Threads
- Emulation on the Steam Deck is excellent, especially for the retro games, where you get a taller screen size and no pixel distortion.
- You also get 10-12 hours of battery life with the retro games, and they look extremely crisp with the OLED panel.
- You can even run PS2, PS3, and Xbox 360 games, but the 3D games aren’t the smoothest, so you should stick to the less demanding titles.
The Steam Deck is one of the most popular handheld devices to date, having sold nearly 4 million units. While its standard game usage primarily consists of games from the Steam library, one aspect of it is often overlooked: its exceptional emulation capabilities.
Emulation Is The Way To Go
You might wonder why someone would buy a Steam Deck solely to use it as an emulator for older games. While your concern is valid, the issue is that the Steam Deck is no longer capable of running modern AAA titles.
This would be unfortunate news for you because it used to run games pretty smoothly, but as the games advanced in technology, this poor device lost its ability to keep up with the high demand of the games.
Most people clung to remote play on the Steam Deck, which is phenomenal. However, emulation is something that many people still miss out on. To run the emulator, the best approach is to use Emudeck.
Best For Retro Games
Then, you can use a different tool, such as the Emulation Station, to access all the various emulator games in an organized and aesthetic way. This allows you to have Xbox, Xbox 360, PS2, Wii, PSP, SEGA, and all the different platforms you have stored as a library.
Classic Games
Now you must be wondering if you’re going to play the older games, which tend to have lower graphics and some even have visible pixels, wouldn’t there be pixel distortion? Well, it can be countered easily through a settings tweak.
Best Settings For These Games
EmuDeck has its own settings where you can set the video filter as ‘Normal 4x’ after enabling ‘Bilinear Filtering’. What it does is blow out the screen to four times its normal size and then shrink the screen back down while applying bilinear filtering.
This way, it rebalances the pixels, allowing for a clear and crisp picture in retro games and other games as well. While you can use shaders and filters to counter that as well, this also does the job pretty well. You can later change the filter speed from 4x to any value depending on which emulation platform you’re using.
Taller Screen Size Than Retro Systems
Another great benefit of emulation on a Steam Deck is that it provides more screen space for retro games. Typically, the retro game systems play at a 4:3 aspect ratio, but on the Steam Deck, you get a 16:10 aspect ratio, which is a lot taller without the screen being stretched.
Yes, you do get the black bars on each side of the screen, but it is forgivable because the newer Steam Deck has thinner bezels compared to the older one. Moreover, because the panel is OLED, the blacks are deep and the colors are vivid, so you automatically focus on the area where the game is being played.
Other Games (PSP, PS2, PS3, etc)
For PSP, every game is going to play at full speed at 3x resolution. I’m referring to a smooth 60 FPS experience throughout the entire game. The black bars are thinner on the PSP as the game covers the screen for the most part.
PSP = No Problem
Now, these games won’t be quite as sharp as in ROG Ally, which has a 1080p display panel and can play at 4x, but they’ll still look great on the Steam Deck due to the OLED panel.
Best For 3DS
For 3DS games, you also get the Emulation On A Steam Deck Is Better Than You’d Expect, which lets you navigate through the menu with your thumb. Not only that, but you can also interact with the screen on these games, as the 3DS was also touchscreen and had features that required touch inputs at times.
PS2 And Onwards Have Some Limitations
These were the older games, but you can also emulate the PS2 on the Steam Deck, providing a smooth overall experience. You can run it at a 2.5x upscale over 800p, so it is gonna fill out the screen as well.
Even in the heavy-duty games like the God of War 2, there are a few frame drops, but you can drop the resolution a bit to get great FPS. Not only that, but Xbox 360 and PS3 are also playable if the game isn’t as demanding. For 3D games like Infamous, you won’t get over 20 FPS consistently.
Battery Life
You’ll get around 10-12 hours of battery life with the retro games (NES, SNES, Sega Genesis, Game Boy Advance). For the GameCube, you can play for up to 6 to 8 hours, and the same applies to the Wii, although it draws less power.
The original Xbox and Wii U are expected to provide 3 to 4 hours of battery life, but playing a demanding game like The Legend of Zelda may reduce this to 2.5 to 3 hours.
Is Emulation For You On The Steam Deck?
If you tend to be on the lighter side of games, where the games don’t consume a lot of power, emulation would be great for you. But if you prefer to play open-world games, like on the PS2, PS3, and Xbox 360, this might not be for you, since that is the limit of the Steam Deck.
Thank you! Please share your positive feedback. 🔋
How could we improve this post? Please Help us. 😔
[Comparisons Expert]
Shehryar Khan, a seasoned PC hardware expert, brings over three years of extensive experience and a deep passion for the world of technology. With a love for building PCs and a genuine enthusiasm for exploring the latest advancements in components, his expertise shines through his work and dedication towards this field. Currently, Shehryar is rocking a custom loop setup for his built.
Get In Touch: shehryar@tech4gamers.com
Join Our Community
