like Steam Machines, were a complete and utter failure outside of like five people. But it led to Steam Input (and SteamOS) which are genuinely amazing and play ridiculously well with games that don’t have a gamepad mapping or don’t have a good one.
Which is why Steam Controller 2 is going to be a challenge. Because touchpad instead of button or stick is bad. Touchpad in addition to buttons and sticks are godlike.
I hate controllers with a passion and the steam controller is the only one that i like. I hoard 4 of them in case they break
Eh, I’ve tried to like it and I don’t. It’s fine, but the buttons kinda suck and I never got used to the left touchpad. The main thing I miss is a second joystick.
The Steam Deck is way better, and I think I’d like a standalone controller designed that way, with a bit bigger touchpads (not as big as the Steam controller though).
The touchpads are great at replacing a mouse, but not great at replacing a joystick.
I’m imagining one touch pad like the ps4 controller had to save space, but split in half
They took em away cuz there’s a patent troll on buttons behind controllers. All the cons you put forth are fairly solvable or up to user preference (I quite liked the touch pads myself)
The patent troll you’re referring to is SCUD (fuck those guys and fuck their owners, Corsair).
Thankfully, Valve won the appeal in their lawsuit a few years back and the patent is no longer valid. Unfortunately, the damage was already done
Obligatory: Fuck Polygon since it is now a website owned by people who built their empire on rape
https://www.polygon.com/2021/2/3/22264213/valve-steam-controller-lawsuit-scuf-4-million/ covers the lawsuit.
It was filed in 2015. Valve discontinued the controller at some point between that and when they finally sold out in 2019.
That can mean one of two (main) things:
Both are fairly plausible because 4 million USD isn’t even what GabeN spends on knives in a given year. Neither paint a picture of the Steam Controller being some wild success.
Because, if it were, they could have just as easily
Its great you like it. That doesn’t mean others did.
Eh, Steam Deck has buttons, which are probably different enough design-wise to avoid lawsuits.
I guess I am one of those 5 people you mention. I have both a steam controller and a steam deck. The controller is slightly better than the deck, for me. It is the best controller I have owned, hands down.
I played 200 hours of MGSV with the Steam Controller. I love it.
I hate playing Xcom with the Steam controller which, arguably, it should be better at.