I had to update Windows on my gaming PC this morning and it got me thinking about how we’ve lost the joy of updates for our devices (mostly).
When I got my Asus ROG Ally, I gave my Steam Deck to my wife (where it sits unused 😥), but I always looked forward to updates on the Steam Deck, because Valve was innovating, so I would likely get some new feature or experience from the device, and that made me happy. Updating the Ally is mostly a chore, because it is a Windows device, so all we get are bug fixes and hopefully performance improvements.
Innovative companies and devices make us look forward to updates because they are pushing the envelope and adding capabilities and features. Updates for my Tesla Model 3 are always exciting, because Tesla is innovating the user experience regularly (and generally moving in the right direction). My car is very different from the one I bought nearly 4 years ago, yet the hardware hasn’t changed. Apple used to be that way, but now we get the yearly updates with new features and mostly vulnerability fixes in between. At least Apple still supports their devices for years. I have recent PCs that won’t run Windows 11 for various reasons, so upgrades for them are just tedious patches.
Sony and Microsoft have also kinda stalled with their game console updates. For a while, Microsoft was frantically revising the XBox interface to try to come up with something to match Sony’s intuitive one, but once they got something reasonable, not much has changed.
I’m glad for bug fixes, performance improvements, and vulnerability updates, but I’d sure like it if companies gave us a reason to want to update our devices, particularly our gaming gear. Otherwise, it is just a chore.