'Tis the season to gorge ourselves on a bunch of demos for upcoming games in the Steam Next Fest and then wait extremely patiently for them to actually launch after Next Fest ends. Steam's twice-yearly demo extravaganza event is well underway this week so I've sneaked a peek at what's popular. It's mostly multiplayer games, which should not surprise me.
The top 5 Steam Next fest demos this week are:
- Delta Force: A new free-to-play extraction shooter/Battlefield-like
- Supervive: A MOBA and battle-royale hybrid
- Strinova: A free-to-play anime hero shooter
- Rivals of Aether 2: A 2D platform fighter
- Gladio Mori: Slow-motion physics sword dueling
That's the official tally based on Steam's Next Fest charts of daily active players today. Steam.db produces approximately the same list based on peak concurrent player count. In that version, the co-op platformer Popucom knocks Gladio Mori out of the top 5.
Harvey Randall has played Supervive and says it's got the faster matches of a battle royale and a somewhat steep learning curve. "Supervive's combat takes your usual MOBA team fights and makes them pure skillshot flex-offs," he says.
A few PC Gamer members have checked out Delta Force. Morgan Park played it the last time it ran an open beta and liked its Battlefield-like conquest mode, but thought the guns sound plastic-y and it couldn't quite match the scale or polish of Battlefield 2042. A no-brainer to try out before the beta ends.
It's pretty expected lately for multiplayer games to take top popularity spots during Next Fest. The best co-op games aren't always cheap and every group of gaming friends is constantly on the hunt for the next popular one. It's hard to turn down trying things for free.
I will say this is slightly more multiplayer dominance even than usual. The Next Fest in June had a bit more variation with Tiny Glade breaking into the top 5. Though naturally another free-to-play multiplayer shooter (Once Human) took top spot then too.
If you want something a little less obvious to install, Robin Valentine gave Ballionaire a try which is apparently a bizarre roguelike mashup of Balatro and Pachinko. Harvey Randall also put some time in on Windblown, a new roguelike from the Dead Cells developer. I guess we're still into roguelikes around here after all.
Steam Next Fest runs through this coming weekend until early Monday, October 21 so you have plenty of time left to keep trying out anything that looks up your alley. For what it's worth, the next Steam sale is a themed one starting the week after: Steam Scream Fest on October 28.
