Uploaded March 2022 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Friday was a big day for PC releases. Not only did the sensational Elden Ring finally land, so too did the first wave of Steam Deck pre-order emails, allowing early-adopters the opportunity to get their hands on Valve’s handheld PC.
The timing of both events couldn’t have worked out better, and we here at Rock Paper Shotgun took the opportunity to play the biggest game of the year on 2022’s most exciting piece of hardware. Admittedly, however, our initial impressions of Elden Ring running on a Steam Deck were... mixed, to say the least.
Elden Ring has suffered a rough launch on PC thanks in no small part to a number of performance issues which cause the game to stutter repeatedly while both exploring the open-world and fighting bosses. Over on the Deck, the situation was noticeable worse, with the game frequently stuttering as we explored the opening area of Limgrave.
Thankfully, these issues appear to have been largely fixed, not by Bandai Namco or FromSoftware but by Valve themselves instead. Over the weekend, Valve engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais confirmed via Twitter that the team had made improvements to Proton, the Linux compatibility layer Valve uses to run Windows games on SteamOS. Hardware editor James has been testing the new update, and to our eyes it appears to have removed the majority of stuttering - at the very least in the game’s opening area. The stutter still remains, don’t get us wrong, but this is definitely a step in the right direction. The result is a version of Elden Ring that is perfectly playable on a *handheld*.
🎥: Want more juicy video content? Check out our review of Elden Ring: youtu.be/dWtZhaGS44A
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🛒 Buy some RPS merch: teespring.com/en-GB/stores/rockpapershotgun
🐦: Follow Liam on Twitter: twitter.com/meevil
0:00 Intro
02:11 Comparison Footage
#EldenRing #SteamDeck #Performance #RockPaperShotgun
Friday was a big day for PC releases. Not only did the sensational Elden Ring finally land, so too did the first wave of Steam Deck pre-order emails, allowing early-adopters the opportunity to get their hands on Valve’s handheld PC.
The timing of both events couldn’t have worked out better, and we here at Rock Paper Shotgun took the opportunity to play the biggest game of the year on 2022’s most exciting piece of hardware. Admittedly, however, our initial impressions of Elden Ring running on a Steam Deck were... mixed, to say the least.
Elden Ring has suffered a rough launch on PC thanks in no small part to a number of performance issues which cause the game to stutter repeatedly while both exploring the open-world and fighting bosses. Over on the Deck, the situation was noticeable worse, with the game frequently stuttering as we explored the opening area of Limgrave.
Thankfully, these issues appear to have been largely fixed, not by Bandai Namco or FromSoftware but by Valve themselves instead. Over the weekend, Valve engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais confirmed via Twitter that the team had made improvements to Proton, the Linux compatibility layer Valve uses to run Windows games on SteamOS. Hardware editor James has been testing the new update, and to our eyes it appears to have removed the majority of stuttering - at the very least in the game’s opening area. The stutter still remains, don’t get us wrong, but this is definitely a step in the right direction. The result is a version of Elden Ring that is perfectly playable on a *handheld*.
🎥: Want more juicy video content? Check out our review of Elden Ring: youtu.be/dWtZhaGS44A
🔴: Subscribe and ring that bell to never miss a video: youtube.com/rockpapershot?sub_confirmation=1
💬: Chat to Rock Paper Shotgun on Discord: discord.gg/rockpapershotgun
🍾: Support RPS by becoming a YouTube channel member: youtube.com/channel/UC5bKSAZBvV9AKlBJPG0Py-A/join
🛒 Buy some RPS merch: teespring.com/en-GB/stores/rockpapershotgun
🐦: Follow Liam on Twitter: twitter.com/meevil
0:00 Intro
02:11 Comparison Footage
#EldenRing #SteamDeck #Performance #RockPaperShotgun
