We’ve already known that Valve was forced to delay the release of the release of Steam Deck, its handheld gaming PC, for a period of time from December 2021 to February 2022 because of the continuing shortage of chips. Thankfully, it appears to be the only reason for a delay to the Steam Deck before its official release date, since Valve confirmed that the Steam Deck will not be delayed until its new date of release without any additional delays.
In an interview recently in a recent interview with PCGamer, Valve designer Greg Coomer confirmed that the company is not required to delay Steam Deck’s releasedate, and the first deliveries are in place for a release date of February 2022. “We’re not happy that we were forced to shift from the end of the year to the beginning of next year. But , all indications point to our ability to launch on February 1,” Coomer told PCGamer.
Despite the February 2022 release confirmed for the Steam Deck, many people who reserved a unit will not receive theirs until later in the year as well saw earlier this year when reservations when up in July. “It’s a real product launch, so many thousands of people right away are going to receive Decks as soon as we’re able to ship them,” Coomer told PCGamer. “But even talking about thousands would be quite low compared to the volumes we’re shooting for in the first few months.”
The Steam Deck is one of many gaming handhelds negatively impacted by the chip shortage. The Playdate, a quirky little gaming handheld, was also delayed into 2022. While the Analogue Pocket was also negatively impacted by the chip shortage, it did meet its 2021 release date. Though new orders won’t ship until next year and the device increased its price by $20.
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