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PayPalA celebration of upcoming games big and small and everything in between. Steam Next Fest for June 2025 is now live.
If you've been here before, you know the drill. There's hundreds of new demos that have gone live, and my inbox is positively overflowing with developers announcing demos and upcoming games. It's a good problem to have.
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Here's a few games that I think are likely worth a look (these have Native Linux builds):
Horripilant is a chilling incremental dungeon crawl through the horrors of a forgotten underworld. Combining idler, puzzle and autobattler elements, you'll fight, mine, and think your way through the depths of a forsaken dungeon.
The year is 1986 and you are David Sugimoto, born and raised in South Bend, Indiana. Thanks to a family friend, you’re headed to Japan for your very first job at Matsuzawa Manufacturing.
Choose your doctrine and preach across medieval Italy in this real-time strategy roguelike. Gather your diverse cast of followers, venture out to convince and convert new believers, conquer towns, and strive to become a saint in your lifetime—or die trying.
A 2.5D turn-based RPG where you dodge through enemy turns - and emotional abuse.
Watchword is the anagram roguelike. Strategically spell real and made-up words while using magical rule-bending books to score massively satisfying combos. Build your deck of letter tiles and find synergies in this endlessly re-playable twist on classic word games.
The billiards roguelike. Strategic, physics based combat against Pool Sharks who don't play by the rules. Sink your balls and clear out your opposition in this chaotic game of pool!
And a few other suggestions that should work well with Proton:
Reclaim Earth for humankind. Enjoy a taste of this gripping human fate story, as EVE embarks on a mission to save Earth from oblivion.
Jump Ship is a mission based co-op PvE for up to 4 players, where you are the crew of a spaceship. Transition seamlessly from crewing the ship to on-foot exploration and space walks. Engage in intense battles both on the ground and in space, and always keep your ship upgraded and intact.
SCAD is an action packed roguelite apocalypse adventure. Fight against zombie hordes, craft & upgrade your weapons and prepare for new missions.
As per usual, I'll be giving individual shout-outs over the next week and beyond on anything I find interesting. I've already been mentioning some demos over the last few weeks too. Although, my time right now is very much being sucked away by Dune: Awakening (more on that tomorrow!).
Steam Next Fest is live until June 16th at 10am Pacific / 5pm UTC. Head over to Steam to check it out. Be sure to leave a comment with some cool demos you've tried and what you thought about them.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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You can also find comments for this article on social media: The Demons Told Me to Make This Game is a Time Loop game and a cosmic horror narrative adventure about demons, monsters, evil cults, bloody rituals, and Elder Gods.Works great via Proton, and Steam Deck compatibility is promised for the release version. I have played the demo and liked it very much, waiting for the release.
You play as Dark Wisp, a disembodied spirit who is unable to interact with the physical world directly, but instead can possess people and speak into their ears, influencing their behavior.
Your hosts have agency and will keep trying to act on their own accord, but you mustn't let them do that. They're dumbasses, and without your help they will imminently perish. Fortunately, you have control over the flow of time, so you can undo their stupidity whenever you want.
Make choices. Experiment. Explore different timelines. Learn what you need and help your hosts survive. After all, they're the ones destined to save the world.
R Daneel Olivaw a day ago
Anza 22 hours ago
omg yes!! Love a good nextfest :) Are there just a ton more this time around than last time, or am I just imagining that?
After I enabled Proton by default few years ago, there has been more than you have time to play. I couldn't find any actual numbers for each year, but this year doesn't seem to be making any records. Might be just the new normal.
I played two demos today, both enjoyable, but neither caused urge for immediate wishlist.
Rentlord: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3546440/Rentlord/
Rentlord is Balatro inspired "deckbuilder". Instead of cards, you buy properties and collect rent. There are multipliers and jokers (though game calls them plugins). There's bit less randomness as without plugins the profit would be static. Demo gives you a taste, but hopefully final release has lot more content.
Wander Stars: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1575810/Wander_Stars/
Wander Stars is vaguely deckbuilder like game with anime theme. Anime theme is even followed by re-using same animations, which was back in the day used for budget reasons. Though at least animation looks gorgeous.
It's built around the cliche of shouting movement names before doing them. In Wander Stars the movement names are actually constructed from verbs and adjectives and they each have slightly different function. In overall it's maybe slightly too simple after you understand how everything works (it's bit more complicated than what I explained). But at least map view has other things than battles and plot while not highly original has potential for some drama later on.
Kind of still on the fence adding it to wishlist.
Nezchan 3 hours ago
Quest of the Hero (Native): Hard to explain, in no small part because the mechanics are not explained at all. A lot of the game doesn't make that much sense at the start, but it seems like you make a bunch of choices, either safe ones which raise a "doom gauge" or ones that hurt you but give better rewards. Most of the damaging ones have damage to health or a stat over time, but not *real* time so no idea what that even means. Advise skipping this one.
The Drifter (Native): Pixel art point and click in the classic style, about a homeless man caught up in a violent conspiracy, but somehow able to return to moments before each successive death. Good premise, well communicated and grabs the player right away without a lot of laborious setup. Demo is very short, but enough to communicate the key features. Recommend.
Bloom - a puzzle adventure (Native): No Linux executable. Runs with forced Proton. Apparently personification of Mother Earth is being bullied by personifications of Jupiter, Saturn and...Pluto, for some reason? Which causes smog? It doesn't make much sense, and honestly it doesn't matter. Simple puzzles with a colourful style. Doesn't especially grab me but maybe this is for somebody.
AbstractPunk (Native): Oldschool FPS with an eyestrain-heavy collage style, where you're an office drone on a mission to deliver a message to a high-powered executive. Your weapon is a cutout of a woman who shoots happiness, while your enemies shoot sadness back at you. Very weird, very stylish, very confusing, VERY hard on the eyes. Seems kinda good though?
Black Hole Fishing (Native): Simple incremental about a fishing pond, except you're not using standard methods like hooks or dynamite, but a tiny black hole instead. At first you scare them in using your hookless bobber, but soon you've got a stronger hole and multiple auto-restockers to make that unnecessary. Not much content so far and the graphics are extremely basic, but the idea is pretty amusing.
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