Valve's SteamOS release for handheld consoles other than the company's Steam Deck has not reached the “kicking the can down the road” level of Half-Life 3. But it is getting there.

Last week, we gave you tantalizing hints that Valve's Linux-based gaming OS might be released for Asus' ROG Ally handheld. It still might. But now, after speaking directly with Valve designer Lawrence Yang, it appears that it is not imminent.

“SteamOS is not yet ready for immediate use on other handhelds, but we continue to work on adding support,” he said in the SteamOS release notes, “Added support for extra ROG Ally keys When asked about the new item “Added support for extra ROG Ally keys,” Yang told PC Gamer, “We've added support for extra ROG Ally keys.

In other words, SteamOS is not ready to run on other handhelds today, and Valve has not set a deadline for its release. Nevertheless, with at least a few third parties beginning to support the beta release of SteamOS, I think we're getting somewhere. Not to put too fine a point on it, however, this is still becoming a small stumbling block now.

The original Steam Deck launched more than two years ago, in February 2022, and Valve said a standalone version of SteamOS would be coming soon. And last year, when the revised Steam Deck OLED was released, Valve confirmed that it was focused on bringing SteamOS to other handhelds.

And mid-2024, nothing has been announced; Valve is still working on it, but does not appear to be moving at a rapid pace to announce anything. Of course, one could argue that Valve doesn't particularly need to release SteamOS for competing handhelds, nor does it need to release it as a general build with broad compatibility for PCs.

However, given that SteamOS is currently a fairly significant USP of the Steam Deck, the incentive from Valve's perspective is not at all straightforward.

To be fair to Valve, ensuring a consistent experience across multiple handheld devices is never easy. Even similar hardware can have different performance characteristics. Similarly, differences in specifications of details, such as the number of WiFi adapters or screen resolutions, all need to be supported or optimized.

Put another way, it is one thing to deliver the sophisticated experience of SteamOS on a single in-house device, the Steam Deck, and quite another to make it run smoothly and consistently across a multitude of third-party handhelds, let alone a PC.