Overview

This is documentation for the “MythDeck” configuration to be used with “Myth II: Soulblighter” on the Steam Deck. I’ve included some info on how to install Myth 2 on the Steam Deck and some controls-related gameplay notes, but the main point here is to describe how to use the Steam Deck controls. When it comes to how-to-play-Myth basics, this is not a substitute for the game manual!

The most important things to know about using this configuration are that you must be using the Project Magma patch for Myth 2 (version 1.8.3 or later) and you must enable “Alternate Preset Recall” in the Myth controls preferences. Failure to do this will result in having a really bad time! These and some other setup recommendations are covered in the Myth Setup pages (see the Navigation table of contents in the sidebar).

Background

Myth: The Fallen Lords and Myth II: Soulblighter are a couple of my favorite games from the golden age of back when the World Wide Web was just getting off the ground. Along with Quake and a small number of other titles, they’re games that I always have installed and it’s fun to try them out in new contexts. Fortunately a small but dedicated community of players and developers have kept Myth updated and playable on new hardware and operating systems.

So Myth on the Steam Deck was something I wanted to try. The Myth games leverage the capabilities of mouse and keyboard input very heavily – at one point I looked into making a good Myth configuration for the original Steam Controller and couldn’t pull it off – but it looked like the Steam Deck would have just enough input oomph to make it work. (Also sometimes I enjoy the process of optimizing a game control scheme a bit too much.)

This config is what I ended up with! I like it a lot. So far I’ve played through the Myth 2 single player campaign with it, on Normal difficulty which is down a notch from the Heroic setting I would have originally used with m+kb. The Myth 2 campaign is one I haven’t dusted off for many years now so IMO being able to play it on Normal, lounging in a bed/sofa/chair, seems pretty good.

I don’t really expect many other folks to look at this, but hey if you are reading this then welcome. Hope you have fun!

How to use this

A bare-bones summary of how to use this configuration:

  • Install Myth 2 on your Steam Deck, including the Project Magma patch.

  • Add Myth 2 to Steam as a “non-Steam game” shortcut. Give that shortcut the name “Myth II: Soulblighter”. You must use that specific name in order for the “MythDeck” configuration to be available for you on Steam.

  • Select the game that you added and open the controller settings. In the community input configurations, select “MythDeck”.

  • Launch Myth 2. Note that you can use the right trackpad to mouse around and click in the game menus (right trigger can also be used to mouseclick).

  • In the Myth 2 controls preferences, make sure you are using the default “Right Handed” set of control keys,

  • Also make sure that “Alternate Preset Recall” is enabled, and check the Myth Setup pages here for some other recommendations.

  • At this point you’re good to go, but you should really have a look at the Deck Config pages here for a controls explanation, and maybe the “Tips” pages for some general info.

OK? Not trivial I guess, but not too bad, especially if you’re already used to adding non-Steam games to your Deck. To go through these steps in detail, start with Installation and then keep clicking the next-page link at the bottom of each page.