#Portal bundle no steam portable
#Portal bundle no steam series

You can aim your portals a little more precisely with the trackpads, you can hold the device more comfortably thanks to the ergonomics, and you’ve got more actions at your quick disposal with the back buttons. You would likely conclude that the Steam Deck version plays better, since the Steam Deck has the features mentioned above, while the Switch doesn’t. You’re comparing which version is better. So let’s say your playing Portal on both your Switch and the Steam Deck.

decent ergonomics (unless you’re using third-party joycons that have them)įollow us on Twitter or Mastodon to stay up to date with our content as well as the numerous additional info we share every week with our followers!.

While the Switch may have a built-in gyroscope, haptic feedback, and a handheld mode, notice what the Switch doesn’t have:

To be sure, the Switch does not boast as many features as the Steam Deck does. I have even conspired that it was a clever marketing attempt to make people buy the Steam Deck because the Switch version may have a throttled resolution/framerate, or because of a lack of features that make it a barebones experience. Portal 3 could be in the works and will be first on the Deck, giving a point for Switch users to transition to the Deck at some point.Just a way to tide gamers over while they wait patiently for the Deck to get into their hands.

#Portal bundle no steam portable

It might have been a way for Valve to “shake hands” with Nintendo - because after all, the Steam Deck has frequently been compared to the Switch for its portable form factor, and Valve was kind of saying, “Sorry we took quite a few notes from you guys”.

Switch gamers may have been asking for it for a while and Valve just decided to act on it - it may have been in the works way before the Steam Deck was announced.

They put it on the Switch for the Nintendo fanboys who refuse to pick up the Deck so that they can play it.

Why would Valve do this? If Portal 2 is Steam Deck Verified, why bother putting that and the original Portal to another handheld? So here were some of my (and my fellow editor’s) hypotheses: It’s interesting enough that they’re putting a game onto a platform they have never reached out to before, but the fact that the Steam Deck will be out in a couple of weeks/months made my head scratch. With Valve being the incredibly interesting corporation that it is, I had been brewing different theories as to why Valve was doing this. Now it was a matter of bring its sequel to this chipset and making the necessary adjustments so that it could work on the Switch. Sure, NVIDIA Lightspeed Studios may have had to adjust the framerate, resolution, and graphics quality a bit, but they already had 50% of the work done with the original Portal being available on Tegra X1+.

#Portal bundle no steam series

While I’m no developer, I would imagine that it took very little effort to bring the Portal series to the Switch, since both platforms are basically using the same architecture. The 2019 model of the Nintendo Switch, as well as the Switch Lite and the OLED Switch, are using the same chipset as the NVIDIA Shield TV: the Tegra X1+. The difference here with Portal: Companion Collection is that the majority of the work was already taken care of eight years ago with Portal being brought to the NVIDIA Shield product family with NVIDIA’s help. However, it’s an experience that Gabe Newell didn’t like, as he called developing for consoles “walled gardens” and noted that the graphics for consoles “are essentially derivative of the PC.” They’ve brought Portal 2 to the PS3, The Orange Box to Xbox 360/PS3, Left 4 Dead series to Xbox 360, and CS:GO to Xbox 360/PS3 (although, a lot of these ports were outsourced to other companies). Now, just to be clear, Valve has prior experience in developing for the console market. I was pretty sure this is the first time Valve has ever worked with Nintendo to put their games onto their platform, and sure enough, I found out later that it indeed is. Those games are coming to the Nintendo Switch this year, titled Portal: Companion Collection. But what took me by surprise - and the reason why I’m talking about it here on Boiling Steam - was the trailer for the Portal series. Of course, since I’m a Nintendo fan, I wanted to see what the company had planned for its upcoming games. So on Wednesday I had watched the Nintendo Direct.