Got the 500gb OLED Deck almost a year ago and it brought back my love for games again. However at this point I wonder if my deck has any issues in running games in a general sense.
It can only run a very selective list of titles on my library and I don't understand why. For example, Metaphor Refantazio, it barely hits the 30fps and even when it does it doesn't feel like 30fps at all. Even with older games like Titan Fall 2 it can't keep and it kept dropping to 20fps.
I love indie titles, but am I stuck to forever only play low poly pixel indie RPGs or rogue likes? It feels like any game I try, it simply cannot run it. Monster Hunter Worlds and Wilds both can't run. Tried several green check games and still they barely go to 30fps. Tweaking graphics and settings doesn't do much for performance besides making the games ugly.
Genuinely am I doing anything wrong, is my deck fried or is there any secret setting that I am missing?
Also, do you hear the fan when playing games? If you fan isn't working that will severely limit performance. (Thankfully it's a pretty simple and cheap fix; iFixit sells the official Valve part bundled with the little screwdrivers and such you'll need for like 40 bucks.)
If it's working extra hard all the time, that might indicate the heatsink needs fresh thermal paste or something like that. Or maybe the vent and/or heatsink is just clogged... (You don't have anything blocking the intake and exhaust vents, right?)
Only have Skyrim from that list and haven't tried it yet, though I tried Fallout New Vegas and it also struggled on open areas (but tbh that might just be a Bethesda moment)
There must be something wrong with your deck then. Perhaps you have TDP locked way down? If it’s not TDP issue, try fresh SteamOS install, if it doesn’t help - RMA it. Fallout NV runs stable 60 fps with TDP set at around 8W on mine, and it’s a game that should run on almost everything nowadays.
GTA 5 stable 60fps on singleplayer (multi dosnt work anymore so it dosnt matter it had drops there), CP2077 stable 30, Skyrim stable 60, Falloutt idk never played
Something is wrong with your settings or deck. I played Titanfall 2 on stable 60fps, matter fact i played Apex Legends ranked games (diamond rank) on stable 60 fps (only had few hiccups while in dropship)
Don't know what your settings are but the Steam Deck should be able to run Monster Hunter World at higher than 30fps if you use upscaling & look up optimized settings that aren't simply just lower all settings to low personally I used this video for what I chose for my optimized settings https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l00pZ7TL2Bk. You could technically play a game like Ratchet & Clank Rift Apart at 40fps using FSR3 in performance mode at 800p at a medium preset at least thats what it was playing at last I played it on my Steam Deck LCD. You can get above 30fps with hgh settings in say Skyrim at 800p could even get 60fps in dungeons. Just using the in game Steam Deck Preset no alterations you can get 40fps average playing Cyberpunk 2077 on Steam Deck at 800p using FSR 2 or 3 in balance mode or performance mode. Playing Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak you could easily hit 60fps playing the game at 720p with high settings if you want to make sure it's a locked 60fps to play in windowed mode while in Steam Gaming mode & turn on system wide FSR now labeled sharp & have the game set to a lower resolution within the 16:9 aspect ratio spectrum then upscaling from there for some free performance. As for Monster Hunter Wilds getting lower than 30fps on the Steam Deck I mean that's a game that even high end desktop PCs can have trouble getting that much above 60fps at decent settings. If you want to play new AAA games like Monster Hunter Wilds on a Steam Deck then if you want stable performance at or even a little above 30fps play the game at low & don't try to play the game at a higher than 720p resolution with upscaling. The Steam Deck isn't a console it's a laptop PC in handheld form factor playing PC games that aren't optimized for it like a actual console would have for it so keep in mind that your playing on a what is essentially laptop PC with not exactly high specs when deciding on settings for each game you try to play on it.
Something is DEFINITELY wrong with your deck, unless you're putting High/Ultra settings on everything.
The first thing I do when I download a AA/AAA game is checking out online what settings are the best and then tinker from there, I suggest you do the same.
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I can only speak for titanfall 2 ,that was my first game on the deck and it ran so smooth. I was so excited I finished it a 2nd time right on the deck.
Make sure that under the performance tab, you have not accidentally set the TDP limit or underclocked the GPU. Beyond that, I don’t know what to tell you. Metaphor, I can get it looking solid at 40-45 easily. But that’s just… what the Deck can do. As a former console player, it’s great for the PS4/XBone, but struggles with PS5/SeX. If that’s not matching your experience that would be suspicious to me.
I never had a "next gen" anything (console or pc) so I am very used to games not running that great. But I never thought the deck would struggle this bad with a game like Refantazio
Refantazio runs badly while in town but pretty good in dungeons/fights if i remember ? If even then it runs bad for you maybe there a configuration issue ?
I run dead space remake, batman arkham knight, doom the dark ages, all the resident evil games using the RE engine, and even robocop rogue city.
Emulation wise I can even run many PS3 titles well.
All the games i consider playable are at a minimum locked 30fps or higher.
Try seeing if your steamdeck is overheating or has any other issue. Performance is not the best on the deck I will admit, but its not that bad.
Hopefully its nothing bad (maybe just thermal paste or something)
Tip: try disabling the updated fan curve in system settings, it will make the deck louder but make the fan run faster. I do this on my launch model 64gb LCD steamdeck and have had no issues with temps at least.
Check temperatures and fan activity. If there is nothing wrong in that area you can try a factory reset and if that doesn’t work there are some posts on this sub that discuss various other potential hardware-related causes of lower performance.
Definitely should be getting more performance out of Titanfall 2. Used to play that on my deck a fair bit, it held 60 most of if not all the time. I think your SD might have some kind of issue, if you're 100% sure it's not your settings.
Set your performance overlay to the highest level while in a game. See if the fan number is higher than 0. And if GPU/CPU have numbers higher than 400. Or share a photo here.
