I just happened to be checking out /r/SteamController today and saw. I'm still not convinced that it means anything positive for SC but it is cool to see it progressing a bit.

Оу, привет)))

@Deuz 311 Thanks. ;)

Bring on the v2! Hopefully it could be designed a little 'heavy duty '.

I dunno if it confirms it -- the Link went on liquidation and never saw a revision -- but I agree it's a sign of sort. Valve is definitely wanting to clear out their stock of SCs. Now whether that's because they are washing their hands of it or gearing up for the next version is something we'll have to wait to find out.

mewish. I missed out on this tech because I didn't see myself wanting one, it looked fucking weird for crying out loud! Well now I want one. Not because it's discontinued, but because it adds a lot of functionality out of the box to Linux computers which would require some compromises and tweaking to get working with other controllers. And it's unique. I've been using a mouse since I was 8 years old and I'm well in my 30's now, when this controller was launched I still mainly used a mouse. But since then I've completely switched to trackballs and I haven't used a mouse for almost 5 years, at all. This controller is to other controllers what trackballs is to other mouses. I know I would love it. I just hope there's a Steam Controller 2 coming out soon but i sincerely doubt it. They discontinued production and cleared out the storage because it failed to reach expectations. The only way I could see a SC2 in the horizon was if they were still investing in the Steam Machine project, which they're not. It makes no sense continuing development of a controller to a project that got scrapped

I actually thought about keeping this information to myself as to not get anyone's hopes up in case it turned out to be nothing but I couldn't contain my excitement and needed to tell people. :)

I wouldn't hold my breath for a BPM overhaul but a better response time could definitely be part of the hardware. Though honestly the SC's biggest issue with input latency is Steam Input. The last time I checked SI introduces 3-4 ms of latency. So even if they could impossibly get a 0ms latency on the SCv2 it'll still be higher than a native DS4 controller. I don't think the SC can get much more responsive since it relies on a software wrapper. On the other hand, I don't really think 6ms is bad. It's the second most responsive controller when it's wired.

well, because of how steam input works games dont need to have pressure sensitivity support. Same as games dont need to have gyro support for the Steam Controller' gyro - or any steam input supported gyro controller - to work.

What do you think of the thin trackpad? I can't imagine using them for anything other than scrolling, which is a huge disappointment since I'm a pad movement user on the SC.

I've been using it in H3VR and it actually feels a lot better than the round trackpads because of it's concave design. Hitting a cardinal direction always felt a little hit and miss for me on the wands, whereas with the thin design I can trigger whatever direction with ease. It also doesn't feel like you lose that much horizontal movement, so I guess there is some acceleration going on there. I guess the you're losing precise horizontal inputs though. @@criticalinput

@@peterallen900 Thanks for that info. I doubt I'll ever get my hands on them (way too pricey for me) but it's good to hear that they still sort of work in a magical kind of way. Though the loss of precision still makes it worse in my eyes. For the majority of situations I guess it works just fine but there are going to be those fringe cases where I would really wish that I had that extra horizontal space.

@@peterallen900 I'd have to disagree. I hate using the Index "track" (read; "glorified") button despite the fact I go pads only on the SC for all flat games and do just fine, no accidental directions or anything (sc power users represent!). It probably has to deal with the fact my thumbs are wider than they are, but the x axis on them sucks. Swipes and precise thumb tip movements are out of the question on them. The track button is more rolling your thumb from left to right, which... eh... Its possible, but then I find myself constantly hitting diagonals or something other than a cardinal direction all the time on them due to that squashed axis and subsequent loss of precision due to the overall smaller size. That lack of angular control was the first time I ever experienced nausea in VR when normally I do absolutely fine. I genuinely dont think they want you to use the pads for locomotion on the Index Controller. Scrolling and a couple of buttons, maybe. And you cant edge ride like on the Steam Controller for increased angular precision (and the edges are really harsh too; dunno why they sunk the pads bellow the surface of the face plate like the Chell prototype SC's instead of lifting them above like on the SC). BTW; the SC's pads are concave too, just at a shallower degree. Unless you were referring to the Wands... in which case... I'm coming from a WMR kit, not Vive. So I have no idea how the Vive Wands pads were. Are they seriously not only flat in line with the grip but also have a flat touch surface? Friggen lame. With that said, I'd honestly prefer the WMR touch pads over the track buttons. What really kills me though is that SteamVR Input for configuring your vr controllers doesnt seem to be nearly as feature rich as Steam Input for flat gaming. Unless I'm blind, its exceptionally barebones. Which is sad. Bet I could solve my issues by applying a cross gate shaped dead zone to the emulated joystick. And on the topic of joysticks... neutering the touch pad for a joystick is one thing, but the fact that the Index Controller joysticks are substandard is an absolute insult. I'm not gonna rage quit and return my controllers as then I'd have no controllers for my Index VR kit and would therefore be forced to use the god awful wmr kit (and also because I dont subscribe to the hyperbole of "unplayable"/"trash"/etc), but honestly Valve should be ashamed. I get that its just supposed to be an accessory button, but why limit it in a way that no other joystick on any major modern controller is limited? Thats dumb. That said... all the yes when it comes to the rest of the finger tracking and pressure stuffs. Steam Controller v2 is what I'm really looking forward to, more than the Index Controllers.

