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Is V Rising Steam Deck compatible?

This vampire survival crafting game runs great on Steam Deck, but a tricky control scheme will be too much to overcome for some players.

A Steam Deck cut out laying over the image of a vampire sitting upon a throne

Is V Rising Steam Deck compatible? On rare occasions, games can be deemed playable on Steam Deck, even though they have some pretty basic issues that plague the experience. V Rising is unfortunately one such case, as there is no controller support, meaning navigating your castle grounds is sometimes more hassle than it’s worth.

While the Steam Deck is easily the best handheld gaming PC we’ve tested, it’s not perfect, and V Rising is a game that exposes the game compatibility rating system.

Is V Rising Steam Deck compatible?

V Rising is officially rated as playable on Steam Deck by Valve. Despite this, there is no controller support for the game, and you are going to need to download an external mod to enable proper keybinds. 

It’s genuinely disappointing to see Valve let V Rising by with a playable rating. The game is hard to enjoy with the base controls and it doesn’t display any controller inputs at all.

While players have found multiple mods to get around this problem, the idea behind Valve’s rating system is that a game realistically shouldn’t require outside files/modding to create an enjoyable experience.

There are plenty of exceptions to this rule, with countless games that literally won’t shut down properly unless you force it via the Steam Deck menu. But issues like this have little to no impact on actually playing and enjoying the game, whereas this control issue is quite major.

What would have been better is if Valve found a way to explicitly state that V Rising is a game best played with a mouse and keyboard even on Steam Deck. Much of the community feedback agrees with this sentiment, but some still insist that the lack of native controller support is hard to look past.

On a positive note, V Rising runs great on Steam Deck, even at relatively high settings, with a steady frame rate throughout the various environments. If you are okay with connecting a mouse and keyboard or downloading a controller layout mod, then we’re happy to report that V Rising is a great game to play via Valve’s handheld.

We’ve compiled our list of the best Steam Deck games that you need to play if you own one of the handheld, and each one is verified by Valve.