[confident_inept]

Emulation aside, the Steam Deck has been compared to the Switch in some capacity or another in almost every single review I have ever seen of it. While I wouldn't think it's had any negative impact on Switch sales, it's a absolute fact that the Deck can emulate a multitude of games at performance parity or better than the Switch itself. The deck is constantly lauded as an emulation powerhouse and the Switch appears frequently in the discourse.

Emulation legality aside, Nintendo would certainly be the company I would expect to pressure Valve for a case against enabling and abetting piracy given their history of legally attacking perceived "competition".

[odessacubbage]

ultimately the iwata strategy of 'sell hardware that is underpowered compared to the competition & and bank on 1st party titles & exclusives to stay competitive' was going to create this problem sooner or later, even 10 years ago it was relatively trivial to run games in dolphin that offered parity if not better performance than official nintendo hardware (not to mention far superior netplay with less headaches). unlike the wii or the ds, the switch's central gimmick, 2-in-1 portability is not some niche offshoot but rather the logical path of progression for pretty much the rest of the market and was already a fairly occupied space before either nintendo or valve decided to pursue that direction. if nintendo continues on this path, then nintendo devices will no longer be the best way to experience nintendo games; arguably that has already been the case for some time.

[danieldisu]

They sell hardware that is very competitive in price, and I thank that was one of the biggest selling points of the switch