To be fair, I have rarely bound anything to the face buttons since the Activators update -- even with only two grips. For weapon selection I tend to use a Radial Menu on Right Pad Click. The cool thing about this method is that the gyro will still be activated (if you use "gyro activate on RP touch) so you don't even need to sacrifice aiming to switch your weapons.

​@@criticalinput well, sounds cool for some games but 1. In borderlands 2 on the right pad click is melee attack, so if you use it for weapon change, then you again need more buttons for melee attack 2. Then I change the weapon I usually don't want to aim accurately (which gyro is used for) because well... I'm changing weapon. More likely I want to change position/hide so I want not precise but fast camera movement with pad

I'm right there with ya. I typically wait for sales on stuff but I 100% know that the SC2 would be worth the money and I would have no problem dropping that money on the day pre-orders were announced.

Not really. All gyros output yaw, roll, and pitch data. Pitch is the term for the y-axis movement -- or up and down. Hopefully though we an see an update to Steam Input that allows for all 3 axes to be used as analog output simultaneously. This would make any controller with an IMU perfect for 6dof games. I believe the move data is for the accelerometer but I could be wrong there.

@@criticalinput thanks for the clarification!

I really hope they figure it all out. JoyCons currently work on PC (and some games even have native support for them) but for the most part they are the only current generation controller that lacks support on Steam Input. It would be a huge boon for the software to support them.

It better be... hopefully

I firmly believe the SC to be the best controller around and this is looking to be such an improvement on it. I'm a bit dissatisfied that they are sticking with the SC1 design rather than taking another look at the Chell but this is certainly better than nothing.

I would have liked to see more touch surfaces as well but, I mean....we are in the minority, I think. Most users just want more of the same. More physical buttons and more joysticks. Bleh...

Would they potentially be able to get a read on where the pressure is being placed on the bumpers, opening up some option for touch menus or something similar?

@@Belfoxy it gets a bit pipe-dreamy, but possibly. If the fsr was towards the center of the controller and the bumper acted like a giant lever with its fulcrum near the fsr, it could theoretically be possible to make that determination due to leverage at the outside of the bumper leading to much more force being applied on the fsr than if you pressed closer to fsr. Unfortunately that might act like the dual stage triggers, adding delay to the soft pull to make sure you arent activating the full pull. I really just want a simple linear touch surface there though. doesnt need 2 axis of touch, just one. That would be quicker and more reliable for determining where you pressed the bumper. But thats why I was thinking... why not both? Linear touch for press location, fsr for pressure lever. That would make the bumpers REALLY functional.

When the SC was released it could be purchased pretty much anywhere. I bought mine from Amazon since Prime shipping was free. Newegg and Gamestop also carried it and I'm pretty sure I saw it in a Walmart years ago. It's only be a recent decision for stores to stop carrying it. I do hope that these stores decide to stock a 2.0 and don't dismiss it because of the SC1. Valve's shipping is brutal, especially since you have to pay for shipping on each item rather than getting it shipped in bulk.

@@criticalinput I was hoping this controller would change the game for all controllers, but it doesn't seem like anyone want to ditch dual analog for some reason. My SC is in ok condition, but the thought it could end with no upgrade made me worry. Hopefully this thing comes and Valve don't give up on it.

