Steam Next Fest: June 2025 Edition

nikos

nikos

Member
Steam Next Fest is back! Let's share and discuss any interesting demos we find.

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Next Fest February 2025 - LIVE NOW!

Steam Next Fest is a week-long celebration featuring hundreds of FREE playable demos as well as developer livestreams and chats. Players try out upcoming games on Steam pre-release, developers gather feedback and build an audience ahead of their Steam launch, everyone wins!
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Linked in another thread but here it is again. Classic survival horror style game. Feels better to control than the first one.

 
I found something traditional with high quality and something in a sleazy grindhouse style.

Space Adventure Cobra - The Awakening (Run N' Gun)
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Oxide Room 208 (Survival Horror)
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I also highly recommend checking out the Neon Inferno Demo if you haven't yet.
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Ninja Gaiden Time Mofos!


Some point and click goodness with amazing pixel art


Hilariously written Superhero team management/office slice of life? Moist Critical voices one of the characters I think.

 
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A fun rogue-like that combines Breakout with something like Vampire Survivors

 

Explore upcoming games, and try out free demos. Wishlist your favorites to get notified when they release!

New to Next Fest? Scroll to the bottom for more info, or just explore around to discover your next favorite game.
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store.steampowered.com

Next Fest February 2025 - LIVE NOW!

Steam Next Fest is a week-long celebration featuring hundreds of FREE playable demos as well as developer livestreams and chats. Players try out upcoming games on Steam pre-release, developers gather feedback and build an audience ahead of their Steam launch, everyone wins!
store.steampowered.com store.steampowered.com

Not home right now but I already see a few I wanna try.
 
It would sure be nice if SIE, MS or Nintendo did something like this more consistently for console players. AFAIK, MS tried a couple times some years ago, but their consistency with it was spotty and now it's probably dead since they are moving away from the traditional Xbox consoles.

Nintendo doesn't get the most 3P support historically, especially early on (even systems like Wii only had modest support the first year), and their biggest sellers tend to be the 1P games, which their audience generally buy no matter what. So, little need for demos.

But PlayStation? It'd be a great opportunity to build upon, and it'd be beneficial for smaller 3P who could benefit thriving on the console. As E3-style demos though they should be free to access if only for a limited amount of time.
 
UFL(30gb!, fifa/pes rival?) and Tokyo Underground Killer(retro fps/melee) were on my wishlist so I will try them first. Ball x pit, ninja gaiden, dead as disco(sifu+hifi rush?), ratatan(patapon sequel, roguelike?) and the drifter next.
 
Thank FUCK for indie devs. They, to me are single-handedly keeping me from going full time into backlogs and retro gaming. It's a huge load picking up the slack from these AAA devs.
 

I know it's been linked already but having played through the demo I have to say that this is fucking awesome. As an old school Ninja Gaiden fan that played the originals back in the 80s the intro was a nostalgic orgasm.

Literally me:

Leonardo Dicaprio Look GIF by Once Upon A Time In Hollywood


The game itself is fun and responsive and very much on point with the classic Ninja Gaiden feel of running, jumping and slicing through a level. There's optional built in challenges for each stage to promote replaying and mastering the game. I bet it'll be super fun to speedrun; or at least watch someone more skilled do so.
 
I'm going to download a bunch of demos now on the Deck. I'll start off with Hotel Barcelona, Dispatch, MIO, Morsels and Ninja Gaiden Ragebound.
 
nikos said:
For fans of the old "Strike" games.

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Finally a Desert Strike like game! Played through the demo and really liked it, tight controls and it plays very well. I loved Desert Strike on the original Game Boy, and I can't believe that here I am over 30 years later, playing a similar game on a modern handheld... wishlisted
Little Mac said:
Thanks for the heads up …

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I have no idea what I am doing, I was quite crap at Patapon, so I am no better with this game, but it is fun.
 
Rough one for my tastes. There is a racing game that is basically a rip off of No Hesi. Which is actually welcomed since who the fuck wants to pay monthly for an Assetto Corso mod?
 
Love Next fest, always try to play a few games. The one that really impressed me was Eriksholm, I am quite hyped for it. Seems to have an interesting story and great visuals for an AA title.

Something like Shadow Tactics and Shadow Gambit by with a different vibe.
 
