Not sure if Valve 'woke up' too late, as opposed to simply taking longer to come to market, and with a much more grand vision than other manufacturers have.

Valve recently released a promo booklet for the Steam Deck [1]. Page 14 of that booklet describes how each of their products have iterated in various verticals for their platform to make one cohesive device.

Namely:

* The Steam Controller: Produced the Steam Input system, one of the most flexible input systems in existence.

* The Steam Link: Produced Remote Play, which to my knowledge has no relative competition on other platforms.

* The Steam Machine: Produced SteamOS and Proton.

* The Valve Index: Produced the first premium product from Valve, and the lessons learned from manufacturing, shipping, and support.

All of these devices combined gave us the Steam Deck. Considering the pandemic's impact, Valve has made more rapid progress than Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony since 2015 in the gaming space. The usual market players have had years to make small iterations. Valve caught up in approx. 7 years, and with an open platform that provides more innovation to come.

Don't get me wrong - the Nintendo Switch is a fantastic device, and sparked a new form factor and experience that others only hope to emulate. As usual, they define the handheld gaming market. But Valve shot for the sun and came very close.

1: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675200/view/3401926...

I own a Switch and a Steam Deck. While the Deck _looks_ too big, it feels much better and is more comfortable for long gaming sessions.

Same experience here, and I don't have particularly large or small hands. The Switch is uncomfortable to hold- the joycons are a little too thin so you have to grip it awkwardly, whereas the Steam Deck actually has contoured grips like a full-size controller.

The Switch feels like a Game&Watch after playing with the Deck for a while :D

Former PS Vita owner here, still burns me up thinking about it. It was the absolute perfect form factor and had "just enough" processing power to play some really interesting games, sort of like the Nintendo Switch today (but much smaller). Up until I sold my device to a collector in 2020 it was still my preferred platform for Stardew Valley.