> here is just nothing out there that beats mouse and keyboard for more competitive sessions of dota, csgo, starcraft.
I'm not sure that it's close enough for truly competitive play, but look into flick stick and gyro mouse. For first person games it's good enough that I've been able to hop online in a couple of older first person shooters without aim assist and get roughly (or at least close to) the same performance I would get from a mouse today. It's certainly good enough for the vast majority of single-player campaigns to the point where you wouldn't be missing much if anything by not using a mouse.
Gryo mouse isn't quite as good, it's fine for menus and point-and-click games, but falls down a bit more for stuff like RTS games. I've been trying to figure out control schemes to make it perform better for faster movements without losing precision. It's comfortable enough to use as a general mouse, but I don't think I could use it competitively in an RTS (although I do think I could probably get through a single-player campaign).
I'm mildly hopeful that those control schemes will get better in the future, but even today as someone who pretty much only ever played PC games with a mouse, it's switched me from thinking of the Steam Deck as a primarily 2D/3D/platformer device where I could maybe pick up an FPS if it had really good aim assist, into a device where I wouldn't hesitate to load up pretty much any FPS on it without aim assist. I'm not getting 100% of the performance I used to get with a mouse in older high-precision aiming games like Sauerbraten, but I'm not sure how much of that is that I'm generally out of practice using a sniper rifle and that I haven't put hundreds of hours into practicing with gyro controls. I am still getting kills in those games.
Gyro controls have a couple of issues to work out, mainly stability when you're trying to hold the cursor still, but there's potential there to get (very close to) mouse-like precision for the majority of players who aren't investing hundreds of hours into getting competitive -- especially if games start to take advantage of them natively instead of forcing players to hack them together with mouse emulation.
I'm not sure that it's close enough for truly competitive play, but look into flick stick and gyro mouse. For first person games it's good enough that I've been able to hop online in a couple of older first person shooters without aim assist and get roughly (or at least close to) the same performance I would get from a mouse today. It's certainly good enough for the vast majority of single-player campaigns to the point where you wouldn't be missing much if anything by not using a mouse.
Gryo mouse isn't quite as good, it's fine for menus and point-and-click games, but falls down a bit more for stuff like RTS games. I've been trying to figure out control schemes to make it perform better for faster movements without losing precision. It's comfortable enough to use as a general mouse, but I don't think I could use it competitively in an RTS (although I do think I could probably get through a single-player campaign).
I'm mildly hopeful that those control schemes will get better in the future, but even today as someone who pretty much only ever played PC games with a mouse, it's switched me from thinking of the Steam Deck as a primarily 2D/3D/platformer device where I could maybe pick up an FPS if it had really good aim assist, into a device where I wouldn't hesitate to load up pretty much any FPS on it without aim assist. I'm not getting 100% of the performance I used to get with a mouse in older high-precision aiming games like Sauerbraten, but I'm not sure how much of that is that I'm generally out of practice using a sniper rifle and that I haven't put hundreds of hours into practicing with gyro controls. I am still getting kills in those games.
Gyro controls have a couple of issues to work out, mainly stability when you're trying to hold the cursor still, but there's potential there to get (very close to) mouse-like precision for the majority of players who aren't investing hundreds of hours into getting competitive -- especially if games start to take advantage of them natively instead of forcing players to hack them together with mouse emulation.