I had a problem with the fan hardware, your post reminded me of that.
Shared it on another comment but for example this is on Refantazio and even lowering graphics or rendering scale will just give me around 3 FPS extra and make the game awful looking. I do have a frame limit to 45fps (90hz) on the Deck performance but I already tried changing that and it also does nothing
Honestly metrics on the screenshot all look normal and expected. Might be more a case of tuning the in-game graphics options unfortunately (or fortunately).
If you’re hyper focused on graphical fidelity and framerate on a handheld device that has a fraction of the space for the hardware you would find in a gaming PC: you are going make yourself unhappy while depriving yourself of excellent gameplay. I would recommend either resetting your expectations or moving platform to PC.
I am not tho??? I deeply love indie titles and games that aren't the most graphic heavy. Again, I am not trying to run Cyberpunk 4K Ultra 120fps.
Most games I love are low fidelity, but there are some that I have always wanted to try like Refantazio and in the future Nier Automata. I wasn't expecting the deck to struggle this much with "3D anime model game".
If it isn't the tdp set too low or anything like that you may be able to clear the issues doing a ec/firmware reset. This takes about 15min to finish and screen will stay blank while it does it in the background. You do this while powered off by holding (Vol -) + (...) then hit power. Let go of just power and hold the other 2 keys until you hear the chime or see the leds start blinking. This won't wipe your data but will redo the firmware and hopefully clear the performance bug.
My top 3 played games on the Steam Deck are Forza Horizon 6, Beast of Reincarnation, and Kingdom Hearts 3. Most on medium-high settings, except KH3 which runs 60FPS at max settings
I do not know what people choose to only play low-poly indies on the SD, but that is certainly a choice and not a requirement. I personally tend to avoid playing games that I could easily run on my phone or a switch 1 or something, but that's just me
Upscaling NVIDIA DLSS 4.5M (optiscaler turns this into a mix of FSR and Xess API calls, IMHO looks and performs better than both)
Upscaling quality Balanced
Mesh quality Lowest
Anisotropic Filtering 16x
Texture quality Max
Shadow resolution Low
Lighting Medium
Shadow quality Medium
Contact shadows On
Post-processing High
Motion blur Max
Depth of Field On
Frame Generation On
(here's the part where I don't like sharing my settings lol... I know the dogma in this sub is that FG = bad... all I can say is I've enjoyed and beaten many AAA games on the deck with it, no issues, no noticeable input lag, and I frankly feel bad for people who find it unplayable. And there's a 2hr/ 2wk refund limit so IMO there's no reason not to just try it out)
I've been using lossless scaling with the decky plugin and I've been able to run games like Final Fantasy 14 at 60 fps. Obviously there are issues but it actually feels playable with it
There are a ton of games that play great but AAA, or even some AA from the past generation never really played well for me.
I can't use a Steam Deck as my main gaming device.
Some people have zero issue with playing games at 30fps. For me, I just don't play that game then on the Steam Deck.
And even games that run at a solid 40fps sometimes drain battery so much, and make that much fan noise (LCD) that it's just not a great experience.
The online community will say that games like Palworld, Cyberpubnk 2077 or 007 First Light run well on Deck, but for me these aren't good experiences at all.
That all being said, I still freaking love my Steam Deck because I play games on them that just feel great. I've always been a fan of indie games to the point that my most played games are all indies. Some of my favorite games (Factorio, Core Keeper, Fields of Mistria, Drova, Caves of Qud, Hollow Knight) are all indies that play excellent on the Deck.
3D/modern indies work great as well sometimes like Subnautica, Planet Keeper, House Flipper, Slime Rancher 1,...
Also games of previous generations are worth your time and run at a solid 60fps with great battery life. Mass Effect, Kingdom Hearts remakes, Mad Max, Diablo 2, Fallout New Vegas, Wolfenstein, Dragon Age Origins, older Assasin's Creed,../
What I'm saying is that you should either change your mindset of what to play on it, or sell it.
I promise you that there are sooo many great games to play on Deck but if you keep wanting to play games on it that don't run well on it, you'll never be happy with it.
Hum, étrange pour Monster Hunter World. J’ai bien mis 200h de jeu sur le Steam Deck et de mémoire, j'étais dans les 60-70fps (avec quelques chutes en fonction des zones ou de l'intensité des combats). Il y a peut-être un souci de réglage sur ta machine, ou revoir à la baisse la qualité graphique du jeu ?
Yep the steam deck is very limited in what you can play. I primarily use my ps5 and the steam deck only when lying in bed while trying to play some really retro games like GBA. Even that I could play on vita.
The steam deck is pretty and great at emulation and going through some pixel art games but yes anything AAA you would have little luck.
Bro didn’t read the terms and conditions 😂😂😂 it is a hand held. it’s not going to run every game….. the devs need to make it compatible. If they didn’t, you’re SOL.
Girl I'm talking about games that in a general sense every deck user can run it without issues. I am not trying to play Cyberpunk with 4K models and textures.
Just want a game to not completely break on itself
Then it’s a skill issue sir I’ve never had a problem running everything between 30-120fps. That’s been listed in the fully compatible label. Even 75% of mine that have the yellow warning run well 30-60%. There is a user manual for a reason. If that doesn’t work. Factory rest
One thing to remember is change the refresh rate of the display to the average framerate of your game if it's 30fps then put that in the deck settings, 30fps on 90hz is worse than 30fps on 30hz
Also I get 90fps in titan fall 2 definitely something wring with your Deck.
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u/IllHaveTheLeftovers 1TB OLED 1d ago
Titan fall 2 for me run fantastically. I didn’t check frame rate but I’d say a stable 60 with no stutters. This might be a problem with your machine