If you’ve played some recent games on theSteam Deck, especially right when they release, you may be surprised how many of them perform poorly. But the truth is, you need to choose your battles.
There are tons of really high-quality, big-budget titles that run incredibly well on the hardware, but you’ll usually be targeting thePS4andXbox Oneera for them instead of going for games that individually model every pore.
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Games like Shadows of Doubt and No Man’s Sky show just how much you can do with the sandbox format.
I find that choosing games from this era tends to make for the best Steam Deck experiences, as you get allthe best parts of modern gamingwithout the performance hit and without any janky setup procedure.
These games are incredible experiences that hold up just as well as any recent release, even looking damn close to them, but run with excellent quality, consistent framerate, and won’t decimate your battery on the Deck.
10Portal 2
Holding It Together
I think it stands as an incredible testament to Valve’s ingenuity that a game from 2011 managed to make it on this list, butPortal 2looks incredible to this day and feels like it was made for the Steam Deck.
It still looks impressive, and the realism mixed with a bunch of science fiction concepts makes it look incredible. I was amazed looking at it as a kid, and now, 14 years later, I’m still amazed by it.
The game runs perfectly on Deck, which I suppose is to be expected from the company that made the game. It’s a smooth 60fps the entire time, and it still runs perfectly if you throw it onto a higher-resolution display.
Portal 2 is one of my favorite games ever, and easily one of thegreatest puzzle games of all time. Replaying it on my Steam Deck with gyro aim brought back every bit of whimsy it had me feel in the first place.
9Slime Rancher 2
Slippery Situation
Slime Rancher 2
While I really enjoy both Slime Rancher games,Slime Rancher 2is easily one of the most beautiful indie games I’ve ever seen, and the fact it runs like a dream on the Steam Deck is a nice bonus.
You can pump out a pretty consistent 60fps on medium, or around 30 on high settings, and either way, given it’s a chilled-out game where you can usually take your time, framerate doesn’t matter too much.
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I’ve had all my slime cages filled up with a bunch of rowdy little beasts, and the game kept chugging along just fine. Considering the Switch version of Slime Rancher sucks, this is most likely your best option.
It’s the perfect game to have portably too, with the ability togo on a massive expeditionfor a bit of new slime food, or you could just stay home, harvest plorts, and make far more money than you need.
Cartoonishly Good
As the only game on this list that isn’t a full 3D title, instead taking place in an overhead, isometric view,Hadesneeds to look really damn good to take a spot on this list, and it absolutely blows past all expectations.
The visual style is absolutely stunning, looking incredibly vibrant, every environment is superbly detailed, and it all runs perfectly at the highest settings, never dropping a single frame in my experience.
The game feels smooth as butter, and the Steam Deck controls feel great with it too, letting you choose between controller or mouse aiming with the trackpad, and the convenience of easily remappable back buttons.
This is just about the most ideal game to play on Deck, and while it’s not going to absolutely blow you away with extreme graphical fidelity, the stylistic choices and clean visuals on display more than make up for it.
7Persona 5 Royal
RPG Perfection
Persona 5 Royal
Honestly, I could’ve put any recent ATLUS game here, especiallyMetaphor: RefantazioorPersona 3 Reload, but I thinkPersona 5 Royalstill strikes the best balance of beautiful visuals and incredible performance.
If you remember Persona 5 Royal performing badly on high settings at launch, whatever issue causing this has pretty much disappeared. You can now comfortably run the game at high settings and a consistent framerate.
That said, I don’t even notice a difference between the graphical options, since the incredible stylistic choices cover up the lack of particle effects and whatnot, and honestly, I prefer this game at 30 FPS regardless.
You can absolutely have the game at a locked 60 on Medium settings, but the stylish anime aesthetic looks better at a lower framerate, especially during battles and in-engine cutscenes, as they match with the animated bits.
6No Man’s Sky
Moving Space
No Man’s Sky
After a really rough launch, everything aboutNo Man’s Skygot betterevery year it was being worked on. Nowadays, it’s a banger game that is also pretty well optimized, making it run pretty well on Steam Deck.
It’s going to have some framerate variations here and there, especially while generating new terrain, but you may absolutely get it to run at 60 for the most part while still looking as gorgeous as it can.
Traveling among the stars and discovering planets that are a far cry from the samey looking flat plains they were on launch is truly a treat, and it feels incredible to explore a massive universe in the palm of your hands.
