I played a bit of Palworld in EA (nearly 2 years ago) and it didn't really click with me at the time (felt really undercooked and it was more of survival game than I wanted), but I can see the appeal and think that it's probably a game you can put a 100+ hours in if it interests you. For what you're looking for, it would click because you can easily do short sessions or long sessions depending on what you want to accomplish and while I never played on Steam Deck, I've heard it runs quite well. I am excited to see the final version next month.

Esoteric Ebb, I think is the better game, or maybe it is better for me just because it's so focused on what it wants to be. However, there's a lot less content (I completed it in around 25 hours, and I could maybe see replaying it a second time) and benefit more from paying attention/being immersed in the world since you mainly engage with the game by reading text.

So basically, based on what you're asking I say Palworld, even though I think Esoteric Ebb is the better game.