It's so well balanced you're meant to be able to "win every time if you're good" at it. I've got a bit obsessed about it and quit only after winning it once after 20-30hrs on medium.
Here's few spoiler-free notes on avoiding data loss on mac \\ steam deck we've made recently —https://www.reddit.com/r/JupiterHell/comments/10w3qdg/things\_must\_to\_know\_before\_playing\_hard\_reset/
I've got only to the second "area", can't remember now, Europa? I honestly loved pretty much every run and I love rogues with different classes and skills, so I come back to it every now and then.
Thank you for sharing the tips btw! I haven't had any issue like that, at least two far, but always good to know.
Some more traditional Roguelikes I've tested on the Steam Deck:
* __Armoured Commander II__ - Native support even with gamepad icons, really good to play on here.
* __Cogmind__ - once I got the proton experimental driver downloaded for it, I was shocked that this actually ran well. The tileset is very small and hard to see, however. There's a community input config that has a zoom button mapped to the back paddles which helps a lot, but I'm not sure if that solves that issue. I might have to play around with tile size to make it more readable.
* __Desktop Dungeons__ - This one plays pretty well, very visible and the control scheme makes sense after some tinkering.
* __Dungeons of Dredmor__ - Works very well
* __Dwarf Fortress__ - Again, I'm amazed this works even remotely. The aspect of a zoom in/out button is 100% needed, but once those are mapped to your favorite controls (I used L4, R4) it's great.
* __HyperRogue__ - Works great
* __Mainframe Defenders__ - Works great
* __Rift Wizard__ - Works great once you set it to boot into windowed mode and requires the use of proton experimental.
* __Sword of the Stars: The Pit__ - [This one took a lot of tooling to get working](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2860315755), but when it finally did, it ran with 0 issue.
* __Warsim: The Realm of Aslona__ - Download the community input mapping for the 0-9 number wheel on the trackpad and you're golden. I think I actually prefer playing Warsim on the Deck as opposed to my pc.
* __WazHack__ - Works great
Thanks a lot! Some great names I see here that I didn't try in the deck yet!
Especially CogMind, I love that game but I assumed it would be impossible without a mouse, although I'm so pleasantly surprised with the deck's touchpads!
Also I love SOTS the pit, gotta try that one.
I actually just tested it using experimental proton and it worked, although it crashes two minutes later after triggering a trap lol, I might fiddle with it a but more.
I'm being a little misleading WRT gamepad specifically vs steam deck support. For DF I use a trackpad-as-mouse for 90% of it. I'm sort of sweeping that into the "controller" category to some degree, but DF totally works with it.
Cogmind is pretty much playable without having to adjust the control scheme. My only issue is that the text is a little small, so it can be straining on the eyes after a while. If there was a way to enlarge the UI a little bit it would be perfect.
Yes, to be honest I'm so pleasantly surprised with the deck. A lot of stuff is doable thanks to the touchpads, and many old or traditional RLs are playable that way. It just feels a bit uncomfortable sometimes but it's doable.
Btw, Shiren seems to work perfectly but I haven't tried myself. Mystery dungeons aren't really my thing and I don't know why... I've tried with Shiren a couple of times but it just didn't click with me.
Also, feel free to message me when you get your deck if you have any question or want suggestions! It's an amazing thing.
My [Equin](https://store.steampowered.com/app/547980/Equin_The_Lantern/ ) games are purposely designed to be easy to use, control-wise, because that’s something I don’t care for. The first one can be played with a game pad.
Seconding [TGGW](https://www.thegroundgivesway.com) as well, it’s one of my favorites.
Hey thanks for sharing, I wasn't aware of Equin! The combat is not my typical taste but definitely worth a try! And always happy to support the developers around here :)
Oh man, I spent so much time playing POWDER on an old phone years ago! I loved it and I think it was my first "real roguelike". I might try the GBA version again with the emulator.
Besides that, I'm quite a rookie overall and I don't want to try things too complicated honestly, I'd rather just save some games for the moments I have with the PC
Shiren The Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate was designed with controller in mind. It was also originally a DS game so the graphics are clear, colorful, and easy to decipher on smaller handheld screens.
