The original Steam Controller is undoubtedly one of the coolest pieces of gear I own—and one of the most innovative, too.
I got mine right when it launched in 2015. I wanted to solve a very real problem: I was trying to turn my PC into a console.
You see, Valve had Big Picture Mode, which truly turned your PC into a console-like experience. The problem was that some of my favorite PC games didn’t support controllers. They were keyboard-and-mouse only.
But then—here comes the Steam Controller. Suddenly, I was able to reprogram all the inputs. I could take basic keys, like the spacebar, and map them to a button on the controller—like the A button. And once you did that, you could share your controller configuration with the Steam community, or reuse a config someone else already made. It was pretty awesome.
And those dual trackpads? They were swank. Incredible for first-person shooters and real-time strategy games. They were the next best thing to a mouse. And because of the angle of the handles, it all felt very comfortable in the hand—probably the most comfortable controller experience I’ve ever had.
It’s funny—just a little over five years ago, gamers hated it. Not because they ever used one, but because it was a failure. And as we all know about gamers, there’s nothing they hate more than a failure. It was dismissed as a novelty—something no one would ever use again.
Well, Valve had the last laugh. A few years ago, they released the Steam Deck. And what do you know? It’s a direct evolution of the Steam Controller. And now everyone loves the Steam Deck.
Just take a look at it—it’s got so many of the same things the Steam Controller had: dual trackpads, back paddles, the ability to remap buttons and customize layouts. Having owned a Steam Deck since launch, I can say this confidently: the most killer features on the Deck originated with the Steam Controller.
That said, it wasn’t perfect. There were a few quirks I wish they had fixed. For one, it would’ve been nice if it had dual analog sticks instead of just one. Using a trackpad in place of a right stick is fine in theory, but let’s be real: a trackpad does not replace an analog stick.
Also, unlike most modern controllers, this one didn’t have a rechargeable battery. You needed AA batteries. Now, to be fair, those batteries lasted a long time—but it still would’ve been nicer to just recharge it and forget about replacements.
Then there’s the back paddles. Only two of them. In hindsight, yeah, Valve knew they needed to evolve. I’ve grown so used to having four back paddles on the Steam Deck. They’re incredibly useful—especially in games with lots of inputs. Just good to have.
Still, this was one of the first mainstream controllers to even have back paddles. So hats off to Valve for that.
Honestly, I really wish there was another Steam Controller on the market. I know Hori makes a licensed controller for the Steam Deck in Japan, but it’s missing a core feature the original had: the dual trackpads.
To me, the dual trackpads make the Steam Deck experience. It’s something almost no other handheld has. My wife has a Legion Go, and it does have a trackpad—but only one. And honestly? That makes all the difference. It’s fine. But man… it would’ve been a better handheld with two.
Definitely one of the most innovative controllers ever made.
And yeah, I still use mine. I use it when I dock my handheld. Or when I’m on my living room PC.
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I would love to get ahold of one for my PC. I’m hesitant to buy a used one though. Maybe one day Valve will make more or even better, make a SC2. Until then my PS5 controller will continue to serve me well
I’ve had one since the release 2015. The best controller and, unfortunately, the most worn out of em all. I really need a SC2. It still works just like the first day (well, better since it got software updates), but it’s so damn worn out. Fuck, I’m actually, seriously considering paying those crazy amounts people are selling them (HAS TO BE NEW!) for online. It’s sick how good it is.
I have one too. I love it so much. It’s really, really good. Could map things exactly how I want them! Use it mostly playing Sekiro and Elden Ring.
I love the TouchPads really makes it easier to control those small movements
I really love mine and necer realised how “hated” it was. For me the biggest downside is that the level of customisation is almost overwhelming. Which is a good problem to have, honestly, but it led me to sometimes use the shitty xbox controller instead of fumbling with options.
Yeah for sure, I know what you mean. But like, the ability to activate gyro aiming when holding down right bumper past its “click” for those accurate shots is just cheifs kiss
Behold! The perfect controller layout, from the far future:
spoiler
If only it wasn’t made for tiny hands.
