Here's the most played Steam Deck games for November 2023

What have you been playing recently?

Just finished GTA Batman and now I'm playing Crowns And Pawns.

Horizon chase turbo

!Super Bomberman R 2
More of Super Bomberman R 2 (Proton), so no change there, but here's Bomberman in a nice festive outfit for the season.

!Chop Goblins
Also, I finished the delightfully-silly Chop Goblins (Proton) during the week...

!Battle City
... And I just got started on Battle City (NES), via RetroDECK.

!Super Bomberman R 2
More of Super Bomberman R 2 (Proton), so no change there, but here's Bomberman in a nice festive outfit for the season.

!Chop Goblins
Also, I finished the delightfully-silly Chop Goblins (Proton) during the week...

!Battle City
... And I just got started on Battle City (NES), via RetroDECK.

Woah...... Settle down there Pengling....... You cant show that much colour in games today....... It needs to be grey-brown with loads of bloom.......

Crowns And Pawns

I'll have to play it, everything about it tickles my fancy.

Wow i never knew it was called Battle City. Will have to search for it, i really enjoyed playing it and making custom maps for it as a kid.

As for the list, people still play Skyrim and Fallout 4?

On the deck, I've been playing some Chained Echoes. I feel like the some is a bit of a problem, I'm not that far in and I'm not catching the story well enough. The vibrant environment and the JRPG nostalgia make up for it though!

RoRR is occupying alot of my Deck time right now.

Just finished GTA Batman and now I'm playing Crowns And Pawns.

I loved the earlier Arkham games, but I could never get into games with a lot of driving (like GTA), so haven't delved into Arkham Knight much. Is driving the Batmobile required for a lot of the game?

Also curious about Crowns and Pawns; at one point the reviews seemed a bit mixed, although they look fairly solid now. How does it compare to something like the Broken Sword series?

But to answer the question at hand: I've been playing Disco Elysium. The art style put me off a little at first, and it's quite text-heavy at times, but the story and writing have definitely kept it interesting.


Last edited by Phlebiac on 2 December 2023 at 8:09 am UTC

I loved the earlier Arkham games, but I could never get into games with a lot of driving (like GTA), so haven't delved into Arkham Knight much. Is driving the Batmobile required for a lot of the game?

The story mode has you up against tanks (lots of tanks) so it's not optional. And as well as Riddler trophies and puzzles there are riddler races. There's a lot of car-required content, but there's a lot of content overall. I think my playthrough was around 70/30 in favour of not being in the car.

Also curious about Crowns and Pawns; at one point the reviews seemed a bit mixed, although they look fairly solid now. How does it compare to something like the Broken Sword series?

It's definitely on the Broken Sword trajectory, but less dark in story I would say. "Grandfather died and left you his house" is also the start of Stardew Valley, after all. It has tank controls like OG Grim Fandango which takes a bit of getting used to, but the controller layout is pretty good.

Wow i never knew it was called Battle City. Will have to search for it, i really enjoyed playing it and making custom maps for it as a kid.

Glad to have highlighted it! It has a massive ROM-hacking scene to this day, as well, so you should find a lot out there.

Neverwinter Nights 2, downloaded from GOG, installed using Q4Wine. Works very well on the deck. Only needed to install protontricks to install d3dx9.

reading into the list it really hits home just how much Proton was *necessary* for Linux gaming to be seen as a viable alternative for windiws gamers wanting to move into linux or out of windows

it also hits home how much the indie scene is friendlier towards linux than AAA titles from bigger studios despite having less resources to keep a native linux version

and just what a colossus Stardew Valley became, still being a top list game for so much time


Last edited by Marlock on 3 December 2023 at 11:23 pm UTC

reading into the list it really hits home just how much Proton was *necessary* for Linux gaming to be seen as a viable alternative for windiws gamers wanting to move into linux or out of windows

It's also handy for odd edge-cases like mine, where I was already a Linux user for a long time, but had gamed on consoles until too many disappointments racked up. Given my gaming-tastes, I simply couldn't have moved all of my gaming over to Linux without Proton being there!

And when I think about that, it hits me just how many options we really have - native, source-ports, emulation, and Proton all open up a hell of a lot.

it also hits home how much the indie scene is friendlier towards linux than AAA titles from bigger studios despite having less resources to keep a native linux version

It makes sense - they've got the creativity and imagination to see where their market is and how it will grow, whereas the big outfits just want to eke all they can out of the status-quo.

and just what a colossus Stardew Valley became, still being a top list game for so much time

I just got into it recently (something I don't think I would have done without the Steam Deck making it so easy and affordable to step out of my gaming comfort-zone - console-gaming's costly risk of trying new things just melted away after I got a Steam account), and it's easy to see how well-deserved all of its success is.

Also curious about Crowns and Pawns; at one point the reviews seemed a bit mixed, although they look fairly solid now. How does it compare to something like the Broken Sword series?

It's definitely on the Broken Sword trajectory, but less dark in story I would say. "Grandfather died and left you his house" is also the start of Stardew Valley, after all. It has tank controls like OG Grim Fandango which takes a bit of getting used to, but the controller layout is pretty good.

I wasn't even aware of the tank controls as the traditional mouse controls work just fine. On regular adventure game scale it's somewhat below the classics. Some puzzles are bit tedious, but still in overall enjoyable game.

Should play the Broken Sword games at some point, but there's always something else to play first.

I wasn't even aware of the tank controls as the traditional mouse controls work just fine.

No mouse in the default Deck setup.

On regular adventure game scale it's somewhat below the classics. Some puzzles are bit tedious, but still in overall enjoyable game.

Some puzzles are lifted wholesale from the classics; which I believe is from affection. The timing-critical puzzles in Italy were a bit annoying on the controller.

Should play the Broken Sword games at some point, but there's always something else to play first.

I played 1, 2 & 5 relatively recently on the Deck and had a great time. The 3D ones didn't appeal. I can also recommend the Darkside Detective games on the Deck.

I wasn't even aware of the tank controls as the traditional mouse controls work just fine.

No mouse in the default Deck setup.

Hey, one of the developers here. Yeah, default Deck setup does not use mouse, but there is alternative official setup that uses right trackpad for mouse input :) Feel free to switch to that.

P. S. Connecting an external mouse also works. We made it extremely easy to switch between input schemes.

Hey, one of the developers here. Yeah, default Deck setup does not use mouse, but there is alternative official setup that uses right trackpad for mouse input :) Feel free to switch to that.

P. S. Connecting an external mouse also works. We made it extremely easy to switch between input schemes.

I've completed the game and moved on to something else now, but thanks.

One thing that would help with the default controls would be to have the inventory switch buttons step through rather than scroll super fast. It would have made one of the timing puzzles much less obnoxious, and would make the feature useful for the rest of the game - scrolling to some random inventory item that's essentially impossible to identify with the scale of the Deck's display isn't super helpful.

<...> to have the inventory switch buttons step through rather than scroll super fast.

Hey, thanks for the answer, I appreciate you taking time to give feedback! But maybe you could elaborate, how do you get that "scroll super fast" behaviour? I just tested on my Deck and d-pad left/right (and alternatives L2/R2) seem to step through, not scroll super fast. I would be very interested to know, because this might be some unexpected behaviour. If you could send a video, it might help as well. Also, if it would be more convenient you can write me to info at tagofjoy dot LT – I'm reading that email, so it definitely won't be lost :) Thank you in advance!