After the failure of the Steam Controller: Valve builds new gamepad externally
The Steam Controller was discontinued in 2019 - now there is a successor of sorts. The Wireless Horipad is being built by an external company.
The Hori gamepad with Steam branding has so far only been announced in Japan.
(Image: Hori)
Valve is having the Japanese company Hori build an officially licensed gamepad for the Steam gaming platform. The "Wireless Horipad for Steam" bears official Steam branding, but has so far only been announced for the Japanese market. It remains to be seen whether it will come to Germany at a later date. It costs the equivalent of just under 50 euros.
The Horipad for Steam is modeled on an Xbox controller: The two sticks sit asymmetrically, the buttons are labeled A, X, Y and B. The ergonomics are also reminiscent of Microsoft's gamepad. In the middle of the gamepad is a comparatively bulky Steam button, which can be used to call up the "Big Picture" mode for gamepad control. The Wireless Horipad for Steam connects wirelessly via Bluetooth - an unstable and slower connection method compared to the wireless adapters that Xbox gamepad users can use.
The Hori gamepad is therefore a largely conventional third-party controller with Steam branding. The gamepad is a far cry from a remake of the infamous Steam Controller: the gadget, which was discontinued in 2019, had an unconventional shape, only one stick and instead two large touchpads that could be used to simulate mouse movements. It was a bold design that some Steam fans absolutely loved, but was hardly popular with the masses.
Xbox gamepad most popular
Today, Xbox gamepads are by far the most popular controller on Steam, Valve announced in a blog post published on Wednesday. According to the post, the Xbox gamepad is used in 59 percent of sessions played with a controller, while a Playstation gamepad is used in 26 percent. The Steam Deck, which Valve also counted as a controller for this analysis, is used in 10 percent of all sessions.
Overall, more and more people are also playing on their PC with a gamepad, writes Valve. Since 2018, the daily use of controllers has tripled from 5 to 15 percent. Gamepads are superior to mice and keyboards in some genres because they allow freer movement control with their sticks. Many action adventure games, but also fighting games, therefore recommend the use of controllers. Even titles traditionally played with a mouse and keyboard, such as the hack'n'slay "Diablo 4", can now be played excellently with a controller because their developers also use consoles as a target platform.
(dahe)