Ball X Pit-- Addictive stuff. Hard to follow all the balls but it was good fun. Music is awful though. Not sure about the base building stuff.
UFL-- Fifa but worse? I didn't see any original idea, just an okay copy.
Ratatan-- 3060 ti struggled with this one. Basically patapon 4. I have to play first 3 before this.
Dead as disco-- It could be fun for few hours but my hands won't allow me to play more than 30 minutes. It was fun but not deep, more like batman style. Try endless mode.
Tokyo Underground Killer-- I didn't like this one.
 
So Ninja Gaiden is more than a cheap Unity slop cash in. It's actually really cool. Plays more like an old school console game. No enemy heath bars, no damage numbers. No loot. Gameplay feels like what we'd remember playing some super Neo Geo version of Ninja Gaiden on. If there will be complaints it will be that it is too easy. I felt really powerful and all the abilities felt natural. Actual OG Ninja Gaiden is too much for my diminished mental capacities these days. This feels like it will scratch a lot of that itch. The same tools are there. I'm actually gonna buy this.

Here's the fun part internet gaming forum crew: what would you price this at? Prince of Persia failed. I think Contra being $40 hurt it a lot.
 
ChoosableOne said:
Ball X Pit-- Addictive stuff. Hard to follow all the balls but it was good fun. Music is awful though. Not sure about the base building stuff.
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It's certainly an interesting concept and they do need to scrap the music. I'm not sure what to make of the base building either but it feels like a needless time waster. They also need to let you skip that elevator scene that plays out before every journey into the pit. The first boss is pretty awful too and I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm getting a little tired of the power up structure that Vampire Survivors popularized. It's also very drab visually. Even with all that negativity, it did erase an hour of my time in a blink of an eye.
 
bender said:
It's certainly an interesting concept and they do need to scrap the music. I'm not sure what to make of the base building either but it feels like a needless time waster. They also need to let you skip that elevator scene that plays out before every journey into the pit. The first boss is pretty awful too and I'd be lying if I didn't say I'm getting a little tired of the power up structure that Vampire Survivors popularized. It's also very drab visually. Even with all that negativity, it did erase an hour of my time in a blink of an eye.
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The base building thing didn't make sense to me either, until I realized that you could launch the little people at an angle where they bounce around and hit multiple "sites" to gather. The tutorial made it seem like you just aim them in a straight line where they immediately bounce back. Later you unlock stones that they'll actually bounce off of, so you can create a kind of "ideal path" for them to bounce and collect the goodies. But even then, yeah it's still pretty stupid.
 
jshackles said:
The base building thing didn't make sense to me either, until I realized that you could launch the little people at an angle where they bounce around and hit multiple "sites" to gather. The tutorial made it seem like you just aim them in a straight line where they immediately bounce back. Later you unlock stones that they'll actually bounce off of, so you can create a kind of "ideal path" for them to bounce and collect the goodies. But even then, yeah it's still pretty stupid.
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I got all that and unlocked all the buildings. It just seems like a needless timewaster to unlock additional characters. It just feels unnecessary. Also, the ghost power up that allows all of your projectiles to pass through enemies can fuck you over in the early game. Some of the power-ups are pretty creative and the fusion/fission system is kind of neat beyond how random it is. While some of those powerups promote you catching your balls, that feels pretty optional, especially if you get ahead of the difficulty curve which doesn't make it a great game of Arkanoid and if you do build into something that benefits from catching balls, the first end boss is going to ruin that with his shmup bullet patterns as slow as they may be.
 
simpatico said:
Here's the fun part internet gaming forum crew: what would you price this at? Prince of Persia failed. I think Contra being $40 hurt it a lot.
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I think ~$30 is the sweet spot for this kind of game assuming the quality and/or legacy is there. You'll get the hardcore folks regardless but pushing it higher than that risks pushing more casual people towards other games as this is the range where higher priced big budget games fall into once they start getting the larger (~50% off) sales. Word of mouth is what makes or breaks the smaller games.
 
Cleared Hot is pretty good nod to the Strike series, but the dialog and voice actors are so terrible.

Holstin is great and I had to force myself to stop playing as I'll be picking that up for sure. I do hope they tone down the volume of your footsteps though. It's like Russian Resident Evil mixed with Killer 7.

Baby Steps has a demo which oddly took forever to download. It's...not for me.
 
Hirogami seems like a nice little platformer, like Tearaway and the latest Sackboy game combined a bit. Short demo, only the first level but I liked it.
 
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