As of Christmas Eve, I’m shutting down the desktop PC and burrowing under a pile of blankets to begin my winter holiday. But I’m not leaving my PC games behind: I’m just going to be playing them on the Steam Deck. Valve’s handheld gaming PC has given me a great excuse to play some of the older games in my Steam library this year, but it’s also made me hungry to snap up deals on games that feel perfect for the Deck. There’s no better time for that than during the Steam Winter sale, which is on now and runs until January 5.
Below I’ve collected the standout deals from our best Steam Deck games list—our top picks that are on significant discount. We also have a guide to the best deals from the 2022 Steam Winter sale in general, but not everything there is primed for portable play. Here are __ games we love on the handheld, broken down into under $25, under $10, and under $5 tiers.
2022’s best Steam Deck games on sale
Elden Ring | $41.99 / £34.99 (30% off)
This is the first discount we’ve seen for FromSoftware’s 2022 magnum opus, which runs at a solid 30 fps on the Steam Deck (and is remarkably less stuttery there than it is on desktop).
Pentiment | $14.99 / £11.24 (25% off)
Give Fallout: New Vegas developers Obsidian free reign to follow a passion project and you get a historical murder mystery that’s basically Fresco Elysium. Full controller support makes it an easy fit for the Deck.
Vampire Survivors | $3.99 / £3.19 (20% off)
Earlier in 2022, we called Vampire Survivors “one of the best deals you can get on PC” at its full price: $4.99. Now it’s on sale for just $3.99. It’s regularly at the top of Valve’s most-played Steam Deck games chart for good reason.