Test drive all your games in offline mode before a big trip

You can take the Steam Deck anywhere. But as many Deck owners have discovered, one of the growing pains in turning Steam into a portable platform has been dealing with games that require online authorization, launchers, or other functionality that demands an internet connection. There’s nothing more frustrating than getting on a plane and discovering the title you had planned to pass the next several hours with won’t work because there’s no internet.

Obviously if you’re planning a trip where you won’t have a connection, you shouldn’t be trying to play a multiplayer game or anything where online functionality is essential. But sadly, on Steam even many single player games require some kind of internet-based authentication process.

To make sure your games will work offline, test drive them in offline mode. Hit the Steam button, and navigate to Internet. There you’ll find an “Enter Offline Mode” button. Then fire up the game you’re hoping to play to make sure it works without the internet. I recommend doing this for every game you plan on playing before a trip. Actually get into a game and run around or something. Don’t just let it sit at a menu. You want to make sure your game is playable, not just that it launches and will later prompt you with some internet issue.

If you’ve got a trip coming up, you probably should leave the Deck in offline mode once you know it works, just to be safe.