A while back I became quite disappointed when I noticed that my Steam Deck started to drift in games that utilized the gyro controls. Even if I were to calibrate the controls, the drift would return every time I powered on the system or woke it up from sleep.
I contacted Steam support who recommended to do a factory reset, but then I would need to download all the games anew. There had to be another way!
I scoured the internet in hope to get some answers, but all I got was either the normal calibration “trick” (it’s not a trick if it’s an actual function, lol) or some random scripts that forced the calibration settings automatically every reboot which didn’t work.
So, this started around when I got myself a dock for the Steam Deck. Because of this, I was afraid that it might have caused some damage to the system. Too bad, because I loved having a powerful, albeit a clunky Nintendon’t Steam Pro™…
However, one day when I was about to play I had it laying flat on the desk next to me while it was booting when an update had been received. Without picking it up, I applied the update and rebooted. Back in business, when I started the game and was about to do the calibration as per usual, lo and behold, the gyro drift was gone!
I wonder if the drift had anything to do with the Steam Deck resting on the dock, slightly tilted? It sure seems like it, I have now restarted the Steam Deck (both laying flat and while holding it) and the gyro is all calibrated now. However, I noticed a slight drift when I started the Deck while resting my thumb on the capacitive area of the joystick. I guess it’s like when you start up a console holding the stick in a certain direction, and the console thinks that direction is the resting position.
So if you’re having issues with the gyro, remember – for great justice, don’t fiddle the sticks while booting.