On an average day, about a dozen new games are released on Steam. And while we think that's a good thing, it can be understandably hard to keep up with. Potentially exciting gems are sure to be lost in the deluge of new things to play unless you sort through every single game that is released on Steam. So that’s exactly what we’ve done. If nothing catches your fancy this week, we've gathered the best PC games you can play right now and a running list of the new games of 2020.
The Plague: Kingdom Wars
Steam page
Release: July 10
Developer: Reverie World Studios
Price: $19.99 | £15.49 | AU$28.95
The next instalment in the long-running Kingdom Wars series is a timely RTS / grand strategy hybrid focused on managing your kingdom during the black death plague of the 1300s. As either a minor lord or king you'll need to bolster your society, keep it happy, defend it, and inevitably go to war with other nations. According to the devs it's "the first historical strategy game to feature a full scale pandemic," and as an added bonus there's also an undead mode. The game's in Early Access, though most of the remaining work is on art: the gameplay itself is mostly complete and 1.0 is expected mid next year.
Lairchitect
Steam page
Release: June 27
Developer: Sokpop Collective
Price: $2.99 | £2.99 | AU$4.50
The latest Sokpop game is reminiscent of Dungeon Keeper: it's your job to build a well-protected (read: dangerous) lair in order to protect its precious "soul core" from heroic dungeon crawlers. To fend off the intruders you'll have a dozen objects and 15 different minions you can spawn, and these intruders come in six varieties. The campaign itself can be completed in an hour, but there's an endless mode, too.
Soda Dungeon 2
Steam page
Release: July 10
Developer: AN Productions, Poxpower
Price: Free
Here's the sequel to the popular Soda Dungeon, which first released for mobile phones but also garnered a decent fanbase on Steam. It's a free-to-play dungeon crawler with a bit of a casual vibe—don't expect a stiff challenge—but if you're a fan of seeing numbers increase, of amassing loot, and of only paying half attention to what's going on, this is a nice thing to have open in a separate window while you work. The devs claim that a lot of the free-to-play trappings of similar games, like timers you can pay to speed up, are absent in this game.
Rite
Steam page
Release: July 7
Developer: Pond Games Pty Ltd
Price: $4.99 | £3.99 | AU$7.50
Rite is as simple to describe as they come: it's a high difficulty precision platformer that will appeal to fans of Super Meat Boy and N++. You play as a Nim, but it doesn't matter what a Nim is, or where Nims come from. What matters is that Nims can jump, and that Nims can be killed by spikes and blades. Nims must collect keys in order to open doors to the next level. Nims can collect gold but they can choose to ignore it. Nims must navigate through 160 increasingly difficult levels to escape their horrible living nightmare.
Elden: Path of the Forgotten
Steam page
Release: July 10
Developer: Onerat Pty Ltd
Price: $15.99 | £12.99 | AU$22.95
Elden: Path of the Forgotten is a deliberately cryptic action adventure game focused on exploration and combat. You play as Elden, who is "on a mission across a blighted land to save their mother from ancient horrors." Not only is this blighted land riddled with horrific enemies, but it's also entirely deprived of anything that can help you: navigating the world and figuring out what needs to be done seems to be one of the biggest obstacles in Elden.
These games were released between June 6 and July 13 2020. Some online stores give us a small cut if you buy something through one of our links. Read our affiliate policy for more info.
