Steam’s latest Next Fest kicked off this week, showcasing a wide range of upcoming titles. And as it became a trend, the publishing platform india.io contains several titles. To celebrate this, it launched a campaign titled The next holiday party which will run from October 13 to 20 and includes free demos of 12 different games.
Games come from a variety of developers and genres, so we thought we’d give you a rundown of everything that’s available. You’ll find brief descriptions of each game below, and each title comes with free demos so you can try them out for yourself.
Monsters and me
This 2D top-down roguelite shooter is tumultuous, stupid, and a bit gross (well, as gross as a 2D game can be). Your city has been overrun by slime mutants with one goal: to rip your face off. The natural reaction should be to prevent this from happening, so you’ll need to upgrade your weapons and special abilities to fend off the horde. The demo version takes you to the first level of the game and your task is to survive as long as you can. Simple, right?
Cryophobia
Cryophobia also challenges you to survive, but in a VERY different way. You play as Anna, a geophysicist trapped in a frozen Soviet bunker… and there’s something else hiding down there. It’s a classic psychological horror game, perfect for spooky season and for gamers who don’t want their hands held. Combat is tense and tough, so much so that sometimes it’s best to avoid it altogether. The demo is a stand-alone part of the game’s second chapter, in which you’ll have to deal with Anna’s frigid, mysterious abominations and traumatic past.
Flag
This pixel shooter is a hellish roguelike set in a post-apocalyptic kingdom where an attempt to cure death has resulted in an all-encompassing plague. Before this event, you were a doctor, but now you must utilize cursed masks and plague-infused weapons to face growing waves of enemies. The demo is a vertical segment that will give you a feel for the brisk pace of the game and will allow you to experiment with various cursed masks and power-ups.
Dwarf Hollow
It’s time to pick up your Battlemallet, delve into the mines, and try to safely grab as much riches as possible in this first-person roguelite extraction game. The mines are randomly generated, so no two trips are the same. You’ll need to craft items like support beams and ladders to traverse hazardous areas, and utilize lanterns and headlights to see in the murky. Once you’ve collected your loot, you’ll need to watch out for traps and other hazards on your way back to safety.
Heist festival
Do you enjoy stealing things and then causing untold destruction throughout the city as you try to escape while being pursued by increasing police forces? Well, great news. That’s the premise of the aptly named Heistfest. You’ll traverse hand-drawn environments faster, and things get more and more intense the longer you avoid capture. And if you think that just means adding a few police cars and maybe some guns, think again. You will have to face spike traps, helicopters, paratroopers, tanks and full air raids. Chaos and fun are more vital than realism anyway. The demo is a vertical segment that gives you a sense of the core gameplay loop: rob a bank, initiate a police chase, and see how long you can survive as Public Enemy No. 1.
Locked in My Darkness 2: Peace
It’s Halloween time, so of course there can’t be just one scary game on this list. It’s a horror-style psychological walking simulator with a focus on atmosphere, exploration, and puzzle solving. You play as Yuki Tachibana, a Japanese high school student who has recently moved to a novel apartment with her family. Something sinister awakens within the walls of their novel home, distorting reality and bringing to lithe the sins of the past. With a flashlight in your hand, you will discover notes, solve environmental puzzles and discover the secrets of Yuki’s family.
Reset: Solus
You are Solus, a scavenger drone sent to rescue the Zero Star from a dying world. But in this game there is only one goal that really matters: to be faster. To progress through the levels as quickly as possible, you’ll need to master flying mechanics, thrusters, and momentum. These levels come with high risk and high reward, so you’ll need to stay vigilant to deal with anything they may throw at you.
Air hares
You probably haven’t seen a bullet hell like this. In Air Hares, your main goal is not to shoot enemies from the sky; uses your plane to sow and water crops to save the starving inhabitants of the barren Winrose Warren. But your feathered enemies from the Gale Gang want to stop you, so you’ll have to dodge, stab, and ram them to get them to pack up and get back to vital work.
Binary golf
Minigolf gets a tumultuous overhaul in Binary Golf, where you utilize a golf ball to eliminate targets until the last one becomes a hole into which you must put the ball. But this isn’t just any aged mini golf course. You can jump over obstacles, teleport along tracks and move between objects to perform tricks. The demo includes the first two episodes of the game, where you’ll learn the basics of the game before taking on a boss to test what you’ve learned.
Stuntman
If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if a roguelike deck creator collided with a magical coin stuffing machine, Cascadier has the answer, and it’s deliciously tumultuous.
In each run, you charge coins with the elemental powers from your deck and drop them into dazzling pinball-like cabinets that erupt in chain reactions if you drop a coin at the right moment. You will be guided by Fortuna, the dishonest goddess of fortune, and her jealous brother Theodan as you pursue divine rewards.
Each round begins with ten coins to drop and a deck of acquired skills. Like any good coin acceptor, you’ll grab coins mid-round and play them back to keep your score and ticket count ever-increasing. You’ll run out of steam and the round will be over, so make every roll count. Reach your point goal to advance, then select novel power sets to add to your growing deck and mix it all up for the next round. You’ll spend your hard-earned tickets on upgrading your Talismans, which grant novel skills and lasting buffs. The demo allows you to try out the first cabinet, a lush nature-inspired machine that hints at the elemental powers each novel board will bring.
Brawl of the elements
Elemental Brawl is a multiplayer party game whose task is to beat your friends with the power of the elements. Each round starts with everyone only able to punch and kick, but as time goes on random elemental orbs fall. By collecting them, you gain the power associated with that element, and during the round you can combine elements. Maps are not unchanging, you can utilize your items to burn them, freeze them, turn puddles into steam catchers and more. It’s all about coming up with artistic ways to eliminate your opponents.
Chowdown Kitty
Chowdown Kitty, a puzzle game with elementary yet addictive gameplay, features a board filled with cat treats. Match matching treats in a string of three or more and those treats will be pulled out and placed into the cat’s food bowl. The more treats you can combine, the higher your score will be and the happier your cat will be.
