Well, at CES 2025, the reveal of a third-party SteamOS handheld, the Lenovo Legion Go S, paves the way – and it's "the first of many" from various potential makers, signalling what I think could be the death of the Steam Deck and the birth of, well, spiritual Steam Deck-like successors.

Lenovo announced that its upcoming Legion Go S PC gaming handheld will be the first non-Valve device to include SteamOS, although a Windows option will still be available.

The Steam Deck led to a surge of handheld gaming PCs, but GPD has been making its own options since before Valve entered the scene. Now the company has revealed a new laptop-handheld hybrid, the GPD Win Mini 2025.

As reported by Rock Paper Shotgun, the upcoming grand strategy title Civilization VII will come with a Steam 'Deck Verified' tag at launch. In plain terms, this means that Civilization VII passed Valve's round of testing to ensure that the game gets along with the Steam Deck without issues.