NEXT FEST 2025 - Don't Miss These Cool Games!

There is no way for me to keep my regular posting schedule when the gosh darn STEAM NEXT FEST is online. Simply put, there are too many superb Demos to play through and right now I am inhaling them through every orifice like a hapless addict, chasing the Dragon. And so, the usual publishing schedule is, for now, tossed out of the window and you can expect multiple posts talking about cool games coming, well... Likely every day until I run out of (hah!) Steam. Without further ado, let me share my unbound excitement for some ultra banger I played already!

AXE GHOST

Okay, so I really need to talk about this. I ain't gonna obfuscate the truth - the developer himself kindly dropped that precious thing into my lap and I felt obliged to check it out. It was 2 am in the night, my eyes were sore, and my brain - on the fritz - and yet I had no tangible defense to stop me from playing this demo until I completed it. I'll be honest - at first, it completely bounced off me. Not because it's bad or unapproachable, but despite stellar interface and perfectly crafted explanations for what does what, the whole flow of the game just could not click into my tired brain. It was like that mental strange shape that struggled to be rotated the correct way to fit.

But then, it did fit and I was in brainburning heaven. When AXE GHOST clicks it's an Experience. You start seeing patterns, perfect pathways of using your mobility cards to shift the blocks of monsters just right for one grand slam, a deadly hit to see the buggers routed. If you're a puzzle enthusiast, you surely know that gentle moment of bliss when you find a solution and everything folds into place for that satisfying ding in your grey matter. Here that Ding is powerful, addictive, a delightful injection of pure 'now I wanna do it again'. It might be because the game is also very stylish - sprites are lovely and lively, and the visual effects are crystal clear and impactful. But no, the true juice lies in the brilliant system - I never played a game like this. A game where a challenge, at a glance, seems impossibly daunting. And then, a few clever cards in a row and bam - clean screen, the score goes up, the soul is nourished, the mind is happy.

Watch out for this one - it's unforgiving and might take a moment or two to 'catch' what you should be doing, but when it does, it will make you yearn for more.

NEON GARTEN

Another gem I spent too much time in, considering it's a demo with a single level. What a clever little city-building, block-stacking roguelite. You are building a cyberpunk city, tightly packed, and made of colorful cubes divided into various categories. Parks, residential areas, industry, commerce, et cetera. But on top of that, there are also Factions, and each faction brings another label and its own mechanic to the whole stacking shenanigans. The corporate world of the dystopian future ain't a gentle place though, and each week Taxes come with unavoidable surety. You better get enough income to pay them off, because guess what - the next week is going to ask for more, as your little district grows. And so, finding out some quick and clever little engines to ramp up your income is crucial. You won't go far if you don't place your buildings in proper fashion, making good use of their properties, adjacency bonuses and multiplier growth.

And roguelite? Each taxation day, assuming you can pay'em off, you also get a selection of a random, powerful perk that can greatly shift your tactic. Suddenly Parks become extremely profitable and important. Or maybe going high with residential buildings can score you a nice bit of scratch. Or, perhaps, Bars are selling illicit substances, joining the Illegal faction, and seeding your district with lots of labels to score off with future buildings? It is a very dynamic, and well-controlled system - this contributes to the feeling that you are not merely at the mercy of RNG, but have real, tangible input in how to shape your strategy to win.

The current version has some teething issues for me, mostly related to the user interface being a little bloated, asking me to click way too many times to do anything... But those are nitpicks. The general core loop of the game is pretty darn great, and I am riveted for the full version, promising more buildings, perks, and levels to try myself with.

SIEGECASTER

I was never a big buff for the tower defense genre. I feel like I got my fill during my High School years when bored out of my mind in Computer classes we played all the flash games available to kill time. This genre had quite a prolific representation. Of course every now and then something interesting managed to fall into my lap with the whole concept of putting towers near a road, and in the case of SIEGECASTER, well... It's revolutionary!

I might be overselling it, I might be out of the loop of what modern tower defense games are, but for me, I have never seen nor played anything like this. First of all, it's sort of real-time. You don't get waves in controlled fashion by a press of a button or some times drop. Second, there are no 'roads' the monsters travel on. The whole map is free roaming for the buggers, they can come from any direction, at any time, and they even have a charming way of just loitering around... menacingly! You can slow the hordes down a bit to zoom in for your purchases, putting down towers and walls, which you swarm from your initial tower to encroach on runes for perks and upgrades as well as locking down more area to place your structures on. It's a pretty well-executed rush, a great battle of pacing - expansion, and growth versus constantly scaling difficulty.

Another great bit is the combat. As far as I got, there are no wimpy automatic attacks - you have a beefy crosshair and you, personally, unleash your arsenal wherever you please, shooter-style. It feels fantastic, as different weapons have different arcs and travel time, and affect various enemy types differently. This makes for a hectic formula of non-stop action, there is not a second of a lull in the experience - a juggling of building, upgrading, picking good upgrades, and slaughtering the hordes of monsters. It feels awesome.