And The Winners Of Steam’s Next Fest Are

Steam has announced top 50 most played demos during its recent Next Fest, a regular celebration of upcoming indies. Sadly, most of the demos are only up within Next Fest’s running window and you’ll probably find some of the more interesting ones unavailable. Don’t fret though as I am shamelessly grabbing this opportunity to highlight my own tops with demos still up for grabs.

The Invincible

Played from a first-person perspective of Yasna, an astrobiologist, The Invincible is a sort of an atompunk, story-driven adventure of cosmic mystery on a hostile planet. What I’ve seen in the demo is perhaps too linear, but may open up later on in the full game. Nonetheless, I think it looks fantastic and the atmosphere is one hell of a hook. The game doesn’t have a release date outside of “2023” yet, but the demo comes wholeheartedly recommended by yours truly.

Hammerwatch 2

Absolutely gorgeous pixel art is what brought me to Hammerwatch 2, a sequel to the excellent action RPG crafter roguelite Heroes of Hammerwatch. Aside from Windows and Linux, the original game has released on Nintendo Switch too and since I have never played it, I am planning to procure it there and may tell y’all all about it later on. Hammerwatch 2 seems to be sticking with the tried formula, but puts on a coat of even more colourful pixels that with its dynamic weather are a sight to behold. But don’t merely listen to my gushing over it, see for yourself. Hammerwatch 2 is slated to release in full on 15 August 2023.

Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew

There’s a couple of things about Germany’s one mighty fine development team going by the moniker Mimimi Games. The first thing is, they seem to specialize in heavy on stealth real-time tactics. Think Commandos if you will. The other thing is, whatever the hell they put out, gets almost exclusively overwhelmingly positive reception. Seriously, just have a gander over on to Desperados, or Shadow Tactics. Now, one might think that doing this same thing over and over gets the gears grinding quickly, but it just so doesn’t. Their games feature fantastic stories, stand-out characters, uncompromising tactical stealth play, and are a delight to look at in the process. Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew, taking on a pirates theme this time around, is no exception and is my personal winner on this summer’s Steam Next Fest. Grab the demo, try it, anticipate its release two days after Hammerwath 2 drops, on 17 August 2023.

The next Next Fest has Valve down for 9 to 16 October 2023. If this trend of ever-increasing quality of titles on display is anything to go by, we are likely to be treated with another salvo of fantastic indie games. Do feel absolutely free to tell me how wrong am I with these top picks, but don’t forget to give us yours. That’s what the comments section is for. Cheerio.