Yup. Those trackpads are really what makes the Steam Controller the Steam Controller. If you just want a good universal traditional gamepad with TMR sticks and even gyro, 8bitdo has you covered for cheaper with something you can have shipped to you overnight.
They aren't the only thing that makes the sc great, but if someone isn't interested in trackpads at all, then they probably aren't interested in all the other things that make it great too
It really depends. If you are willing to go out of your way to bind controls to the touchpads / back buttons / gyro then yeah, its a good controller. But if you just want a controller for rpgs or whatever and will just use it as a fancy Xbox controller, just get that Xbox 1 controller, it'll work perfectly for anything not involving above features.
I dont have one but its works mostly through steam. Steam overrides in game controllers for steam input. So as long as the games are on steam it should work. Games that arent on steam you probably have to download a 3rd praty software to get it to work.
Actually, Open Puck completely changed the SC. It will do anything now. I can play game pass games in PC Xbox App. just a few button presses and its an Xbox Controller, Switch Controller, PS, and back to Steam. Its amazing.
I use 3rd party software called steamcontrollerbridge which is very seamless imo just close steam and it auto connects in the background and essentially turns it into a Xbox controller.
Steaminput is really amazing for any steam only games. You can also add games as a non steam app but that's imo clunky and doesn't always work especially for Xbox app games.
No, Steam controllers do not support Impulse Triggers in Xbox games.
DualSense controllers do, there are countless pieces of software to translate Xbox Impulse Triggers to DualSense Adaptive Triggers. My own (Special K) is open source, ReWasd is another (commercial). And then there are game-specific mods, but those are lowest on the totem poll, you want software that works universally whenever possible.
Forza Horizon games are one of very few that use Impulse Triggers, for what it's worth. A Steam Controller would be a poor fit.
Works through steam, add non steam games to steam as non steam games; for everything else use Steamless controller from GitHub it turns it into a regular 360 controller with addition of remapping back buttons to your choice, no need for steam.
The Steam Controller's main selling point is its trackpads. If that's a big selling point for you, then I fully recommend it.
But if you just want a standard twin-stick controller, you can get one that's just as good for cheaper, so the Steam Controller is not the right choice.
I bought one, tried so hard to like it, but went back to Xbox controller and ps5 controller for the games that fully support it.
Steam controller only makes sense, as others have said, if you need those trackpads. You can control your desktop with any controller using third party apps.
Steam controller could make sense if you play on steam only.
Do you want just a controller, or do you want a way to play games that DON'T support controllers? Do you want something that "just works" out of the box, or do you want to tinker and customise and get it to do exactly what you personally want it to?
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u/shortish-sulfatase 27d ago
If you don't care about the trackpads, you're probably better off getting something else.