A recent statement from Arrowhead Game Studios' CEO Shams Jorjani has tempered hopes for official Steam Deck support in Helldivers 2. Speaking on the game's official Discord, Jorjani explained that the studio must first stabilize the core PC experience before considering handheld optimization. "We want to primarily get the game working well on the sys requirements we target. If we make that happen, Steam deck will improve as well. Then we might consider formally supporting it more," he said. The admission comes as players report wildly uneven performance on Valve's portable PC, with frame rates frequently cratering into the 20s during heavy combat.
Helldivers 2 launched to massive acclaim, merging chaotic cooperative action with cross-platform multiplayer across PC and PlayStation 5. Its recent arrival on Xbox has only expanded its audience. Yet the Unreal Engine 5-powered shooter has been a tough sell for handheld hardware. While the game includes a "Steam Deck" graphics preset, that preset alone doesn't deliver a smooth experience without extensive community tweaking—and even then, the results are often unstable.
The Steam Deck's hardware, built around a custom AMD APU with RDNA 2 graphics and a 4–15W power envelope, was never designed for the kind of asset-dense, particle-heavy workloads that Helldivers 2 throws at it. Benchmarks and user reports consistently show the Deck hitting high VRAM usage even at the lowest settings, leading to stuttering when new areas stream in or when dozens of enemies fill the screen. Proton compatibility, required to run the Windows version on SteamOS, adds another layer of complexity; some players have had to resort to community Proton-GE builds to bypass anti-cheat hurdles.
Arrowhead's decision to prioritize stability over handheld optimization is understandable—but frustrating for portable gaming enthusiasts. The game's most recent update, "Into the Unjust," introduced crashing bugs that the studio had to quickly patch, underscoring the technical debt Jorjani has acknowledged. "Our goal is to make the game stable and playable for everyone on the hardware we officially support," he said in a separate Discord exchange. "Once we're there, we can look at other platforms." This triage-first approach is common in live-service games, but it leaves Steam Deck owners in limbo.
So what would proper Steam Deck support look like? Developers who target Valve's handheld often implement handheld-specific rendering presets that aggressively cap expensive effects, precompile shaders for Proton to eliminate runtime stutters, and optimize streaming to avoid frame-time spikes. For Helldivers 2, that could mean a dynamic resolution scaler tuned for the Deck's 800p screen, memory budgeting that keeps VRAM usage within the Deck's 16GB shared pool, and UI scaling for the smaller display. All of this is achievable—and has been done for other UE5 titles—but it requires dedicated engineering time that Arrowhead currently doesn't have.
The handheld landscape extends beyond the Steam Deck, and that's where the conversation gets more nuanced. Windows-based handhelds like the ASUS ROG Ally and its upcoming successor, the Ally X, pack more punch. The Ally X, for instance, features AMD's Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme chip with a more powerful iGPU and an NPU, giving it a performance edge over the Deck. In theory, Helldivers 2 could run better on such hardware without the need for Proton translation. However, a bigger obstacle looms: ecosystem fragmentation.
Helldivers 2 currently offers no cross-progression between Steam and Xbox. A player who buys the game on Steam for their Deck cannot carry progress over to an Xbox console, and vice versa. The title isn't even available on the Xbox Store for Windows, meaning Ally owners who use Xbox Game Pass or the Xbox ecosystem must purchase it separately on Steam. Arrowhead's community manager has confirmed there are no plans for cross-save, making the prospect of a seamless handheld-to-console experience a non-starter for many. This isn't just a technical limitation—it's a commercial and design decision that undercuts the value of portable play in a game centered on persistent progression.
So where does that leave players now? For those determined to spread democracy on the go, some short-term measures can help. On Steam Deck, switching to the in-game Steam Deck preset and then manually lowering shadows, reflections, and view distance is a must. Capping the frame rate at 30 or 40 FPS via the Deck's quick-access menu provides a more consistent experience. Adventurous users can explore community Proton-GE builds, though these come with no guarantees and potential anti-cheat risks. On Windows handhelds like the Ally X, performance will be better out of the box thanks to raw hardware headroom, but don't expect desktop-class visuals or battery life; lowering settings and capping frames remains wise.
The road ahead is uncertain. Arrowhead has shown a willingness to engage with its community, and Jorjani's comments leave the door open for future handheld support. The studio is still in the thick of post-launch content drops and bug fixing, and those rightly take precedence. Handheld gamers must weigh the reality: a playable but compromised experience today, with no clear timeline for official optimization. The booming handheld market, with its new Z2-series chips and growing user base, will only increase pressure on developers to cater to portable play. Whether Arrowhead can afford to ignore that demand indefinitely is the question that lingers after every stuttering firefight on the Deck.