Valve has made it clear that Steam Deck 2 will be available at some point, but those expecting it to be released soon will be severely disappointed, the company has confirmed.

Pierre-Loup Griffais is the latest Valve developer to manage expectations of how quickly the follow-up will materialize. He told CNBC, "Right now, we're kind of looking at this performance target as a steady target for two or three years."

If that wasn't blatant enough, Griffith made it clear in another email to The Verge. He wrote, "It is important that Deck provides developers with certain performance targets, that the message to customers is simple, and that they can play the same game on any Deck." [Therefore, changing performance levels is not something we do lightly, and we only want to do so if we can make a sufficiently significant improvement," he continued, adding that he does not envision "such a leap being possible in the next couple of years" without taking a hit to power efficiency and battery life

While this will no doubt be disappointing to some who have felt a bit underwhelmed by recent Deck experiences like "Baldur's Gate 3" and "Starfield," for me, and for many others, this finding is perfectly fine. Steam Deck is great as it is.

As I wrote when I belatedly purchased the Steam Deck, I was not looking for a portable gaming console that could play all the latest triple-A games. I have a desktop and a PS5 for that purpose.

What I was looking for instead was something I could quickly pick up and play here and there. Something to organize my ever-growing Steam backlog and a list of titles that seems to grow with each new Humble Bundle announcement.

When I open Steam to write this article, I find that I own 153 verified games on Steam Deck, carefully avoiding the temptation to play Spelunky's Quick Game. If we expand this to "verified and playable," the number doubles to 369 games. How many of those games have they played? Probably at least 40 games, at least.

Since getting the Deck, it has proven to be a great way to play games that I just can't get to sitting alone in my home office.

But being able to play Deck on the couch, in bed, on the subway, and with my family has allowed me to play fun that would otherwise slip through the net. returning to Union City with "Beyond a Steel Sky" and playing "The Dorfromantik", unwind in "Rustler" for some good old-fashioned "GTA" fun, and enjoy anxious fishing in "Dredge". I was also drawn back to "The Binding of Isaac".

What I'm trying to say is that I have enough games to play here for probably a decade, and there's plenty more available on the Steam store. Just don't really buy anything until you've eaten more into the disappointing list. As of this writing, according to SteamDB, there are 3,881 verified Steam deck games and 7,613 playable games.

What Valve has also not ruled out very carefully is a hardware refresh of some sort.

The company has indicated that it wants to keep the speed the same (which is sensible in my view, as it makes it easier for developers to optimize their games), but other quality of life improvements could still be possible. Perhaps a version with a larger battery or OLED screen could be on the horizon.

That might tempt me - but even then, probably not. the Steam Deck is not for everyone. it's not as accessible as the Nintendo Switch, not as powerful as the Asus ROG Ally. it's not going to be as satisfying in 5 years, let alone 2 years when Deck 2 talk gets going. I'm sure I'll be just as happy with it in 5 years, let alone 2 years when the Deck 2 story is getting hot.