The Steam Deck’s influence on the new Steam Controller could scarcely be more obvious, the gamepad looking as if the Deck’s two grip sections were cleaved off and stitched together by Valve’s maddest hardware vivisectionists. That said, no small amount of the Steam Controller’s appeal lies in the hidden refinements it makes to those seemingly borrowed inputs: refinements like the more stable D-pad and the more precise, drift-resistant TMR (Tunneling Magnetoresistance) thumbsticks.
Now, there’s a good chance that these improvements could head back the other way. As Valve engineer Steve Cardinali and designer Lawrence Yang told me in an interview, which also touched on the ongoing Steam Machine delays, there’s plenty about the Steam Controller that they’d like to put into a potential next-gen Steam Deck.
This is an exciting development! It’s great to see how the Steam Deck is influencing new hardware, and the potential for upgraded controllers sounds promising. Looking forward to seeing what Valve comes up with next!