You can use a lot of external controllers with the Steam Deck but the current system to interact with them isn't great. The Controller Tools plugin could solve some issues.
This is awesome and something more developers should do with games they shut down. Counterplay Games have made their mix of a collectable card game and a turn-based strategy Duelyst fully open source.
Game store Fanatical have put up another Steam Deck Verified game bundle and there's some great looking gems inside.
It seems people haven't learned from the debacle with the dbrand Project Killswitch case using magnets, that causes problems with certain Steam Deck fan speeds.
DOSBox Staging is a favourite of mine to follow that expands on the original DOSBox but with a focus on implementing new features and fixes. A new major update went out in December 2022 with some big additions.
Took a while huh? It's not quite as well-known or as loved as some other free and open source games, but worth pointing out: FreeCol 1.0 is out now. 20 years in the making for this Sid Meier's Colonization remake!
GameCube and the Wii emulator Dolphin had a progress report posted up in late December, and it's looking really good, especially so with their performance optimization work.
Decky Loader is a project I've covered before multiple times now because it can add a lot to the Steam Deck with plugins, and now it's even easier to use.
Something it seems Valve has been working on for a while now, is an easy way to transfer game installs between PCs and Steam Deck.
Sold as interactive storybooks, these took the form of narrated picture books which went over the story from the film while allowing for a certain degree of user agency, typically by allowing a selection of quirky animations to play by clicking around with the mouse. UAV must have wanted in on this craze as well, and so Atlantis: The Underwater City - Interactive Storybook was born.
Version 0.14 of the Multiplayer voxel RPG Veloren is out now, adding in some fun sounding additions while they work towards giving you more to do.
What might seem like a pixel-art Age of Empires on the surface, the RTS game TFC: The Fertile Crescent is much more than that and they recently released a major update for the game.
Coldwild Games developers on Luna's Fishing Garden, Merchant of the Skies, Lazy Galaxy 2 and more have announced another peaceful game with Druidwalker.
OBS Studio, the very useful and popular recording and livestream software has a new release available with version 29.0 out now.
Joe Danger was the first commercial game release from No Man's Sky developer Hello Games, and as part of keeping it alive they've put it up online free to play in your browser.
Tis the season of leakage apparently. Seems a prototype of Left 4 Dead 2 has made its way online and you can even try it.
Valve started the year off rather nicely by breaking two of their own records recently with users online and users actually gaming.
The first Proton Experimental update of 2023 from Valve has landed for Linux desktop and Steam Deck, plus Proton Next is live again with the upcoming release of Proton 7.0-6.
A new real controller from ASUS is on the way with the ROG Raikiri Pro that features an OLED display, plus Dell get weird with the Concept Nyx from CES 2023.
As Google hover over the nuke from orbit button on Stadia, they're at least releasing some of it as open source like CDC File Transfer.