I don’t need touch options on my controllers and I don’t use fancy macro/keybind/crazy stuff
It’s good that you know what you want in a product, but this product is clearly not marketed at you in this case. It’s kind of silly to compare apples to oranges especially when you’re allergic to citrus in the first place, you know?
Weird that you call out macros/keybind/crazy stuff as why this isn’t for me, which makes a lot of assumptions.
I don’t want to macro all kinds of shit, but I do use my controllers for all kinds of games. I do keybind certain things to the extra buttons. This isn’t even what Valve is going for really. They have effectively three unique features, One extra front button for the quick access menu, the touchpads and a “grip enabled gyro”
Every 3rd party controller has extra buttons that you could setup for that quick access menu.
I have a steam deck. I know how the little pads work. They aren’t great. I still fallback to the touch screen or grabbing a real keyboard instead of trying to type with the stuff.
Nobody is going to have “grip enabled gyro” but where is this going to be useful day 1? A valve tech demo title if anything? There’s no screen like the deck has, so even switch “homebrew” won’t quite work as you’d like without a display touchscreen.
So that leaves the rest of the features which are run of the mill.
Tons of competitors have TMR joysticks at this price.
Most have excellent rumble.
Four buttons on the back is standard with everything. My $25 example only has two bonus buttons, but once you start hitting $50-60 everybody has the two extra buttons and closer to $100 you have a pair of levers too and several extra buttons all over.
Once you start looking at competitors then you start seeing the downsides
No way to adjust stick tension
No short trigger switches (the clicky on the vader is beyond addicting.)
No support for consoles (mentioned anyway)
No color choices
No RGB, programmable or otherwise
Somebody’s gonna have issues bumping into that touchpad when they hold their controller a certain way
A lot of competitors add a 3rd button to the top on each side as R4/L4. This doesn’t.
Some competitors also add a couple extra buttons below XABY
TMR on sticks, but not triggers
Joysticks not offset like a typical controller. They are very centered and favor the dpad over the stick, and they’re squished upwards because of the touch pads
Anywho, obviously I haven’t held this thing… but on paper it’s just another overpriced controller unless you REALLY want that quick access button and touch pads.
I feel like your negatives, while subjective are just completely meaningless to me, who would gladly buy this over anything else, especially considering the terrible battery life my Dualsense has had.
Not having RGB to me just seems good, no battery drain and stupid “gamer” styling.
Colour choice sure, but I would have picked black.
Offset sticks would mean I wouldn’t be interested at all.
Console support is entirely meaningless to me, I guess not for everyone but Steam devices are already geared towards PC gaming so it should come as no surprise.
If you have a Steam Deck you should be aware the touch pads can be unbound if that is your preference, so any accidental touches are avoided.
And regarding the price that is the price of an Xbox or PS5 controller in my region already, What is the price for you?
I can’t speak for triggers using different tech as I don’t know enough (or care lets be honest) but I would’ve appreciated the adaptive trigger tech in this one, while underused I think it can be great, especially for driving games.
I feel like you are some sort of power user with a very strict preference, which you seem to make the mistake of thinking your average user is. I just want a controller that does the job and does it well, with some few requirements, like non offset sticks. I might enjoy adjustable sticks. but I will not be bothered by it not being there.
just want a controller that does the job and does it well
This one portion is the reality. This controller will work just fine, but still be one of the most expensive ones on the market. Enjoy, but know you’ve done no research and don’t really care about the outcome per your own admission.
I grew up with shitty third party controllers that ruined reputation of said off brand controllers, but times have changed. With how the steam software works you can use basically any controller in the world and configure it however you want with your pc games… which is exactly why there’s no compelling reason to go with this model over any other so long as it’s a good controller and just works.
There’s countless stick layouts and choices for people with specific niches. That wasn’t a list of mine, just some potential ones. Most people don’t even know that common and cheap controllers exist with tension settings or adjustable triggers… but hey most people just follow the brand brainwash that advertising and echo chambers on the internet encourage.
This is way cheaper than the “Elite” Xbox controller and PS equivalent though? As stated in my region 100 usd is the rough price of a Dualsense or Xbox controller.
The only competitor with a touchpad I know of is the Dualsense, but the battery is trash and it has a mic and speaker which is more annoying than useful to me.