@@tobydion3009 the SC is light-years ahead of the game, and people who don't truly try to adjust to it can't see the full beauty. If they nail the issues people had with V1, it may be the best controller, PERIOD

It's an unpopular opinion, but I would like to see the Chell version mashed with the V1 and given the FSR treatment. That would mean 4 rear grips but the ABXY buttons orbit the two pads. The joystick should be removed as well. I'd even suggest adding 4 "auxiliary" buttons where the joystick/face buttons are now just to utilize that dead space. But like I said, unpopular opinion.

The $5 Steam Controllers was a liquidation, Valve wanted to move stock and empty their warehouse's of the SC. Plain and simple. Inventory/warehouse systems are typically rather outdated and have great difficulty with handling large volumes of requests (just look at the multitudes of Amazon items that "will arrive in 1-2 months" during Black Friday) and they actually ran out of stock long before they stopped accepting orders. It happens. Now this could mean that they are either gearing up for a V2 or they are washing their hands of the SC entirely. Only time will tell.

It's time for waiting.

_IS THAT A _*_JOJO_*_ REFERENCE?_

I hate to break this to you but I don't have any hopes about this. Valve has moved onto Proton, the new Library, and VR -- and the VR configurator is a mess, lacking many vital functions that exist in Steam Input. None of their recent games have use SIAPI and neither Artifact nor DotA Underlords would have had a Recommended Config if not for Sprayrate jumping in and making one. Sprayrate is, as far as I know, (one of) the last developers still working on Steam Input. It really says something when the video game development branch of Valve won't use Steam Input in ANY capacity. Not to mention that looking at the last few months of Steam Client updates shows very little released progress on Steam Input. It's mostly a really tiny bug fix or added support for a third party controller. So either there is some huge progress being made by just a single person or a small group (remember, even Campo Santa has been pulled from their own game "In the Valley of Gods" To help work on Alyx so how many actual Valve employees have been pulled) or very little work is being done at all. I'm banking on the latter, sadly.

Aw how dare you be the bringer of bad news. Lol. Thanks for the content bud!

Trust me, I don't wanna be that guy. But the writing's on the wall. Even if we got an SCv2 it would still have the same software problems as the V1. As much as I love the SC, I've abandoned it completely because of the software. I'm now a Dualshock 4 user, avoiding Steam Input like the plague. I miss the SC, but I'm also loving all of the benefits of the change too.

Oh wow. Lol. I recently bought one to play every now and then for fun. The software is confusing ofcourse but its something different for me right now. I just love the idea of something different in general. I also play on analog, the design of modern day comtrollers are satisfactory enough.

I'm sure it will have the one thumbstick but I'll be very disappointed if it ends up with two. Honestly, I'd be happy if they ditched the joysticks and diamond pad entirely and applied the same "out of the box" thinking to that area of the controller that led to the touchpads. But I also understand that it would alienate even more players than the 1.0 already did.

Me either until last night. I was very surprised to see it.

The thing about AA vs an internal battery is that it's a trade off of current convenience vs long term convenience. The internal battery would be better now since it allows you to charge over USB when the battery is low rather than having to track down your spare AAs and taking the minute to swap 'em out. However, internal batteries are proprietary and thus production will eventually cease, making the batteries difficult to find and possibly even jacking the prices up as demand increases on a low supply item. At some point there will be no working batteries left, leaving me with a brick of a controller. Since Valve released the stl files for 3D printing we can continue to repair these controllers forever and the only way to guarantee that we can keep the battery alive as long as our controller is to use an industry standard. So while an internal battery might be better for the now, I will 100% support Valve's decision to use AAs as it's a better decision for the future.

@@criticalinput good points there. Still, I think that at least having an optional more limited/expensive version that has internal batteries would be cool, I would buy one of those since the only thing in my house that uses AA batteries is my steam controller :| sometimes I forget to get those when I'm at walmart. Also, I think that using one of these controllers for, say, 2 years makes up very well for the 60$ one of these controllers cost (and I bought mine for 25 or something like that) so I don't really think we need to keep repairing or fixing these 'forever' so, an update every now and then would be awesome

I have been collecting and documenting all of my configs on a personal cloud an am over 50 configs done with another 100 or so that I need to organize. And even with that amount of work done already I would 100% convert every single one of those configs into an SCv2 config in a heartbeat, complete with modifying them to make use of the extra features.

