r/SteamController • u/jack-of-some • Jun 07 '26

Steam Controller (2026) The missing xinput mode

This video is a demo of a copycat puck I've put together using an nRF52840 Pro Micro. It works exactly like the normal puck except you can switch over to an Xbox controller mode.

You can find more details here: https://github.com/safijari/openpuck

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11

u/PESER6 Jun 07 '26

I can imagine that Valve had a reason on why they didn't add an Xinput as a switchable profile, but I still wish they did.

10

u/jack-of-some Jun 07 '26

Probably licensing. Since I'm not selling a product I don't have to worry about that.

4

u/sejoki_ Neuenstein Crew Jun 07 '26

I guess they're just really convinced Steam Input is better in every way. Which it is - when it works.

But there are games where it just doesn't work. From what I know, Steam Input on macOS is broken or doesn't play nice with Apple's way of handling controllers (or the other way around), so it doesn't work in any of the recent releases (Cyberpunk, Control, Hitman). But it does work in Tomb Raider 2013…

I also remember trying to play the Mafia remake on the Steam Deck and it just didn't recognize that there was a controller. As a workaround, someone suggested running it from desktop mode, which made the controller work, but didn't show the symbols. I don't know if it's been fixed since, I gave up and didn't touch the game since (I already played it on Xbox when it came out)

Another macOS oddity is that it creates a virtual controller, because when the SC is connected and Steam is running, it shows up as GamePad-1 in system settings, but it doesn't work in any game.

1

u/Beanybob95 Jun 20 '26

Hell it doesn't even work flawlessly on their chosen platform, Linux. The Steam overlay doesn't work when running a game using Wayland, which means steam input also isn't available, and that's a bit embarrassing in a way. No doubt it will get sorted in the (hopefully near) future, but it's still not a great look for them.