CD Projekt Red has offered fans a brief look at how the Witcher 3 will run on Steam Deck, using a number of short clips to show off various aspects of the game running on the new handheld.
Showcased in a series of tweets posted on the Witcher 3 Twitter account, fans will be pleased to see that the Witcher 3 appears to run smoothly on Valve's upcoming handheld PC.
— The Witcher (@witchergame) October 6, 2021
The clips shared by CD Projekt Red detail a range of scenarios including general exploration and combat. Shot on an external camera and with Twitter video compression, it's difficult to tell exactly what resolution the game is running at, but fans on Twitter are impressed with how the game is looking on the handheld's native 800p screen.
From what has been shown by CD Projekt, the game's framerate appears to hold up well across the board. Even as Geralt enters more densely populated areas such as the game's cities, there doesn't seem to be a noticeable effect on performance. As previously reported, we know that the Steam Deck aims to have a baseline target of 30fps for all games being accessed on the handheld – a factor that seems to be maintained in captured gameplay.
— The Witcher (@witchergame) October 6, 2021
We haven't seen what the game looks like when docked and connected to a TV with a higher resolution. Valve has noted that the device won't receive a performance boost when doing so, so it will be interesting to see if and how the performance changes.
While the Witcher 3 is certainly graphically demanding, footage of the game working well on the handheld may not come as a surprise considering that the game has already been ported successfully to Nintendo Switch, which is a less powerful machine. To find out more about the two devices, make sure to check out our comprehensive rundown for how the Steam Deck looks to shape up in comparison to Nintendo's Switch OLED.
In other related news, Valve recently published a video breaking down the Steam Deck in order to showcase the console's inner parts. During the video, the company not only showed fans how to open up the Steam Deck but also how to replace a number of components including the device's thumbsticks and SSD. Despite being an official demo, Valve issued a number of warnings at the beginning of its walkthrough stating that, while they can't stop you from doing so, it is strongly advising you not to open up the Steam Deck for any reason.
Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN who is thoroughly looking forward to "clearing his steam backlog" on the go. You can follow him on Twitter where he'll inevitably break that promise to himself in the coming months.