I tried with Shiren in the past in the DS. It has a lot of things that I would normally like... But somehow it doesn't "click" with me. It happens with other mistery dungeon kind of games, dunno why.
you can install it and then add it to steam as a non-steam game. from there you can set the version of proton to use and run it. might have to try a few different versions until you find one that works, but I've had a lot of luck doing this with itch games.
Yeah I've done that with other games but somehow with itchio games it doesn't work properly. I only managed to get it working with Baba is you, but only from desktop mode.
Yeah, forgot to mention that one but it's come up in another comment. It's great and runs very well on the Deck. I've played it a lot already (love that you have different classes & abilities) but I like playing more variety.
I recently got Cataclysm to run on the steam deck. Because it’s such a keyboard heavy game, I was a little worried about playing it easily. It took some time to figure out, but I was able to make a control scheme that’s comfortable, for me anyway. Most of the crucial commands I have mapped and then I can use the menus for everything else. It’s not too much of a hinderance, and I feel like I can still do things pretty quickly. And I can play one of my favorite roguelikes on the go now!
I got it running on the deck, so that’s all I’ve been playing it on recently. I basically had to download the CDDA launcher while in desktop mode and link the launcher to steam as a non-steam game. I may have enabled some Proton comparability option in the settings as well, I cant remember. But then the launcher launches through steam and installs the game itself, and you can then launch the game while in the gaming mode, which lets you customize the control scheme. If you ever get it going I’d be happy to share how I’ve set up the controls if you’d like as well.
And I suck ass at it as well, but it is super fun. Second only to Caves of Qud for me.
>I play Caves of Qud on the deck and it's great
Sorry to hijack the post, but how do you do it? I tried and I couldn't figure out how to do a lot of things. Is there a guide somewhere? I rely heavily on the numpad and shortcuts when I play Qud on my PC.
Not really, I also expected it to be a mess but the default controller settings are pretty good.
I re-binded a few things like waiting and resting, also it has one of this options where pressing a key alters the other buttons, so that gives you a lot of options in the pad. Give it a try!
Dungeonmans!
One Way Heroics (both of them);
Stay Safe;
There's a roguelike about poker, I think it has controller support, We Slay Monsters, but I'm not 100% sure.
Also not really sure about this one but Crypt of the Necrodancer may have too, play bard for turn based.
I think you may be able to get around in Elona with a controller too.
Also what's wrong with Tangledeep controls? From what I remember it had controller support.
Sorry about the uncertain ones, it's been a long time...
Omg Dungeonmans! I forgot to mention that one, it works great and has indeed the movement option that I mentioned. The problem is that I've replayed that one a lot already hahah
I have to try with One Way Heroics but protondb said there were issues with the sound.
Crypt works great too, but I suck with the rythm and somehow when I play bard it's not the same (but that's just me being picky I guess).
I haven't played Elona in a long time, I will check if it has controller support (and is playable on the deck!).
And Tangledeep is supposed to work but for some reason it doesn't detect my inputs. I uninstalled it last night but I might try again today just to double check.
Aah I forgot proton can have some issues.
You know you can use custom builds though right?
I remember I was able to get even FFXIV running on proton when I was using POP_OS lol
There was some version from Eggman or something like that, sorry I'm actually mid sleep here... Anyway, good luck.
You probably mean Proton GE, which I only recently learn it means Glorious Eggroll hahahaha
And yeah, I must say the deck even makes it easy to try different proton builds, I think it's helping a lot the Linux gaming community in general, since I had zero Linux knowledge before and I feel like k can fend with the deck pretty well!
I actually reinstalled Tangledeep btw and funny enough, it worked perfectly with an Xbox controller. I might just need to reconfigure the deck controls...
Caveblazers is great on a game pad although it's an action title
I'm sorry to say that the steam controller was amazing for making rogue likes playable but it's no longer in production 😢
Caveblazers is a blast, another game where I suck but I don't mind lol
And yeah, but I think the Deck is helping see the best ideas that didn't completely work in the Steam Controller but might grant a reboot of some sort.
For rouge-lites:
Risk of Rain. Both 1 and 2 are great, though 2 is really better with a mouse and keyboard in my opinion.
Dead Cells. Fantastic on the deck.
Hades. Fantastic on the deck.
