You may be wondering how to deal with the lack of an Xbox button on the ROG Ally when using Steam Big Picture mode. You’re prompted to press the Xbox button to access the sidebar, but Asus inexplicably neglected to include one. Even setting one of the rear buttons to act as an Xbox button on the Ally won’t give you the desired results. Fortunately, there’s a straightforward fix for this that just requires you to think out of the box a bit.
How to use the Xbox button in Steam Big Picture on the ROG Ally
While the ROG Ally is more powerful than the Steam Deck, it does have some issues compared to Valve’s device. One of these is the lack of a dedicated Xbox button. Unfortunately, Steam Big Picture mode uses this button as a shortcut to bring up the sidebar where you can access your library and other menus. Even if you use the Armory Crate software to set another button (or button combo) to act as an Xbox button, pressing it in Big Picture mode just brings up the Xbox Game Bar.
Fortunately, there’s an easy fix for this. In fact, it’s so simple I felt dumb after spending ten minutes trying to figure out a way to make the Xbox button work in Steam Picture on the ROG Ally.
All you have to do is tap the Xbox icon in the lower left part of the screen in Big Picture mode. Doing so will make the sidebar appear, and you can access your Steam library and install games. Unfortunately, unlike Steam OS, Windows 11 doesn’t feature a unified solution for accessing your games. So, prepare yourself to find little workarounds like this.
Note that this fix won’t work in every program. For some reason, Asus didn’t fit a dedicated Xbox button, so you may find issues with other programs that require its use.