Valve has built a lot of trust with their hardware snd every indication is that is will be a very servicable device.
My research is daily driving an og steam controller from day one. I have had some gripes and issues with it, and this seems like it fixed most of them. This is clearly an improvement over it. You don’t need the features the steam controller brings. Fine. There’s nothing wrong with that. Feel free to purchase any of the trillions of Xbox controller clones.
straightup if you don’t immediately recognize the touchpads as game-changing, then this is NOT the controller for you.
just be content with knowing that scores of people saw the $100 price tag and said “oh that’s actually fine.” and moreover that offering a dissenting opinion to folks who like it is akin to saying “i get this Mona Lisa is popular, i just don’t think anyone should pay that much for a painting!”
it’s got a unique stank threat no other controller replicates. also valve hardware is pretty faultless up to this point.
The trackpads are amazing, actually. It’s fine to not like them. In that case, get a cheaper controller and have fun! 100€ is very expensive, but there is no other product out there that offers what Steam Controller does. Also, touch enabled gyro (be it the sticks or trackpads) is a complete game changer for me.
First-party support for Steam Input’s deep configuration is a big selling point for a lot of people, myself included. It also means the lack of some of the extra buttons you mentioned present on other premium controllers doesn’t hurt so much, because there’s already so many options for layering in more inputs. Not wanting to mess with most of that doesn’t mean the controller is “not for you,” but it does mean it’s going to align less with what you value.
I absolutely love the Deck’s touchpads. I consider them non-negotiable inclusions for any future PC handheld or controller I buy. I will agree though that they aren’t ideal if your main use case for them was typing any more than a couple words at a time.
Citation needed on no one using grip-enabled gyro. It’s not something you need a game to support to make use of. Also, touch-enabled gyro was awesome on the original Steam Controller, and grip sensing on the Index controllers enabled some cool functionality.
I don’t think lack of console support or color customization are going to register as negatives for most people in the market for this. I can’t even remember the last time I used a console.
Valve has a pretty good track record with ergonomics, so I doubt accidentally activating the touchpads will be a common problem. Even if you find yourself in that spot though, you can have Steam Input disable a pad under certain conditions like when its thumb is on a stick.
Symmetrical sticks being a downside is extremely subjective.
It’s good that you know what you want in a product, but this product is clearly not marketed at you in this case. It’s kind of silly to compare apples to oranges especially when you’re allergic to citrus in the first place, you know?
Weird that you call out macros/keybind/crazy stuff as why this isn’t for me, which makes a lot of assumptions. I don’t want to macro all kinds of shit, but I do use my controllers for all kinds of games. I do keybind certain things to the extra buttons. This isn’t even what Valve is going for really. They have effectively three unique features, One extra front button for the quick access menu, the touchpads and a “grip enabled gyro”
Every 3rd party controller has extra buttons that you could setup for that quick access menu.
I have a steam deck. I know how the little pads work. They aren’t great. I still fallback to the touch screen or grabbing a real keyboard instead of trying to type with the stuff.
Nobody is going to have “grip enabled gyro” but where is this going to be useful day 1? A valve tech demo title if anything? There’s no screen like the deck has, so even switch “homebrew” won’t quite work as you’d like without a display touchscreen.
So that leaves the rest of the features which are run of the mill.
Once you start looking at competitors then you start seeing the downsides
No way to adjust stick tension
No short trigger switches (the clicky on the vader is beyond addicting.)
No support for consoles (mentioned anyway)
No color choices
No RGB, programmable or otherwise
Somebody’s gonna have issues bumping into that touchpad when they hold their controller a certain way
A lot of competitors add a 3rd button to the top on each side as R4/L4. This doesn’t.
Some competitors also add a couple extra buttons below XABY
TMR on sticks, but not triggers
Joysticks not offset like a typical controller. They are very centered and favor the dpad over the stick, and they’re squished upwards because of the touch pads
Anywho, obviously I haven’t held this thing… but on paper it’s just another overpriced controller unless you REALLY want that quick access button and touch pads.
I feel like your negatives, while subjective are just completely meaningless to me, who would gladly buy this over anything else, especially considering the terrible battery life my Dualsense has had.
Not having RGB to me just seems good, no battery drain and stupid “gamer” styling.