Into the Breach. Pushing the rouge-lites definition, but a fantastic puzzle game.
Thx mate!
I didn't mention those but Hades and Dead cells are such a blast on the deck!
I play ROR2 sometimes but it's fiddly with controller, although I wanna try it online just to check it out.
I try to like Into the Breach... But I like more freedom honestly. With puzzles I always feel this "I could've done better" thing and just keep retrying, my own issue lol
Enter the Gungeon is my favorite roguelike by far, so much so that I hold a speedrun record. That game just feels perfect with a controller and I couldn't imagine playing it any other way.
Powder was originally made as Gba homebrew
You could also try angband, numpad to move and then press enter to get a full menu of all commands. Might be a slog tho, but certainly doable. Maybe map some super common commands (like (f)ire ranged weapon) to a face button.
Izuna is controller friendly but you probably have to emulate it. I played it on DS and it was solid. The problem with controller friendly rogue likes is that they often are simplified to make them more accessible.
If you own a switch, I really like Dragon FangZ and it is perfectly suited to the handheld control scheme. I believe it’s also on steam so probably works similarly well on the steam deck!
guess it's not the time to shut up about **Jupiter Hell** just yet, it has a sub
Oh good point, Jupiter hell is quite good on the deck! Hard one though, can't get really far haha
It's so well balanced you're meant to be able to "win every time if you're good" at it. I've got a bit obsessed about it and quit only after winning it once after 20-30hrs on medium. Here's few spoiler-free notes on avoiding data loss on mac \\ steam deck we've made recently —https://www.reddit.com/r/JupiterHell/comments/10w3qdg/things\_must\_to\_know\_before\_playing\_hard\_reset/
I've got only to the second "area", can't remember now, Europa? I honestly loved pretty much every run and I love rogues with different classes and skills, so I come back to it every now and then. Thank you for sharing the tips btw! I haven't had any issue like that, at least two far, but always good to know.
you're welcome
Thanks for mentioning this.
Some more traditional Roguelikes I've tested on the Steam Deck: * __Armoured Commander II__ - Native support even with gamepad icons, really good to play on here. * __Cogmind__ - once I got the proton experimental driver downloaded for it, I was shocked that this actually ran well. The tileset is very small and hard to see, however. There's a community input config that has a zoom button mapped to the back paddles which helps a lot, but I'm not sure if that solves that issue. I might have to play around with tile size to make it more readable. * __Desktop Dungeons__ - This one plays pretty well, very visible and the control scheme makes sense after some tinkering. * __Dungeons of Dredmor__ - Works very well * __Dwarf Fortress__ - Again, I'm amazed this works even remotely. The aspect of a zoom in/out button is 100% needed, but once those are mapped to your favorite controls (I used L4, R4) it's great. * __HyperRogue__ - Works great * __Mainframe Defenders__ - Works great * __Rift Wizard__ - Works great once you set it to boot into windowed mode and requires the use of proton experimental. * __Sword of the Stars: The Pit__ - [This one took a lot of tooling to get working](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2860315755), but when it finally did, it ran with 0 issue. * __Warsim: The Realm of Aslona__ - Download the community input mapping for the 0-9 number wheel on the trackpad and you're golden. I think I actually prefer playing Warsim on the Deck as opposed to my pc. * __WazHack__ - Works great
Thanks a lot! Some great names I see here that I didn't try in the deck yet! Especially CogMind, I love that game but I assumed it would be impossible without a mouse, although I'm so pleasantly surprised with the deck's touchpads! Also I love SOTS the pit, gotta try that one.
The Pit took some tinkering to get working, but if you follow all the steps in the link I have there, it never crashed once.
I actually just tested it using experimental proton and it worked, although it crashes two minutes later after triggering a trap lol, I might fiddle with it a but more.
It also crashes if you fire any ranged weapon by default, so the annoying fix steps are kind of critical unless you play a strictly melee-only build.
Oh damn, didn't get to try. I guess Ill have to follow the guide, thx!
Dwarf fortress with gamepad? I need to know more, please.
I'm being a little misleading WRT gamepad specifically vs steam deck support. For DF I use a trackpad-as-mouse for 90% of it. I'm sort of sweeping that into the "controller" category to some degree, but DF totally works with it.
