Steam Deck Support: Challenges, Progress, and Our Plans for Full Compatibility by Tech-5 Team

Over the past months, we have been actively working on bringing Corsairs Legacy to Steam Deck. While the current compatibility status is still marked as “Unsupported”, we want to share some insight into why supporting Steam Deck for a large open-world RPG is significantly more complex than simply enabling gamepad input.

Why Steam Deck Support Is Challenging for Open-World RPGs

Corsairs Legacy was originally designed as a PC-first open-world RPG with a strong emphasis on freedom, simulation systems, ship management, trading, exploration, boarding combat, world interaction, and complex UI systems.

Unlike many action-focused console titles, our game contains a large number of mechanics traditionally optimized for keyboard and mouse:

• advanced inventory management
• world map interaction
• economy and trading systems
• dialogue and menu navigation
• tactical ship controls
• contextual interactions
• multiple UI layers
• free camera systems
• hotkeys and quick-access actions

One of the biggest challenges is that modern RPGs with open-world systems often require far more inputs than a traditional gamepad comfortably provides. Steam Deck introduces additional flexibility through touchpads, radial menus, virtual cursors, and Steam Input layers, but integrating all of this in a seamless and intuitive way requires substantial engineering work.

Our goal is not just “basic controller support”. We want the experience to feel natural and fully integrated.

Feedback From Valve

Valve recently completed an internal Steam Deck compatibility review for Corsairs Legacy. While several categories already passed successfully - including launch stability, offline functionality, audio, menus, rendering, and general gameplay support - several important issues were identified.

Among the key areas highlighted by Valve:

• controller behavior conflicts between onboard and external controllers
• missing default mappings for certain UI interactions
• insufficient controller glyph handling
• low readability of some UI elements and tutorial prompts
• performance drops during sailing sequences
• incomplete default settings restoration behavior

Valve also specifically noted that our game already demonstrates substantial functionality on Steam Deck, but additional work is required before it can achieve a higher compatibility rating.

We appreciate the detailed feedback from Valve, as it gives us clear technical targets for the next stages of optimization.

What We Are Improving Right Now

We are currently working on several major improvements specifically targeting Steam Deck and controller usability:

Fully Unified Input Architecture

One of the largest internal changes involves rebuilding parts of our input architecture.

Our objective is to ensure that:

• Steam Deck controls work consistently
• external controllers behave correctly
• hot-plugging devices no longer creates conflicts
• controller glyphs dynamically update depending on active input device
• UI interaction becomes fully gamepad-accessible

This work also benefits all future controller support across the project.

In practice, we are designing the system so that any standard controller should work properly by default once Steam Deck compatibility reaches its target state.

UI and Readability Improvements

Steam Deck’s smaller screen size exposes many UI scaling issues that are less visible on desktop monitors.

We are already working on:

• larger scalable fonts
• improved contrast for tutorials and popups
• redesigned tutorial prompts
• better readability for settings and interaction windows
• improved controller-focused navigation

Performance Optimization

Another important area is sailing performance.

Open-world ocean rendering is one of the most technically demanding systems in Corsairs Legacy. Dynamic waves, world streaming, AI ships, vegetation visibility, weather systems, and simulation layers create substantial GPU and CPU load on handheld hardware.

We are currently optimizing:

• ocean rendering costs
• LOD transitions
• vegetation rendering
• streaming behavior
• CPU-heavy world simulation systems
• graphics presets specifically tailored for Steam Deck

Our immediate goal is achieving a stable and comfortable handheld experience while preserving the visual identity of the game.

Long-Term Goal

Our goal is to move Corsairs Legacy from “Unsupported” toward full Steam Deck compatibility and eventually achieve the best possible experience on handheld devices.

We do not want to rush a superficial implementation just to change the store badge. Instead, we are focusing on building a robust long-term controller and handheld architecture that will benefit the entire project ecosystem going forward.

Steam Deck support is not a simple checkbox for a game of this scale - especially for an open-world RPG originally built around deep PC interactions - but we are steadily moving forward.

We sincerely appreciate the patience, feedback, and support from the community while we continue improving the experience.

09.07.2025, Tech-5 Team