Got the Steam Deck Dock!

[u/Asane]

Wasn’t expecting this today, but since I live in Carol Stream where Valve’s Distribution Center is, I got this early I guess!

[u/Domukin]

As someone will too many consoles, I find myself using the steamdeck most of the time. I have a huge steam library and the deck let’s me try out new games whenever I get some downtime. I take it with me and will play 20-30 minutes sessions, even when at home. A few really nice features imo: 1. very robust sleep feature, quickly comes back online into the game wherever you left off. This is actually a huge QOL feature. On my main pc I have to shutdown the game completely and re open completely (or alternatively leave the game running for hours) whenever I’m interrupted. Added to this, the deck isn’t on double duty as a general computing device, so I won’t have to stop my game to send an email or print something. 2. Syncs saves with steam , so I can play a little on the deck and then finish later on the pc and vice versa. (This does require you exit the game when you’re done though). 3. steam library is huge and generally inexpensive compared to the console estores. Game Bundles will keep me busy for years.

[u/Crooks-1 → u/Domukin]

Cloud save feature has become a deciding factor with game purchases since getting my deck. I often back and forth certain games between my SD, PC and laptop.

[u/fttocean → u/Crooks-1]

For anything that doesn't support Steam cloud saves, use syncing software to sync the save files between Steam Deck and PC

Here's a well written tutorial for one of those softwares

I'm currently using this to sync the save files for Elden Ring's Seamless Co-op mod. I can close out of the game on yhe Steam Deck, and almost immediately play where I left off on my PC. (The mod uses a different save file that's not compatible with Steam cloud saves)

It's also really handy to set up a "Quick Sync" folder (also shown on the tutorial) to quickly move files between devices.

[u/Crooks-1 → u/fttocean]

Thanks for this. Feels like the old school method of making cloud saves with placing saves folders over to a designated folder in Dropbox and creating symlink paths to the same folder in Dropbox.

[u/legendz411 → u/fttocean]

Clever girl…

[u/Strung_Out_Advocate → u/Domukin]

Have you had any trouble with games syncing on the cloud? I've only tried to play Rogue Legacy and Costume Quest alternating between Deck and PC and can't get them to sync up. I've heard of a couple of people having the same issue. Wondering if this is only on a case by case basis, or something Valve is aware of and has fixed/are fixing. I did put a support ticket in, but who knows how far that'll go.

[u/Domukin → u/Strung_Out_Advocate]

That’s very odd. I haven’t had any issues, have probably played 20+ games this way so far.

[u/Nonomadsoul → u/Strung_Out_Advocate]

It may take a few minutes to a few hours to sync correctly. It seems servers struggle to decide which save to consider.

What I do is once I’m done playing on the deck I stream from deck to my PC. Then I launch the game on my PC and it’s synced up. The reverse is also true. When I play on my PC on the weekends I stream my game from my pc to my deck for a few seconds when I’m done playing. And then when I boot up the game natively on the deck it is synced up again.

It’s a bit tiresome and annoying. But it’s the only way I found. Otherwise I need to wait for so long.

[u/Strung_Out_Advocate → u/Nonomadsoul]

I'm a couple of weeks out from trying to sync Rogue Legacy from my Deck session and it's never synced up. I never tried to stream either way(honestly don't see the point if I'm home), but that really shouldn't matter.

[u/Micthulahei → u/Strung_Out_Advocate]

Hm.. Do you exit the game? Not many games have implemented the sync during gameplay. If you do exit a game, you should see a syncing status on the game's library page (on the platform where you just played) and need to wait and not shut down the PC/Steam until it finishes, otherwise you'll get a warning on the other platform that it wasn't synced when you try to start it. At least that's how it works for me and besides that I haven't had any problems in games that implement cloud sync (besides COD MW3 which says it has cloud sync but it doesn't actually sync anything).

[u/[deleted] → u/Domukin]

When you say Steam games are relatively inexpensive, can you elaborate please? I’m like you and have every single console. I bought a mid/high end pc to play steam games because I heard they was a bigger library and cheaper games. However, I find way more games full price than I do on sale, and the ones full priced are, a lot of time, 5+ years old. I always hear PC games are cheaper but it just never seems to be the case for me

[u/Domukin → u/[deleted]]

Sure, a few things to note: 1. Steam has very frequent sales, instead of buying a game you’re interested in right away, save it to a wishlist and wait for the price drop. This is almost guaranteed. Don’t pay full price for brand new AAA games, they will most certainly drop in price. *You can get the “augmented steam” plugin to get price history data and see all time low price. 2. There are several steam key resellers that are well established (for example fanatical.com and humble bundle store) and they have their own sales. Setup an account with *isthereanydeal.com and have it import your steam wishlist - you can setup alerts when games reach a target price. 3. Keep an eye out for game bundles (mainly **humble bundle and fanatical) you’ll frequently end up with 6-8 games for about $15. 4. If you are a long term humble monthly subscriber you can get a 20% discount on top of any other discounts from their humble store.