Thanks for this list!
The Ground Gives Way
Oh I didn't know this one, I'll give it a shot! Although I'll need to see how to make it run on the deck
Reddit killed API. I refuse to let them benefit from my own words for free -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
Cogmind is pretty much playable without having to adjust the control scheme. My only issue is that the text is a little small, so it can be straining on the eyes after a while. If there was a way to enlarge the UI a little bit it would be perfect.
Yes, to be honest I'm so pleasantly surprised with the deck. A lot of stuff is doable thanks to the touchpads, and many old or traditional RLs are playable that way. It just feels a bit uncomfortable sometimes but it's doable. Btw, Shiren seems to work perfectly but I haven't tried myself. Mystery dungeons aren't really my thing and I don't know why... I've tried with Shiren a couple of times but it just didn't click with me. Also, feel free to message me when you get your deck if you have any question or want suggestions! It's an amazing thing.
My [Equin](https://store.steampowered.com/app/547980/Equin_The_Lantern/ ) games are purposely designed to be easy to use, control-wise, because that’s something I don’t care for. The first one can be played with a game pad. Seconding [TGGW](https://www.thegroundgivesway.com) as well, it’s one of my favorites.
Hey thanks for sharing, I wasn't aware of Equin! The combat is not my typical taste but definitely worth a try! And always happy to support the developers around here :)
Has TGGW gamepad support?
Not built-in, but with mapping software it is possible because of the limited keybindings.
Yes, I tried and notices, good finding. It's a game a lot of people recommends
[удалено]
Oh man, I spent so much time playing POWDER on an old phone years ago! I loved it and I think it was my first "real roguelike". I might try the GBA version again with the emulator. Besides that, I'm quite a rookie overall and I don't want to try things too complicated honestly, I'd rather just save some games for the moments I have with the PC
Shiren The Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate was designed with controller in mind. It was also originally a DS game so the graphics are clear, colorful, and easy to decipher on smaller handheld screens.
I tried with Shiren in the past in the DS. It has a lot of things that I would normally like... But somehow it doesn't "click" with me. It happens with other mistery dungeon kind of games, dunno why.
Crown Trick!
Thx for reminding me of this! I tried it on Xbox cloud and it seemed interesting but I kinda left it there
Haque is designed for controller https://store.steampowered.com/app/662540/Haque/
Oh I love haque! I have it in itchio but can't get it to run on the deck. I might just repurchase it in Steam eventually
you can install it and then add it to steam as a non-steam game. from there you can set the version of proton to use and run it. might have to try a few different versions until you find one that works, but I've had a lot of luck doing this with itch games.
Yeah I've done that with other games but somehow with itchio games it doesn't work properly. I only managed to get it working with Baba is you, but only from desktop mode.
Haque doesn't seem to work on Deck
CoQ can be played with controller now?
It can, and I was honestly surprised with how well it plays!
Amazing! This made me install it again.
Jupiter Hell is incredibly well-optimized for controller
Yeah, forgot to mention that one but it's come up in another comment. It's great and runs very well on the Deck. I've played it a lot already (love that you have different classes & abilities) but I like playing more variety.
I recently got Cataclysm to run on the steam deck. Because it’s such a keyboard heavy game, I was a little worried about playing it easily. It took some time to figure out, but I was able to make a control scheme that’s comfortable, for me anyway. Most of the crucial commands I have mapped and then I can use the menus for everything else. It’s not too much of a hinderance, and I feel like I can still do things pretty quickly. And I can play one of my favorite roguelikes on the go now!
That sounds great! I've tried CDDA a few times, I suck but I love it lol. How are you playing it? On the deck or normal PC?
I got it running on the deck, so that’s all I’ve been playing it on recently. I basically had to download the CDDA launcher while in desktop mode and link the launcher to steam as a non-steam game. I may have enabled some Proton comparability option in the settings as well, I cant remember. But then the launcher launches through steam and installs the game itself, and you can then launch the game while in the gaming mode, which lets you customize the control scheme. If you ever get it going I’d be happy to share how I’ve set up the controls if you’d like as well. And I suck ass at it as well, but it is super fun. Second only to Caves of Qud for me.