Admittedly, if you have a massive set of bases with a ton of stuff going on, the Deck can tend to struggle to process it all, but that isn’t the majority of people, so you can expect a pretty smooth experience overall.
5Subnautica
Deeper in The Depths
Subnautica
If you were ever on the internet throughout the 2010’s, you’ve heard ofSubnautica. It’s one of those smaller titles that took the world by storm, and for good reason, pulling off one of the most terrifying sandbox experiences ever.
It also happens to look pretty great, while running really well. In my experience playing it on Deck, I haven’t experienced so much as a slight frame dip outside of loading, and that’s incredibly impressive.
Almost every sandbox game I’ve played on any device will tend to struggle due to the massive amount ofinteractions and user-created structureseating up RAM and CPU usage, but not this one.
Subnautica is really well optimized, and that deserves some massive respect. On top of running well, any first-person game is going to benefit from the trackpads, which makes this the ideal on-the-go experience.
4Sonic X Shadow Generations
Double The Detail
Sonic X Shadow Generations
I’ve always had major respect for the waySonic Generationshas held up over the years. In a similar way to Portal 2, the game has been so incredibly optimized while maintaining a great visual style, it hasn’t aged for 14 years.
That said, Shadow Generations being included in the package shows the biggest progression in artistic merit the Sonic series has ever seen, looking incredibly good and havingconsistently fun levels to boot.
Both of these games run at a locked 60 at Medium settings, and I can’t tell the difference between that and High settings, so graphical fidelity is at an all-time high while maintaining incredible performance.
You might find the occasional blurry texture in Sonic Generations, but the game still looks great overall, and the fact you can run at Mach 10 through a massive level without dropping a frame is a feat to behold.
3Forza Horizon 4
Great If You’ve Got It
Forza Horizon 4
You might be wondering why I’m recommending the Forza game that can only be acquired through unscrupulous means, rather than the newer game. That’s becauseForza Horizon 4runs perfectly on Deck, and 5 struggles to hit 50 FPS.
I have no clue why this is the case. These two games look nearly identical in my eyes, but Forza Horizon 4 comes in at 80 GB less space. Though, fair warning, you will be tanking a whole 94 GB overall, which is still a big hit.
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I don’t care how bad Terraria looks, I have a thousand hours, I can’t go back now.
It can run at a mostly solid 60 on Medium, and you can push it all the way to Ultra without it dropping below 30, as long as you’re willing to sacrifice the weirdly taxing anti-aliasing that will tank the framerate.
Forza games tend to look like car ads before they got taken over by terrible AI slop, meaning they’re enhanced, idealized realistic aesthetic holds up incredibly well, even if Horizon 4 is 7 years old and you can’t buy it.
2Devil May Cry 5
Smokin' Sexy Style
Devil May Cry 5
I thinkDevil May Cry 5is one of the most impressively optimized games ever. It looks incredible, once again going for stylized realism that tows the fine line between gross and impressive, without a single stutter.
Usually with Steam Deck games, you kinda need to ignore the first hour or so, as shaders will be caching and causing stutters that impact performance a bit, but they go away after a while.
Not with DMC5, though. The game runs perfectly on high settings out of the box. I genuinely could not believe how smooth it felt with zero extra steps and zero setup to make it more optimized.
Since it’s a character action game, you need that superbly smooth framerateto get all your combos outwithout frustrating dropped inputs, and I’m happy to say Devil May Cry 5 is likely the best experience you’ll have with that.
1DOOM (2016)
Still Slays
Keeping in line with its predecessor,DOOM (2016)stands as one of the most optimized games ever, being able to run on just about anything. That said, you can bet your ass it runs perfectly on the Steam Deck at low settings, and works up to high.
This game’s style is really impressive, realistic, and gritty, but not afraid to use vibrant colors to represent the hellfire surrounding you. It being a First-Person Shooter makes the Steam Deck ideal for playing it.
Gyro controls and the trackpad improve aiming tenfold, making for a perfect pairing. It’s going to feel incredible, look completely uncompromised, and run like a dream, as if black magic was used in its creation.
I feel like the only thing making this game a bit of a tough sell is the 70 GB game, which is less than Forza, but still almost a fourth of the 256 GB of storage the deck ships with. If you have storage to burn, this is definitely a great way to do it.
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