A gaming phone controller accessory that connects physically to phone (With same layout and functionality like the Steam Controller, Steam Deck, and Steam Frame Controllers) Would be cheaper than regular Steam Controller
With FEX making x86 Steam games capable of working on ARM devices it will be cool to game on mobile with mobile controller that has the dual touch control pad things the hardware above has to go with the phone and what better way than another option aside from the actual controller. Plus it gives phone more of a Gameboy Advance type of feel to play like that
Maybe to incentivize more people to have that you can use gaming phone accessory wirelessly or wired connected to any Steam hardware for using your phone with the gaming phone controller accessory as controllers too
Like the idea? Not like the idea? Anyone wanna suggest changes/additions/etc to the idea to be better be my guest.
Also if anyone wants to suggest other stuff Valve can do then please do!! All of us together can ask for the ecosystem to grow in ways that are good and fun for us all!!
Trying to help make gaming better for us all!
Edit: Looking at comments the post does sound like a eh idea but it is salvageable initiative. This post was mainly meant to be focused on extending that dual trackpad for mouse/etc functionality with another addition to the family for mobile to give mobile users ability to have those trackpads at lower price point.
But what would be cooler to see is more companies make their own versions of optional variant controllers with dual trackpads into their own controllers and mobile controllers cases to have more ability to use it as mouse/etc in-game/in other software/operating system as we do in Steam Deck already but having that functionality on phones/other non-mobile hardware across a larger breadth of controllers and devices
Controllers that hold your phone already exist.
So do normal controllers. So did gaming handhelds. So do PCs. So do VR headsets. I’m not sure what your point is.
The difference is each of those options from Valve offer things that traditional options do not. HDMI-CEC, trackpads, SteamOS, foveated streaming, etc.
Why could a phone controller not have innovations such as those? You mentioned track pads yourself.
Because phones already have touchpads on the screen. And games you would play on a phone would be optimized accordingly.
I suppose it’s not impossible, I’m just not sure there is any useful innovation to be had in that area.
Not personally interested because gaming on a phone feels like watching a film or a YT video on a phone to me, some sort of transgression, a line that isn’t meant to be crossed, science gone too far etc. but I do understand that many people do it, so maybe it’s not a bad idea, just not for me.
I think I’d prefer it if they took out the arm on-computer stuff out of the steam frame and just made a good PCVR headset with both streaming compressed jpeg slop wirelessly and decoding on headset and an option for proper lossless HDMI streaming + inside-out tracking over USB-C (one cable, two connectors on the PC end for convenience), costing about $500 bux and aimed at PCVR users with decent-ish hardware like 3090s etc.
Mobile gaming indeed feels like taking a go-kart on the interstate, except the go-karts steering wheel is replaced with playdough.
All I want from Value is for them to continue to destroy everything that greedy game CEOs want to shove down gamers throats to pump their stock prices.