Colour choice sure, but I would have picked black.
Offset sticks would mean I wouldn’t be interested at all.
Console support is entirely meaningless to me, I guess not for everyone but Steam devices are already geared towards PC gaming so it should come as no surprise.
If you have a Steam Deck you should be aware the touch pads can be unbound if that is your preference, so any accidental touches are avoided.
And regarding the price that is the price of an Xbox or PS5 controller in my region already, What is the price for you?
I can’t speak for triggers using different tech as I don’t know enough (or care lets be honest) but I would’ve appreciated the adaptive trigger tech in this one, while underused I think it can be great, especially for driving games.
I feel like you are some sort of power user with a very strict preference, which you seem to make the mistake of thinking your average user is. I just want a controller that does the job and does it well, with some few requirements, like non offset sticks. I might enjoy adjustable sticks. but I will not be bothered by it not being there.
This one portion is the reality. This controller will work just fine, but still be one of the most expensive ones on the market. Enjoy, but know you’ve done no research and don’t really care about the outcome per your own admission.
I grew up with shitty third party controllers that ruined reputation of said off brand controllers, but times have changed. With how the steam software works you can use basically any controller in the world and configure it however you want with your pc games… which is exactly why there’s no compelling reason to go with this model over any other so long as it’s a good controller and just works.
There’s countless stick layouts and choices for people with specific niches. That wasn’t a list of mine, just some potential ones. Most people don’t even know that common and cheap controllers exist with tension settings or adjustable triggers… but hey most people just follow the brand brainwash that advertising and echo chambers on the internet encourage.
This is way cheaper than the “Elite” Xbox controller and PS equivalent though? As stated in my region 100 usd is the rough price of a Dualsense or Xbox controller.
The only competitor with a touchpad I know of is the Dualsense, but the battery is trash and it has a mic and speaker which is more annoying than useful to me.
Valve has built a lot of trust with their hardware snd every indication is that is will be a very servicable device.
My research is daily driving an og steam controller from day one. I have had some gripes and issues with it, and this seems like it fixed most of them. This is clearly an improvement over it. You don’t need the features the steam controller brings. Fine. There’s nothing wrong with that. Feel free to purchase any of the trillions of Xbox controller clones.
straightup if you don’t immediately recognize the touchpads as game-changing, then this is NOT the controller for you.
just be content with knowing that scores of people saw the $100 price tag and said “oh that’s actually fine.” and moreover that offering a dissenting opinion to folks who like it is akin to saying “i get this Mona Lisa is popular, i just don’t think anyone should pay that much for a painting!”
it’s got a unique stank threat no other controller replicates. also valve hardware is pretty faultless up to this point.
What’s a “typical” controller? Playstation controller joysticks haven’t been offset since they invented the concept in 1997.
Also, I didn’t assume anything. I quoted your own words.
The trackpads are amazing, actually. It’s fine to not like them. In that case, get a cheaper controller and have fun! 100€ is very expensive, but there is no other product out there that offers what Steam Controller does. Also, touch enabled gyro (be it the sticks or trackpads) is a complete game changer for me.
A few notes:
First-party support for Steam Input’s deep configuration is a big selling point for a lot of people, myself included. It also means the lack of some of the extra buttons you mentioned present on other premium controllers doesn’t hurt so much, because there’s already so many options for layering in more inputs. Not wanting to mess with most of that doesn’t mean the controller is “not for you,” but it does mean it’s going to align less with what you value.
I absolutely love the Deck’s touchpads. I consider them non-negotiable inclusions for any future PC handheld or controller I buy. I will agree though that they aren’t ideal if your main use case for them was typing any more than a couple words at a time.
Citation needed on no one using grip-enabled gyro. It’s not something you need a game to support to make use of. Also, touch-enabled gyro was awesome on the original Steam Controller, and grip sensing on the Index controllers enabled some cool functionality.
I don’t think lack of console support or color customization are going to register as negatives for most people in the market for this. I can’t even remember the last time I used a console.
Valve has a pretty good track record with ergonomics, so I doubt accidentally activating the touchpads will be a common problem. Even if you find yourself in that spot though, you can have Steam Input disable a pad under certain conditions like when its thumb is on a stick.
Symmetrical sticks being a downside is extremely subjective.