Despite keyboard and mouse typically dominating the PC gaming sphere, over the years, new controller iterations have swayed the common gaming formula, with Xbox’s Elite Controller 2 and PlayStation 5’s DualSense standing out as ingenious feats in the space. And while both of these controllers do have seamless compatibility with Valve’s Steam client, fans of Nintendo’s various controllers are typically left out of the fun.
But much of the headache has been alleviated over the years, with Nintendo’s Pro Controller joining Steam compatibility back in 2018 and a large assortment of legacy Nintendo controllers joining the list only a month prior. Now, Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons are among the myriad controller specs available on Steam’s beta client. What games they might be used for, however, prove interesting.
Nintendo Switch Joy-Con controllers can be utilized in either the connected pair or as individual controllers, making the addition rather ingenious for those who love toying with games using odd controller setups. As it is with every other controller on Steam, the Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons can also be mapped out to whatever suits your fancy, allowing for a host of creativity and modularity in the way players can approach their many Steam games.
For those who may not be acquainted with Steam’s beta client, the platform is essentially the same as the base Steam app. Only it allows users to test out upcoming updates before they are officially released. To enable Steam’s beta client, simply head to the settings and account tabs, then click “Change” on the beta participation option. This will start a new download of the beta software, and once it’s complete, you are good to go!
Although Nintendo’s Joy-Cons do come with the added caveat of prior drift issues, the company has been consumer friendly in its approach to readily fixing them free of charge. However, this came after myriad complaints and several lawsuits, but at least Nintendo fans don’t have to fear about drift all that much now. There are quite a ton of Nintendo Joy-Cons in the wild.
Nintendo only recently reported that a whopping 111 million Nintendo Switch units have sold in the console’s lifetime, with over 90 million of them being the base Nintendo Switch that comes with joy-cons. While not every one of these consumers also plays on PC, it’s proof enough that a wide assortment of potential gamers strictly use Nintendo hardware.
There are already existing forms of software that allow PC gamers to use Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons on Steam, the most prominent among them being JoyToKey. This program will be overridden by the new Steam beta update, making the controller’s connectivity all the more streamlined. It will be interesting to see how players utilize Nintendo’s Joy-Cons on Steam in either the individual gamepad function or in the combined pair format.