Local offline Multiplayer between multiple Decks?

[SirMaoh]

Hey everyone,

does the Steam Deck / Steam OS3 have a feature to do "offline multiplayer" on the go with other Deck owners next to you (with no WLAN AP nearby)? The only possibility I can think of is connecting two Decks with an adhoc WLAN-Connection beforehand while using the "LAN"-Multiplayer of some games.
- Is there an easier way to do multiplayer?
- Is it possible to do multiplayer like this with more than 2 people?
- Is there a tag or something like that I can filter the store / my library to find games that can be played like this? :)

[Taktloss]

Not really since the SteamDeck is just like a PC and not even on the PC SteamClient thats possible maybe some games which dont need the Steam Client to be online and support LAN support (which nowadays are anyway not much games) might work.
The Steam Deck is not a Switch ;)

[retrogunner]

If a Raspberry Pi can act like an AP host so can the Steam Deck. NOW, the big question is, does the WiFi chipset support it. It should, but some have been more finicky than other WiFi chipsets.

You can run dnsmasq, hostapd, and setup a local AP on one of them. You might need Avahi to make life easier for IP assignment.

This would need to be done in Desktop Mode of the host until some scripts could be written to manage it from Game Mode (say via unlisted game, Crankshaft, or Decky Plugin manager).

* https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/software_access_point
* https://nims11.wordpress.com/2012/04/27/hostapd-the-linux-way-to-create-virtual-wifi-access-point/

You should be able to skip the Internet sharing part being basically an isolated lan.

You might need this too for any Arch pacman installs:
https://github.com/ValShaped/rwfus

(This is on my long to do list. Someone's going to get to it soon than later to show off their Doom LAN party in some extreme remote location.)

Good luck. Cheers, retro.