Valve’s own controller solution launched last month, and already the community have been firing back their own suggestions and improvements. Thus, just one month on, the Steam Controller has picked up a big update that adds a multitude of clever new functions to the device.
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The controller has a gyroscope built-in, which can now be used to lean in shooter games simply by tilting the controller. And talking of shooters, we all know they’re better with a mouse, which is why Valve have improved the joystick input on the Steam Controller to replicate the movements of a mouse much more closely.
There’s plenty of zones on a PC game HUD that need mouse navigation, and you can now map those regions with the controller. With regions mapped, holding down a button will snap your trackpads to that zone, and mean you can easily navigate them without wandering off to the rest of the screen. And if you want even more menus, there’s now a Steam UI Touch Menu that allows you to make a series of 16 on-screen buttons for any game’s hotkeys, which can be accessed with a single trackpad.
If you travel around with your controller a lot, you can now save configurations to the controller so you won’t be forced to set up again when you get to a friend’s house.
If you’re a coder interested in working with the Steam Controller, the new Controller HUD will certainly be of interest: as you tap inputs they are displayed on screen, which allows you to see how the controller is mimicking more traditional inputs.
Oh, the update log also showed off this video of the Valve Overlord Robots assembling Steam Controllers.