It’s weird how quickly Sony discovered the perfect layout and how little it’s changed since.
Analogue triggers are the only really great addition since the original Dual Shock.
The gyro aim on the PS5 (well technically all the way back to the PS3, only not as good) are actually really nice too, but I can count the games that use it on one hand. I’ve no idea why devs are so adverse to using them.
The PS4/5 touch pad would be OK if it wasn’t just used as a giant Select button, because for some reason the actual Select button is now “Share” which literally nobody ever asked for.
I disagree about the batteries. Give me replaceable AA cells any day over a built-in Li-ion. Rechargeable AAs are readily available and quickly swappable if you keep hot spares. Much better option for long term serviceability.
Swappable Li-Ion cells like 18650s are even better. I find recharging AAs too slow
I think the availability of AA batteries is higher, 18650 is much less standard than AA in most people’s homes. I would rather have options, so saying AA but having a swappable battery tray is how I would go, but I like kludgey stuff anyway.
That said, I just did a battery replacement for a lithium pouch on some TWS headphones and it was a fairly simple process. Making it a port rather than soldered wires would make it much easier and would make battery replacement a quick and routine task. Hopefully more companies will more towards ports for batteries and maybe even a standard port that is the same for a given voltage/amperage combination so swapping out can be done with confidence.
Is this the AI slop hyphen use I’ve heard so much about?
The em dash? I always use it—love it—you’ll have to take it from cold, dead hands.
Windows: Alt+0151
Linux: Compose - + - + -
Yeah sure, emdashes and curly quotation marks were designed and put into Unicode specially for AI. Take some book or newspaper and look at what characters it uses
Other than just feeling a little light/cheap, I liked it. I actually liked that it used standard batteries so I could just use rechargeable AAs. Only reason I don’t use it anymore, is that I mostly game on PS5 now, and mostly only play strategy games on PC. I used to use it while streaming from my PC to my Kodi/Steam Raspberry Pi in my living room.
It is the best controller ever made by far and I am willing to die on this hill.
The touchpads always made my thumbs feel weird after a short time. It was a functional marvel, but I couldn’t use it for long.
It’s an outstanding controller for games with mouse input, but it’s less than fantastic for traditional controller games, imo.
It’s also very divisive. I love it for couch Civilization, but I have an 8bitDo for expedition 33.
Yeah, I couldn’t get on with it at all. Most games are designed for a right analogue stick, and not having one just kills it.
Then there’s the back paddles. Only two of them.
Speak for yourself. Mine has 14 lol
Lol omg no
When your villain origin story is getting banned from a truck simulator mod because you forgot the macro to turn the headlights on.
I admire the cut of your jib.
Pretty sweet. Original back shell, and battery cover?
You can download an stl for the battery cover. I modified it to allow the backpack controller to attach to/detach from the main controller. The original is in a box somewhere safe and well.
You can download an stl for the battery cover.
The hackability and first-party endorsement thereof was another big underappreciated feature of the Steam Controller.
whole new buttons or just remap face button functions?
It’s an extra 12 button Bluetooth controller using an esp32 dev board. So your games need to allow you to use multiple controllers. You could also program it to send keyboard keys but I haven’t tried it.
That sounds super useful for simulator games.
I assume you’ve been mass reported in whatever game you made this for
I actually made it because I got banned because I couldn’t use my lights in euro truck simulator 2 multiplayer mod. I’m not sure I’d want to use it in any competitive games as it’d likely break off if I got mad.
wtf
If traffic rules were that strictly punished in real life there’d be like max 7 cars on road globally
I wish
Sounds like a good thing, honestly.
Real life: yes
Game: harsh
Like, they could have put him in the naughty corner or something. I don’t like the idea of banning as a game mechanic.
I think it was only like 24 hours. It’s all automated though. So you get a thirty second countdown mashing buttons to try and work out how to get your headlights on if you spawn at night.
No d-pad is an instant dealbreaker.
Edit: Y’know what I’ll properly expand on this. The Steam Controller failed because it tried to replace vital functionality people expect from a controller. The Steam Deck learned from this mistake and just supplemented that functionality.