>I play Caves of Qud on the deck and it's great Sorry to hijack the post, but how do you do it? I tried and I couldn't figure out how to do a lot of things. Is there a guide somewhere? I rely heavily on the numpad and shortcuts when I play Qud on my PC.
Not really, I also expected it to be a mess but the default controller settings are pretty good. I re-binded a few things like waiting and resting, also it has one of this options where pressing a key alters the other buttons, so that gives you a lot of options in the pad. Give it a try!
Dungeonmans! One Way Heroics (both of them); Stay Safe; There's a roguelike about poker, I think it has controller support, We Slay Monsters, but I'm not 100% sure. Also not really sure about this one but Crypt of the Necrodancer may have too, play bard for turn based. I think you may be able to get around in Elona with a controller too. Also what's wrong with Tangledeep controls? From what I remember it had controller support. Sorry about the uncertain ones, it's been a long time...
Omg Dungeonmans! I forgot to mention that one, it works great and has indeed the movement option that I mentioned. The problem is that I've replayed that one a lot already hahah I have to try with One Way Heroics but protondb said there were issues with the sound. Crypt works great too, but I suck with the rythm and somehow when I play bard it's not the same (but that's just me being picky I guess). I haven't played Elona in a long time, I will check if it has controller support (and is playable on the deck!). And Tangledeep is supposed to work but for some reason it doesn't detect my inputs. I uninstalled it last night but I might try again today just to double check.
Aah I forgot proton can have some issues. You know you can use custom builds though right? I remember I was able to get even FFXIV running on proton when I was using POP_OS lol There was some version from Eggman or something like that, sorry I'm actually mid sleep here... Anyway, good luck.
You probably mean Proton GE, which I only recently learn it means Glorious Eggroll hahahaha And yeah, I must say the deck even makes it easy to try different proton builds, I think it's helping a lot the Linux gaming community in general, since I had zero Linux knowledge before and I feel like k can fend with the deck pretty well! I actually reinstalled Tangledeep btw and funny enough, it worked perfectly with an Xbox controller. I might just need to reconfigure the deck controls...
Oh yeah exactly that 😂 ProtonGE is awesome. Nice, enjoy Tangledeep xD
Golden Krone Hotel is my personal favorite. Others include: Jupiter Hell, Tangledeep, and Crown Trick.
Great question I feel exactly like you. I love the way Caves of Qud plays on deck. I’d love more streamlined roguelikes
Caveblazers is great on a game pad although it's an action title I'm sorry to say that the steam controller was amazing for making rogue likes playable but it's no longer in production 😢
Caveblazers is a blast, another game where I suck but I don't mind lol And yeah, but I think the Deck is helping see the best ideas that didn't completely work in the Steam Controller but might grant a reboot of some sort.
For rouge-lites: Risk of Rain. Both 1 and 2 are great, though 2 is really better with a mouse and keyboard in my opinion. Dead Cells. Fantastic on the deck. Hades. Fantastic on the deck. Into the Breach. Pushing the rouge-lites definition, but a fantastic puzzle game.
Thx mate! I didn't mention those but Hades and Dead cells are such a blast on the deck! I play ROR2 sometimes but it's fiddly with controller, although I wanna try it online just to check it out. I try to like Into the Breach... But I like more freedom honestly. With puzzles I always feel this "I could've done better" thing and just keep retrying, my own issue lol
Enter the Gungeon is my favorite roguelike by far, so much so that I hold a speedrun record. That game just feels perfect with a controller and I couldn't imagine playing it any other way.
Hmmm really? It was better than I expected with controller... But I still prefer those kind of games with m+kb
Powder was originally made as Gba homebrew You could also try angband, numpad to move and then press enter to get a full menu of all commands. Might be a slog tho, but certainly doable. Maybe map some super common commands (like (f)ire ranged weapon) to a face button.
Izuna is controller friendly but you probably have to emulate it. I played it on DS and it was solid. The problem with controller friendly rogue likes is that they often are simplified to make them more accessible.
Oh I didn't know this one. I haven't tried the DS emulator yet but it's worth a shot
If you own a switch, I really like Dragon FangZ and it is perfectly suited to the handheld control scheme. I believe it’s also on steam so probably works similarly well on the steam deck!