I couldn't agree less. If you are using the click to play 2D games then you're doing it wrong. Directional Pad Input Style, Requires Click Off, and small deadzone. Keep your thumb close to the center and roll it around the deadzone, just like rolling your thumb around a physical dpad. Once you master this you won't ever want to use a traditional dpad again.

@@criticalinput Fair point, but I tried that for a while on Hollow Knight and Katana Zero, its just not doing it for me. It was better granted but I feel like for games needing rapid changes in direction and not much use for rolling motions the precision just isn't there. I am a bit of a mechanical keys junkie and throw is a very important part of any input system IMHO. The same reason I don't seriously game on my phone. The haptics processing is good, but not fast enough to feel quite "natural" or reliable. I own 2 SCs and have bought 5 total, giving them to friends. I LOVE it. I just think this is the one place it falls down.

So sorry. I was way too excited when I uploaded this and totally forgot about simple things like that. Here is the general patent info from WIPO (patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=WO2018236966) and here is the full document (patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/01/69/7f/e5c0594265db66/WO2018236966A1.pdf)

I was also an early adopter and advocate for the first Nvidia Shield (retroactively named the Shield Portable). There still hasn't been a good successor to the clamshell, all in one Android device that is perfect for emulation. I'm sadly too accustomed to being let down when innovation fails to grab the market.

@@criticalinput The speakers on that thing were incredible. Wasn't crazy for the tiny screen though and I think using a telescopic controller with one's own phone or tablet is a better solution.

The input sources don't line up at all. Not to mention that VR controllers don't work with Steam Input. Which is quite unfortunate because the VR configuration tool is massively under featured. I mean, just yesterday it was updated to support Outer Ring Bindings for the joysticks. It's kinda crazy how little the Steam Controller and Steam Input influence the VR side of Valve. They might as well be two different companies.

I don't know about that typing idea. It sounds cool as an idea but I don't think it would work great in practice for the same reason that the touchscreen wasn't used on the first SC -- Valve realized that people don't want to look down at their controller, removing their attention from the game. Not to mention that the back of the controller already doesn't have a lot of room so there wouldn't really be any place to actually put it without removing the battery cover. As for the "feeling more expensive"....meh? I hear this argument all of the time, that the SC feels cheap somehow. I lacks some of the Xbox's weight but it actually weighs more than the DS4. And I would actually prefer it to weigh a little less since I'm moving it around a lot. I get the feeling that people want the weight of the Xbox controller but imagine rotating that around for gyro aiming during a 3+ hour session of Counter Strike. I firmly believe that the "SC feel cheap" is something that a couple of reviewers might have said but quickly got picked up and internalized by a lot of users before they even held an SC. I use an F710, Xbox One, DS4, and SC at least once a month and I don't really notice any "cheapness" with the SC.

Critical Input I just think the touch pads and top bumpers are kinda loud. I want a softer click if that makes sense. I also see what you mean with the lighter weight.

Out of curiosity, what issues do you have with the right pad?

@@criticalinput I'm just not able to adjust to it as some others have I suppose. In my bedroom I have a hardwired steam link not using WiFi, and next to me I keep a PS4 controller just for those instances where I want to play a game that plays better with the analog stick. Examples I can think of are 3rd person games, or games that require quick responses. I find the Steam controller is awesome when I'm playing something that doesn't require the right pad or where the right pad isn't the primary focus of the game. But again I'm not someone who sits down and plays for 5-6 hours a night with it. I do love the concept, I just wish it was a bit more user friendly in the pick up and go sense (the right pad that is).

@@yearight1205 I don't know that they could make the pad any more "new user friendly" without ditching the best aspects of the pad. The sheer fact that it is a new input source means that user's can't have any muscle memory going into it and will be starting fresh, just like the first time using a dual analog controller or a mouse/keyboard. If the SC interests you then I highly suggest hiding the DS4 for a month and exclusively using the SC. After you start to build muscle memory for it you'll quickly find that it is superior to a joystick. And I mean this for both left and right pads. Ever since switching to left pad movement and right pad aiming it's painful going to back to joysticks. I even use my right pad for touch buttons in games that don't have camera control.

@@criticalinput Maybe you could help me, because the problem I have is when I turn my character it sometimes stops turning, so I have to drag my right thumb to the opposite side of the track pad and start over just to get it moving properly. Is there a setting I can look into?

