There’s a new Steam Controller in town, but Valve didn’t make it

The divisive Steam Controller was the testing ground for some ideas (touchpads, rear buttons, haptics) that eventually found their way onto Valve’s Steam Deck. While the company hasn’t followed up its 2015 wireless gamepad, peripheral company Hori has, in a way. The new $59.99 wireless Horipad that’s up for pre-order at Amazon (launching Dec. 16) brandishes the Steam logo that doubles as a home button, and it’s presumably the closest thing to a new Steam Controller we’re going to get. Thankfully, it borrows some features you might recognize if you own a Steam Deck.

Notably, its thumbsticks are capacitive like the Steam Deck’s, meaning they know whether your thumb is resting on them or not. This trait allows you to program functions to the sticks via Steam’s controller customization tools, be it triggering gyroscopic aiming (which the controller supports), bringing up a mini map, or any other command you can think of just by holding your finger to the stick. The Horipad for Steam has almost all of same buttons that present on the Steam Deck, including its vital system-level buttons, as well as two pairs of mappable macro buttons. While the Deck puts both pairs on its backside near the grips, this controller puts one pair on the front (underneath the D-pad and right stick) and another pair on the back.

The Horipad for Steam supports Bluetooth, and it can also serve as an XInput controller if you attach it to your computer via the included 9.8-foot USB cable. A switch on its back lets you toggle between wireless and wired mode, and another switch changes whether the triggers are analog or digital. As for what the Horipad lacks, you won’t find rumble support here, nor are there trackpads or a headphone jack.

This controller seems competent for the price, although if you have consoles at home, you may already have a favorite gamepad to use with Steam or a Steam Deck. My former Verge colleague Sam Byford reviewed the Horipad for his blog Multicore before it was announced in more regions, saying that it’s an intriguing controller, but not an impressive one.