TBH, the way I see it, the Steam Controller was designed for games I don’t want to play on controller, while being bad for games I do want to play on controller.
I agree that not including the D-Pad was a bad move, but if you play games that use the d-pad just for functions like map or switching of equipment, there was the option to use the trackpad like a weapon wheel where you could define i think 8 functions with OSD, and using one of the back buttons made that 16 functions you could define freely - you could replace the hotkeys of a game that used half the keyboard with this thing lol
Yea the only target audience for the Steam Controller seems to be people who want to play kbm games with a controller if they’re playing on a TV or something. But I reckon most PC gamers who get a controller use it to play on their usual PC setup for games that play better on a controller, they’ll just use kbm for their kbm games.
It walked so the Steam Deck could run.
That’s the key. If you’re wanting to play something like Street Fighter VI, the Steam controller probably won’t fly.
But because I wanted to play Dungeon Siege on my TV, it works far better than a traditional controller ever could.
For the Steam controller to work for you, you have to come in with the mentality of it replacing a keyboard-and-mouse.
That last paragraph is on point. That’s why I have two controllers at my desk, one regular and one Steam Controller! I love playing casual Civilization or XCOM on it and it’s surprisingly great with some FromSoftware games, especially Sekiro (for no reason in particular, it just felt good and the touchpad worked without any issues).
It didn’t fail because of a lack of a dpad but because of lack of two joysticks, but I’m glad the controller exists because I came to absolutely love the dual touchpads. And I wouldn’t trade the left touchpad a dpad, since I like using it for movement.
I wouldn’t trade the right touchpad for a joystick either, since I like using it to do quick 180s, quick swap between 5-10 inputs to bypass reloading in games like Doom Eternal by setting a dpad modeshift on a click, and touch activate gyro all on one touchpad.
Will probably be the last controller of its kind but I’m glad at least one did get made, since otherwise I’d still just be using a xbox or playstation controller like I did before getting Steam Controller.
Exactly, I’d rather lose a D-Pad than a joystick, and the Steam Controller lost both. That’s why my Steam Controller sits on my desk largely unused, while my PS4 controller gets all the love (I prefer XBox controllers, but PS4 has better Linux support).
I’d love to see the Steam Deck controller be made standalone, it’s super comfy and preserves both joysticks and the d-pad while having useful trackpads.
Sad thing is for me I don’t find the touchpads on the Deck useful, since unlike most users of the Deck I want to use them for movement and camera and quick input switching. And I haven’t found the Deck touchpads good for primary use in place of joysticks, so I end up ignoring the touchpads on the Deck for the joysticks despite using my Steam Controller for most games on the desktop.
I use them for point and click games and other games where a mouse is better.
I’m a controller player so it might be why I warmed up to it when it first came out, since I went from using Xbox controller on the PC to being blown away by touchpads moving as fast as a mouse without joystick speed limitation while being able to aim precisely with gyro without having to use aim assist.
So maybe an outlier as a PC gamer who preferred gamepads to mouse and keyboard, but wanted to find an improved method of using controller without reliance on aim assist.
I also prefer controllers (grew up playing Halo on controller), and gyro aim is sweet, but touchpads never felt good to me. I like physical buttons for d-pad style input (even a joystick is fine), and the right touchpad felt too much like a mouse to the point where I’d rather just use a mouse.
The Steam Deck strikes the right balance for me. The touchpads work when the mouse really is preferable, and they stay out of the way when I use the joysticks.
I like touchpads because I like being able to turn the camera as fast as I can swipe like a mouse while retaining X and Y axis control unlike stuff like the flick stick approach. And I like that I can also click up, down, left, right, center and also hold the left grip to set up chords for an additional 5 inputs for a total of 10 I can quickly change to without having to reach down to the facebuttons.
And that’s where the Deck fell short for me because I didn’t find it good for that type of functionality I want to use the trackpads for compared to users who primarily use the sticks.
since I like using it for movement.
At least the basic movement from that video could easily be done with a regular joystick, it’s just the developer chose to not implement it.