@@yearight1205 OK, so this is a huge thing that I could make an entire video about but I'll try to condense it down to a shorter comment without losing any information. There are two main ways to control camera with the right pad and there exists a hybrid method that combines the two. The two main ways are touchpad (swipe to aim) and joystick emulation (hold to aim). The touchpad style is the preferred method for a majority of SC users as the pads don't do a great job of emulating a joystick. In this style you'll swipe from one direction to the other and you'll rotate the camera only when your thumb is moving -- just like when controlling a mouse cursor on a laptop's touchpad. For this method I suggest setting the sensitivity on the higher side or use trackball mode so that you can keep spinning even when you pull your thumb up. Then assign the Mouse Input Style to the gyrometer and give it a lower sensitivity. This allows you to make wide turns with the pad (for general turning and doing 180 spins) and then use the gyro for lining up shots and tracking. The other style, joystick emulation -- has a deadzone in the center of the pad and moving your thumb in any direction will be like moving a joystick in that direction. So if you move your thumb half way to the left then you'll continuously rotate the camera to the left at half speed -- just like holding a joystick half way to the left. The haptics provide a nice thunk feeling when you "hit" the outside edge, sort of like hitting the plastic shell of the controller with an actual controller. You can use the touchpad method by assigning the Mouse or Mouse Joystick Input Style to the pad. For the joystick emulation you'll need to assign the Joystick Move or Joystick Camera Input Style to the pad. If you just want to put your thumb on the right side of the pad and have your character continuously turning until you stop touching the pad then you'll want Joystick Move. I did say there was a hybrid method though. In this part, the center of your pad will be swipe to aim and the outside of the pad will be continuous, joystick style aiming. To achieve this you'll need to assign the Mouse Input Style to the pad and then bump up the Edge Spin Speed (this setting is in the Additional Settings page). You can also play with the Edge Spin Radius setting to determine how large of an area at the outside of the pad will initiate the Edge Spin.

Wait, you bought brand new controllers for an easily fixed issue? All of the plastic pieces can be 3D printed. When my trigger mount broke -- both the little plastic bumper piece and a part that holds the trigger pin in place -- I sent the STL files to a 3D printing company and had a replacement part shipped to me a week later. I easily installed it and my bumper and trigger feel just as good as they did when I got the controller. Also AA is the way to go. Li-On batteries charged over USB might be more convenient but replacing them becomes more difficult over time. AAs are almost guaranteed to be around for my entire lifetime while propriety battery packs will almost certainly cease to exist. And with a controller that I can repair with personal tools it would suck to be able to replace almost any part of the controller except the power source.

@@criticalinput oh wow. I knew u could get parts printed but I didn't know this was printable.... This is what's broke on all 4... the little thin piece that fits between left bumper and the actual button it clicks on the board... Thx! Still tho, this should be tougher in there next controller!

@@Xylo211755 Yup, that's part of the Trigger Mount and also broke for me. The stl files can be found at steamcommunity.com/games/353370/announcements/detail/901091250587575759 make sure to grab the zip for the trigger mount and not the basic zip file.

Of course. As much as I want this to be real I totally understand that none of it is hard evidence that we will ever see a v2.

Nope. I'd wager that Valve is going to be very tight lipped about this like they always are. When(if) they are ready to debut an SC2 then you'll hear about it on every publication and I'm sure hundreds of YT channels will be making pessimistic videos about it. In other words, it'll probably be impossible to miss any news about it if it happens.

It kinda sucks that I put tons of hours into all of my videos preparing scripts and working on clean edits with nice effects and the one video that gets posted everywhere is the one that has no production value and no script. I literally threw this together just to quickly share some cool info with a small, niche community that already knows my usual work. If I knew it was gonna be seen by this many people I would have definitely made a proper video. Please check out some other videos of mine, if Steam Input interests you at all. They are well researched, have production value, and use actual scripts. :)

While I won't discredit the uses of a modular gamepad (The Thurstmaster eSwap does allows you to convert the traditional 4 button controller into a 6 button fight pad) I don't see the point of swapping out the most important hardware feature of the SC. I highly suggest giving the left pad some time to grow on ya. It is 100% better than a joystick for 3D movement and, after some tweaking and practice, ended up using it more often than my DS4's dpad for 2D platformers. In fact, after 4 years of use I can honestly say that there isn't a single game where I would prefer a joystick or dpad over the left pad.