Resident Evil Requiem gets playable status on Steam Deck, but will it become fully verified?

Wherever you look on social media right now, Resident Evil Requiem is likely appearing in one way or another. Despite releasing on PS5 and Xbox, Capcom is pushing the Nintendo Switch 2 version of RE9 hard, and for a good reason – it’s a fantastic port. However, performance on other platforms still requires a few tweaks. Resident Evil Requiem’s Steam Deck playability is surprisingly solid, and it looks like it could get better.

Before launch, Resident Evil Requiem’s Steam Deck-verified status carried a concerning ‘unsupported’ label. That isn’t always a bad thing; there are plenty of games that run on Valve’s handheld, despite the lack of a higher-tier status. Even the best Resident Evil games have a different reputation on handheld PCs, though, especially with Resident Evil 4 suffering from the complexities of the Engima DRM. In a recent small update to RE9 on PC, it’s bumped the game’s status on Steam Deck to ‘playable’.

That’s a promising addition to the game’s handheld reputation, as the caveats that come with it aren’t exactly massive. In fact, Steam says that the main reason it isn’t fully verified right now is that “this game requires manual configuration of graphics settings to perform well on
Steam Deck.” Toggling settings to get a Steam Deck game running smoother isn’t exactly unexpected. Whether you’re using Valve’s platform or the ROG Ally, a little tweaking is always required for optimal performance.

Performance-wise, Resident Evil Requiem holds its own on the Steam Deck, if you’re willing to make some fidelity compromises. Capcom’s RE Engine doesn’t always play ball on handheld PCs, with notable examples including Dragon’s Dogma 2. But with a mixture of low and medium settings, RE9 can truck along with a pretty dependable framerate around the 40fps mark. That’s with AMD FSR 3.1.5 upscaling set to balanced, as this looks slightly better and can help prevent artifacting and minor visual inconsistencies from putting you off playing altogether.

For the tinkerers out there, you can mod Requiem to utilize FSR 4, which improves performance beyond what’s currently available. In a similar case, third-party applications like Lossless Scaling, which you can enable through a Decky Loader plugin, can help with how it fares on the Steam Deck. Again, you’ll likely run into a few visual hiccups due to the nature of the plugin. Beyond finding a home on Valve’s console, Steam is also the place where Requiem is thriving right now.

According to a report from Alinea Analytics, Resident Evil Requiem has sold more than 2.3 million copies, surpassing an estimated 1.7 million on PlayStation and around 300,000 on Xbox. Not a bad feat at all, Capcom. If you haven’t bought it yet, then our glowing 9/10 Resident Evil Requiem review has everything you need to know.