Masters of Albion faces Steam Deck Unsupported rating despite developer efforts

Peter Molyneux’s Masters of Albion hit a familiar Steam Deck wall: 22cans had worked up a handheld setup with trackpad support and full Steam Input support, but Valve still tagged the game Unsupported. The mismatch landed right as the new god game entered early access in late April 2026, turning a compatibility badge into the latest flashpoint around Deck trust.

22cans had initially described the game as Steam Deck compatible while it waited for Valve’s official badge. That optimism ran into Valve’s standards, which appear to have drawn the line at performance. Masters of Albion can run on the device, but not cleanly enough for the badge 22cans expected, and the result is a public verdict that reads harsher than the studio’s own effort sounded.

Valve’s system divides Deck support into four buckets: Verified, Playable, Unsupported, and Unknown. The company says the review process is ongoing and covers tens of thousands of titles already on Steam, with ratings updated as hardware and software evolve. Valve also says the badge affects how a game is presented in the store and library, not whether it can be bought or launched on Steam Deck. That store presentation matters, because Steam’s Deck page puts the first tab on games that are great on Steam Deck, making the badge a powerful discovery filter for handheld buyers.

The problem with Masters of Albion was not simply whether it booted. Its performance on Deck hovered around 30 fps at the lowest settings, but often slipped into the mid-20s and late teens, while mouse-heavy controls made handheld play awkward. That is the kind of experience that can make an Unsupported label feel frustrating to a studio that has already spent time tailoring input and interface work for the device. 22cans said performance optimization remained a primary focus and that it would seek re-verification after future updates.

Valve has also tried to make its own system more responsive. On April 24, 2026, it introduced developer-facing tools that track rolling 30-day frame-rate data for certified games and let players submit feedback after more than 10 minutes of play, including complaints about text legibility, performance, and stability. The tools suggest Valve knows the badge system needs more live data, not just a one-time stamp.

For Masters of Albion, the verdict in early May was not the end of the story so much as the latest reminder that Steam Deck approval still lives in a gray area between what developers think is ready and what Valve is willing to certify.