Dear reader, as another edition of Steam Next Fest comes to a close, there is only one thing I can conclude: there are not enough hours in a day to enjoy everything that this festival has to offer. After just downloading the demos for games I already had on my wishlist, I already had dozens to play. I then browsed the Steam page a bit more, tried out the explorer function, and all of a sudden I found myself with almost 100 demos sitting on my desktop. Considering there were over 2,000 demos featured in this edition of Next Fest, that means I downloaded less than 5% of what was on offer.
This got me wondering: Next Fest started out as a way to put a spotlight on games by developers who don’t always get noticed, but how much light are they actually catching when it has to be shared so far and wide? Even within my circa 100 demos, there was so much variety, in genre, style, and developer size. It feels like I could have kept browsing the Next Fest page for the entire week, and I’d still be finding new gems to add to my wishlist.
I’ll be honest: this was quite frustrating. While there is a lot of joy to be found in discovering a ton of new games, not having the time to fully explore all of them felt restrictive. Now, full context: I had nothing else to do this week. Yes, I wrote an article and made a couple of videos trying to direct you to some excellent demos, and sure there was some housekeeping to be done as always, but I was able to spend most of my time diving into Next Fest. I’m not saying that because I want to boast; it’s just worth mentioning because most people with any kind of interest in a festival like this do not have the time I had these past seven days.
The days of video games being a kids thing are long behind us, but nothing quite says ‘games for adults’ like most of what’s on offer during a festival dedicated to indie games. Whether I was playing a tea-making sim about someone suffering from burnout or a first-person shooter where I am an insurance worker, many of these titles are distinctly aimed at people who are out of school already. But there lies the problem: being out of school usually means holding a job—even multiple, in this economy—and that doesn’t leave all that much time to spend gaming. When time is limited, are you really going to spend a lot of it browsing thousands of demos to see if you can find one that you like? Or are you going to grab one of the games that you already own and just play more of that?
Considering this, it’s important that Steam offers good curation, making it easier for users to find the games that they might be interested in. Now, while this got better once the festival had been running for a couple of days, the first few days were… rough. I found that the recommended section was full of games I had no interest in, despite having a very extensive game library and wishlist. So what the algorithm involved was really doing, I’m quite unsure. Now, I have to be honest, this got a lot better the longer the festival lasted. The more popular demos surged to the top of the page, putting at least some sort of quality filter on the games on offer.
That being said, there are still plenty of games that will have fallen between the cracks and not found themselves the audience they might have with better curation. Because popularity does not automatically equal quality, as is pretty evident if you see which classic indie games still barely have any Steam reviews.
And that brings me back to my original point: does Next Fest actually achieve what it sets out to do? The numbers only seem to be growing, as there are far more demos in this edition than there were only a couple of years ago, and on one hand, that’s great. More people are finding their way into game development and are also reaching for an audience with events like this. That is something that should be celebrated, as it does allow more gamers to move beyond just AAA titles.
But to keep growing in a healthy way, curation is really important. Steam already does important work by not allowing NFT games, but I’m not sure it’s enough. If Next Fest keeps growing this fast, we’ll be overwhelmed by demos—if we aren’t already—during the upcoming editions. And if that happens, what’s the point of being a showcase if 95% of your games won’t get discovered?
Still, it remains important as ever to have a festival like Next Fest. Despite my worries, despite my doubts, there are still plenty of developers reaching an audience they otherwise wouldn’t. The number of Bluesky posts about reaching unexpected amounts of wishlists is a joy to see. I just want to keep seeing those in the future.
Are there any changes you want to see to Next Fest? Could a solution be to split it up into genre-specific editions of Next Fest? Or do you have other suggestions? Let us know by tagging us on your favourite social media. Check out our videos on the best Next Fest demos you should play, as some of those demos remain available despite the festival being over. And keep an eye on the website, because March is absolutely PACKED with incredible releases.
