Steam Next Fest, June demos highlighted in roundup
Steam Next Fest demo waves on June 15 and June 22 prompted writers and streamers to publish roundups recommending standout playable demos. Notable picks included vholume, praised for its atmospheric speed-running parkour, and Hyper Bun Buster, lauded for tight combat and rollback multiplayer, while curated 'AI-free' lists highlighted Meaningless Random Numbers, Rizz Dungeon, Casualties Unknown, and Wizards 95. Showcase hosts and streamers solicited demo submissions and encouraged wishlists as many indie teams released demos and new devlogs during the festival. This matters because the festival gives small teams visibility and wishlist traction before launch, and curated guides help players find high-quality indie demos amid the event's large demo pool and growing number of AI-assisted projects.
Have a gander at the steam next fest Hm this game has a cool art style let's have a look "This game uses AI generation for certain visuals, sounds, or algorithms" I'm tired boss
ThatPossessionGuy17I hate having to second-guess every new piece of art or media I encounter now.
Tangy7710I'm tired of AI slop poisoning every form of media imaginable. Someone NEEDS to end this madness istg
Tangy774If y'all want a recommendation for a good indie demo, I recommend Pathogenic. It's a twin stick shooter roguelike where you play as a parasite and fight against a human's immune system
The Cool Cat Corner ⚧️2I really wish I could hit a fucking ignore button on an entire developer, and not just individual games If you try to sell me a game with GenAI, I don't want to buy ANY of your games, period
We put a Bass Reeves Can't Die easter egg in the Steam Next Fest demo for Truck-kun is Supporting Me From Another World--and the way we folded it in is one of my favorite things in the game. Wishlist the game and give it a try!! store.steampowered.com/app/3642010/...
Helen Carmichael - Game Dev6Aw heck I remember you telling me about the Bass Reeves game, I’m kinda gutted it didn’t happen (Oblivion wheel of doom notwithstanding). Such an interesting guy, I hope you ‘circle’ back to him some day
Elijah Beahm Ver. 3.13Bass Reeves truly cannot die
ArcLyn2bass reeves can't die can't die
A lot of doom and gloom about the industry thanks to Xbox, but Steam Next Fest is here to make sure you know gaming is BACK, baby!
☆「ＹＡＳＥ」IdolismJ ☆15I can't even be mad. It's my fault I jacked up my Steam recommendations by playing a bunch of dating sims and shit. I need to play some normal games I can be recommended normal game and then maybe view Steam in public again
erin plasma4when the big tiddy moms are evil ( :10 ) www.youtube.com/watch?v=k30O...
Barantor4I really wish we had a toggle that could just tag a game that uses AI off our steam lists, would really be helpful.
arcanealchemist.bsky.social2the amount of shameless AI generated cover art. at least I know what games to avoid
Every small indie dev who uses AI art on their steam game, and steam capsules should now go on steam next fest to check the top charts of the fest and see how much ai crap is there. Then think long and hard if you're not shooting yourself in the foot by using that crap. The answer is pretty clear.
Lizzy18my immediate thought when i see ai thumbnails and capsules is that if they can't even be bothered to make a first impression, why would i ever be bothered to play it, let alone spend money on it? ethics of ai aside, using it is an advertisement that you're lazy and don't care about your thing.
Taaamas12I feel like the prevalence of AI in Indie Games is really not brought up enough compared to the prevalence in big AAA games. There's been SO many Indie Games I've seen go big and viral and all the while people gloss over the blatant AI art on the menu or textures throughout the game, or even voices
Polyducks6I saw a game which looked like dumb fun, but there was something off about it, like an asset flip vibe. I saw the AI disclaimer and reversed out of there so quick I almost clipped a pedestrian. It's giving half-assed and cheap, like boarding a ship via a plywood gangplank.
Star Hunter | Play Witchy Tower on Steam or Itch.io4I don't even get it Coding is fun. Figuring out difficult problems and shaders is fun. Drawing is fun. Spriting is fun. Putting original music someone made for you into the game is fun. Banging on pots or sifting through libraries and mangling them in in Audacity is fun. Why skip out on any of this?
Demilune3I agree with the sentiment but to me the critique from the quality angle falls a bit short.The real problems are working conditions for artists and devs, the stealing of everyone’s data and the multiple disastrous environmental and economic consequences. These people are simply being irresponsible.
Hey folks, it's time for another #ShowCasey - STEAM NEXT FEST edition! Dear indie developers, do you have a demo in the Steam Next you'd like to get some more eyeballs on? Reply with a link to your demo's page, and a quick elevator pitch for your game! Only one rule: Strictly no generative AI!
DUCK_BERET48HYPER BUN BUSTER: ROCKET HAMMER ACTION is a top-down bump combat action game about a bunny girl who uses her giant hammer to hit enemies into other enemies! store.steampowered.com/app/3605570/...
emzdanowicz14Tormentum 2 devs reached out to me (they're Polish as well), maybe you can RT this demo since I think you will love the vibes xd store.steampowered.com/app/931060/T...
Ori-Warui -Wishlist KNUCKLE JET10We've got Knuckle Jet in there, it's a 2.5d, off-the-wall, jetpunk ricochet flight action game! store.steampowered.com/app/3199470/...
The Bonsai Treehouse6My comrade’s game ‘Cloud Sculptor’ could use some attention: it’s a first person puzzle platformer about…well, sculpting clouds! :P store.steampowered.com/app/4101700/...
RedEye Games | Miney Golf demo live on Steam!5Hey I appreciate the support, as always! Miney Golf's my solodev effort to make a multiplayer mini golf game where you collect and place landmines to blow up your opponents' courses (and maybe your own)! Good to pick up and put down quickly with friends :) TY! store.steampowered.com/app/4266140/...
Help me brainstorm: what could @itch.io to help developers during Steam Next Fest?
cross couloir ☄️ Comet Angel on Steam22wishlist system. right now, releasing demos on itch ahead of the full game release is unhelpful, since you waste your page launch visibility bump on your demo. with no wishlists, there's no CTA for people on your page prior to full release, so you may as well just not page launch until release day
kc 💀 TRUE LOVE'S CURSE coming to steam!16if you mean to help itch devs who have games in next fest, an easier way to actually connect demos to a game page as well as better visibility for announcements on pages if you mean in general to help itch be more accessible to a player audience the way steam is, multilingual pages, please
leaf corcoran11For games currently participating in next fest on steam specifically, my impression is there's so many demos coming out that many devs have a hard time finding an audience and perhaps itchio could help
Jess 🌺🥚🐞ΘΔ&6🦨 shopping cart feature so I can buy a bunch of $1 fonts in one go instead of separately
Power Cat's Mom5one william dollars for every dev
lowpolis4Email notifications for wishlisted games when they are being released (proper wishlist collection in addition to custom ones).
Thomas Altenburger4Just a featuring of the demos that are also on itch would be nice. We haven't had a demo yet on itch, but I keep hearing that games that have a demo on both itch and steam end up with good synergies. I guess @dodoot.bsky.social might have some insights.
Drew Genel2does itch have a good way to tag a game page or a download as a demo of an upcoming full-release game?
Clastic Artistic2A structured calendar for major itch quarterly sales (sales run by yourselves). There are tracking sites for Steam's sales. Means I can plan my own sales on the site better. Also a way for customers to complete bundles if they have existing purchases. Steam does this as "complete your collection".