It could but I prefer it over joystick because large touchpad makes it so its easier to not accidentally activate sprint on the outer edge.
But, the biggest part is being able to use the touchpad clicks for added move sets like dash, slide, crouch. Which lot of people wouldn’t even enjoy doing with joystick click.
If the Steam Controller was designed the way lot of people wanted it than it wouldn’t have been a Steam Controller and just another Xbox or Playstation controller and added nothing new. Would have been more successful but in the end another generic twin joystick controller. So even if it didn’t succeed it brought new things to the table like touch activated gyro and touch pads that could be considered for other controllers in the future.
Honestly, IMO the lack of D-pad was less of an issue than the lack of a second analog stick. The lack of a second stick made the controller almost impossible to use in any game that was designed with 2 sticks in mind. For example Nier Automata 9S hacking minigame was a horrible experience with the Steam controller.
One tip that could make twin stick experience better on the touchpads is to bring down the range where the joystick does max output. That makes it much more responsive over default where twin joysticks do not need small granular movement. Ramblecan has video covering it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXC2f_dD0g0
Yeah, but counter point.
It’s got Steam branding.
Another win for the good guys.
Why are Valve the good guys?
Yeah, I consider them “better guys,” since they’re better than their competitors. I say this because:
- they firmly support Linux, which was my platform of choice before Steam came to it
- they have useful Greeks features like Steam input
- they have a good refund policy
Because the Cult of Gaben says so.
Because they’ve been good guys so far. They made PC gaming so much easier and have pushed linux into the mainstream.
Agreed on it being a bad replacement for controller games. I got one around the time one of the FROMSOFT games came out (I think it was Sekiro?) and I tried using for that and it was just not usable for something like that. I haven’t really tried it for anything else since then because I don’t really play games away from my PC, so I don’t have a need for a worse but acceptable way to play M+KB games.
agreed to all of the above. I also found the texture on the trackpads to be quite irritating after a while.
It has a D-pad, though…
Where?
I wish it had a d-pad rather than the left trackpad, but otherwise yeah
If only mine weren’t broken 🥲
I also want six face buttons for fighting games. Somebody, please release a controller like this already. I haven’t seen one since the Sega Saturn.
There’s a whole class of controllers, often called “fightsticks”, which have a full-size arcade-style joystick and a ton of buttons, to reproduce the feel of arcade fighting games.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fightsticks/
!fightsticks@lemmy.world (not very active)
Modern fighting games aren’t really designed for 6 buttons. I guess if you want to play SF6 with only face buttons that could be neat, but you’d still want to map parry and DI to shoulder buttons. The reality is that developers know that most pad players have 4 face + 4 shoulder buttons and most stick and leverless boxes have 8 buttons.
That said, 6 face button pads definitely exist. Most of the ones I’ve seen are from Hori, but there are quite a few brands that offer one.
Yeah, the left trackpad sucks. I think they could also fit another joystick if they made the right trackpad a little smaller.
I love the left trackpad. I love it for movement, since I like setting stuff like dash, crouch, slide to it on a click which doesn’t feel good doing the same with a joystick click. And I like setting a sprint activator on the very edge which is easier to avoid not accidentally triggering, because of the trackpad size.
I’m actually opposite where I wish the left joystick on the Steam Controller was a dpad.
I wanted to like it, I really did, but between the buttons being too small and clustered together and accidentally hitting the touch pads it just wasn’t the controller for me. Mostly played Rocket League when I got it and the number of times I’d shitflip or accidentally turn off ballcam was too high
between the buttons being too small and clustered together
For my configs I set up a dpad modeshift with an inverted outer ring on the right touchpad so that clicking up, down, left, right, center is different inputs. So I use that over using the facebuttons and gives me the added benefit of not losing camera or gyro control, since I use the touch activated gyro.
Comes in nice for swapping between weapons in Doom Eternal to bypass reloading without reliance on the weapon wheel, and other games like The Finals for gadget swapping without losing camera or movement control.
I love your passion for this controller. Awesome post.
