8 nice video games to your Steam Deck from 2025

I performed a lot of video games on my Steam Deck this yr. It appeared like there was a endless record of unimaginable indie video games to strive — The Verge wrote about lots of them! — and lots of labored brilliantly on Valve’s handheld gaming PC. Some greater video games made a splash on Steam Deck, too, and whereas they might not look pretty much as good as on a beefy PC, I’m normally joyful to take care of that just because I can play them on the sofa or out of the home.

If you happen to’re unwrapping a Steam Deck for the vacations this yr, or have some Steam present playing cards burning a gap in your pocket, listed here are a few of my suggestions of video games launched in 2025 that you simply may wish to try. (And if you need extra concepts, try my favorites from 2024.)

Ball x Pit blends components from video games like Breakout, Vampire Survivors, and metropolis builders into a pleasant, genre-blending roguelike. In the principle a part of the sport, you shoot balls towards an ever-advancing group of enemies, and after choosing up a bunch of gems and upgrades, you’ll finally flip right into a drive of nature with balls flying everywhere in the display. After a run, you possibly can construct up a base to enhance your stats and unlock characters — a few of that are fairly intelligent, like one which turns Ball x Pit right into a turn-based sport. And with runs normally taking lower than quarter-hour or so, it’s an excellent sport to choose up and play in your Steam Deck.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Sandfall Interactive’s debut RPG floored me earlier this yr; it’s an outstanding bundle with exhilarating turn-based battles, a nice parrying system, memorable characters, a gripping story, and music that I nonetheless come again to though I completed the sport months in the past. On Steam Deck, the sport doesn’t look fairly pretty much as good because it does on my PS5, nevertheless it’s nonetheless playable and was not too long ago verified for Valve’s handheld PC. People on ProtonDB even have some ideas to tweak settings to make the visuals higher. If Steam Deck is your solely platform that may play the sport, it’s nonetheless a good place to expertise The Recreation Awards’ Recreation of the 12 months.

I do know I put Hades II on my model of this record final yr, however the roguelike obtained its large 1.0 replace in September, and it’s rattling good. Supergiant Video games builds on the primary Hades with a brand new protagonist, new boons to carry to battle, a bunch of recent characters to provide ambrosia to, two new routes to discover, and one other banger-filled soundtrack. Supergiant even tweaked the ending to make it higher. Hades II is Supergiant on the prime of its sport, and identical to my colleague Ash Parrish stated in 2024, it’s the proper Steam Deck sport.

After years of ready and plenty of clown make-up, Hole Knight’s sequel lastly launched in September, and fortunately, it was truly definitely worth the wait. Silksong doesn’t reinvent the wheel; it’s nonetheless an atmospheric Metroidvania with lovely bug creatures, tough-as-nails bosses, and some bullshit. However I liked that components within the authentic Hole Knight, and it’s nonetheless glorious in Silksong.

If you happen to’re in search of some enjoyable puzzles, pull up a chair with Is This Seat Taken?. Within the sport, you’re answerable for discovering seats for a bunch of lovely geometric shapes who’ve completely different wants. Some may wish to sit subsequent to a window, or perhaps simply not subsequent to somebody who smells. However when you can’t discover a seating association that works for everybody, you possibly can simply transfer on to the subsequent puzzle with none large penalty; it retains the stakes low, and generally, some low-stakes puzzling is what matches the invoice.

I’ve very fond recollections of taking part in the unique Lumines: Puzzle Fusion on a PlayStation Transportable, and greater than 20 years after the discharge of that sport, the Tetris Impact-like Lumines Come up captures that very same magic. The trance-y visuals, superb music, and absorbing Lumines puzzling sucked me in and briefly let me neglect about the whole lot else on the planet; like my colleague Andrew Webster, I discovered Come up to be an nearly good zen puzzle sport.

Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo

Earlier this yr, I wrote that Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo would really feel proper at house in your Recreation Boy Advance — and that’s a part of what makes it such a very good match for the Steam Deck. The sport is a top-down journey the place you battle enemies and discover the sport’s world with a magical yo-yo, and also you’ll get cool yo-yo tips like the flexibility to “stroll the canine” to cross our bodies of water. With glorious pixel artwork and music full of blaring horns, it seems like a non secular successor to the GBA video games I liked rising up.

The Drifter is impressed by the old-school LucasArts point-and-click journey sport components, however as a substitute of telling a foolish, Monkey Island-like story, it cleverly turns the format into a darkish, gripping thriller. You’ll be able to play with a mouse to level and click on, in fact, however if you wish to use the Steam Deck’s controls or a gamepad, The Drifter additionally affords a very good management scheme that makes use of each joysticks to allow you to stroll round and see what you possibly can work together with. The story is filled with thrilling, mind-bending twists. And when you’re something like me, it can most likely maintain you up lengthy after your bedtime.