Valve gives Half-Life 2 a new interface, possibly due to the arrival of Steam Deck – Gaming – News

Valve has provided Half-Life 2 with a new user interface, which is more suitable for controllers and screens with high resolutions. The company may be doing so because of the upcoming release of the Steam Deck, which will go on sale next month.

De update was noticed by twitter user gabefollower, the also gives instructions to enable the new interface. Valve doesn’t appear to have widely released the update yet, but users can force it by enabling beta updates for the game. Users can do that by right-clicking on the game in their Steam library and then ‘properties‘ in ‘betas‘ to select. In addition, users -gamepadui fill in under the launch options. They can also be found in the properties, under ‘general‘.

The new interface seems to be more suitable for control with a controller and also better scaling on high-resolution screens. In the main menu, the various buttons are considerably larger and easier to select than before. The settings menu and the screens for loading save files and viewing achievements have also been renewed.

Valve seems to be preparing for the Steam Deck with the new update, as it makes the interface available as a ‘gamepad ui’. The sale of that handheld starts on February 25 and the first copies will ship February 28. The handheld has an integrated gamepad and a 7″ screen with a resolution of 1280×800 pixels. Gabefollower writes that the interface may have been created in whole or in part by someone from the Half-Life community, after which it was implemented by Valve itself. Half Life 2 came out in 2004.