Valve has been in the eye of the gaming media for a while now, due to the development of its Steam Deck. The Deck has been on the rise since February of 2022, and was most notable for its innovative use of a trackpad | back paddle | joystick combination, as well as the ability to play games that were previously PC only. Although there were some issues at the first release (later fixed with the new-and-improved OLED), many were wondering if that would be the height of Steam’s consoles. Well fear not – it seems that Valve is cooking up something amazing for us in the coming future.
Reddit users who specialize in data mining, like Sadlyitsbradley, have gathered up information on the brand-new VR headset that Valve has planned, aptly named the Deckard for its intent to optimize the benefits of the Steam Deck. Since 2021, proof-of-concept designs and hints from convention presenters about how “Oh, the Deck is amazing… but it would run so well in VR, no?” have hinted at the existence of this new technology, but the past few months have confirmed it. In 2023, leaked reports told these data miners that Valve had obtained a Radio Certification in South Korea – something that would only be necessary if a product like Deckard was in an advanced development stage.
Additionally, the website that tracks the Proton software (which translates Windows-based games into a Linux-based OS) saw that several games (combinations of 2D and VR) were being tested. This indicates that the Deckard would likely be a hybrid of a standalone gaming PC and a VR headset. Similar to the Deck, but instead of having limited access, any game (regardless of platform) would be playable – which would revolutionize the idea of VR gaming as a whole.
Based on Sadlyitsbradley‘s report, the theoretical specifications of this theoretical machine are as follows:
- Micro-LED Screens (Because Valve has been suspected of having a good relationship with a company that specializes in them)
- Off-Ear Speaker (Insuring that you can hear both your surroundings and your game
- A controller-based system that’s similar to the Quest 2
- Some variation of an ARMx64 processor
- And more to come…
Another system that Valve has been hinting at is the Valve Galileo, which at the moment is little more than a title and just speculations. Interested parties speculate that with the recent updates to the Steam Deck, Galileo might have some sort of connectivity between the Deck or another associated console. A recent 4Chan update also gave us this about a potential console:
- Target Price = $399
- Utilizes a relatively small Strix Halo APU (a mid range one featuring both a cut-down CPU and NPU, 6 cores, and 30 compute units of RDNA 3.5 with 32gb of LPDDRX). It appears to use an external power supply and runs SteamOS (due to the small number of parts needed, and the fact that AMD is selling poorly binned chips to Valve).
For you steam fans, let’s just wait and see what they have for us in the coming years. I
bet it will be way more than any of us could ever imagine, and until then, later gamers!