Just as they do every year, Steam Next Fest was held in June and gave players a chance to try a number of different titles. While it is easy to get overwhelmed with the options, it is also a great way to find out what games to look forward to. After trying out a selection of my own, here are my top 5 choices from the Steam Next Fest titles I played!

Endling: Extinction is Forever by Herobeat Studios

There’s something relaxing about taking on the life of an animal in the wild, but this game doesn’t harvest the carefree air that a nature game could. Instead, Endling: Extinction is Forever takes on the harsh reality of what it is like being a fox in a hostile, human-filled environment.

Take on the role of a mother fox who spends her days trying to raise her cubs. Help them grow by bringing food back to your den until they are able to join you on the explorations. Once they join you, it gets a little harder as threats lurk to snatch them up, and not only will you have to feed them, but protect them and teach them the ways of survival as well. As if that wasn’t stressful enough, the game doesn’t take long before a cutscene has one of your cubs snatched away in the middle of the night and so you will spend days looking for this cub by following clues - clues that will lead you away from food and into threatening conditions.

With this short demo experience, I could tell that this game is a survival player’s dream title if they are an animal lover as well. There is so much into it that you can feel both guided and lost at the same time. Definitely a title I will be keeping my eye on and looking forward to attempting to beat when it releases July 19th.

If you wish to try out Endling: Extinction is Forever, they are leaving the demo up on the Steam page.

Sker Ritual by Wales Interactive

Bringing a cooperative, first-person shooter experience into the horror-filled world they first brought to life with Maid of Sker. In Sker Ritual, players can play either solo or with friends to survive as many rounds as possible in a wave-based shooter experience. There is definitely some familiarity to this game if you have played the Nazi Zombies mode in Call of Duty as you can find guns on the wall, use a random gun dispenser, purchase ammo on walls, and purchase upgrades from machines.

Even with the similarities, this game does stand out on its own thanks to its own unique base of enemies, the occasional boss appearances, and its own story quest line to follow. In the demo, they only had the quest line get to a point where you were supposed to find four key items, but two were locked behind the full game content, but it still gave the gist of how they will unfold. I mostly played the demo solo and it was very doable, but the intensity didn’t take too long to build up.

I can definitely see players using the ole serpentine pattern in this game and the distraction pattern to get the quest line moving forward. But make sure you are prepared for the bigger fights with better weapons because it is easy to slip up and get overwhelmed!

If you are looking for a new co-op shooter game, then be sure to wishlist Sker Ritual on Steam as it is set to release this year!

Through The Nightmares by Sandman Team

If you are a player looking for a challenging, fast-paced platformer title then this is the game you need to look into! The demo for Through The Nightmares alone had me struggling to succeed as the maps provided a challenging first run and I truly only found my way through most levels through a series of trial-and-error attempts. While making your way through these intense platformer levels, there are hidden items to collect as well, giving a bit more edge to the challenge as you will need to take voluntary paths with more challenges to reach them.

From traps to creatures, the threats are all around you in this game. While some levels didn’t provide any actual speed-based challenge, you never knew when one of those moments would happen. Other than short moments, there are even chase levels where you can’t slow down either. You really don’t know what is going to happen next, but you know that you’ll have to react quickly and accurately if you hope to make it through the level!

Through The Nightmares isn’t set to release until 2023, but interested players can still check out the free demo on Steam today!

Kredolis by Pharos Interactive

Puzzle fans have a new game to look forward to when it comes to Kredolis. This game is set up in a similar fashion to the popular title The Witness, but instead of the same puzzle style with new challenges, you are presented with a large variety of different puzzles. Testing your ability to divulge information through clues around you, studying your environment, and generally testing things to see what they do in order to solve your way through the many different puzzles in this game.

The demo is pretty short but presents you with three different types of puzzles up front. Four if you count ‘find all the switches’ as one of them. You have the three-ring tile match-up puzzle in the center where you have to line up the image by moving the tiles, then the time-limited generator that you have to know your path through a maze to get from the generator to the activation switch that turns on the water power, and there is the memory-to-poem match up where you are given a clue through a poem that tells you the answer you need and the details to the answer can be found around the level itself.

If this is what they have at just the start of the game, then I definitely can’t wait to see what else there is to solve within Kredolis! This puzzle game is set to release by the end of 2022, so if you like puzzle games then be sure to wishlist on Steam.

The Last Worker by Wolf & Wood Productions

I honestly didn’t know what to expect with The Last Worker when I downloaded it, as the trailers were more lore-based than anything else, but after playing the demo I have to say that I like the route they are taking with this one. The gameplay itself focuses a lot on stealth and making your way through a convoluted factory while trying to avoid any of the security and worker bots that would alert the boss that you are doing something other than working.

You do end up doing a little bit of the worker and it shows you how to use the controls, including your gravity gun that helps you pick up heavier objects. However, this gravity tool can also be used to blast away little robots and other issues that come your way, so it is sure to be a necessary device to get you through this narrative.

This is another demo that was pretty short but provided a solid experience that showed the basics of what this game will be about. I definitely wouldn’t have guessed that The Last Worker was going to be a narrative game full of stealth and high-intensity gameplay moments, but I look forward to seeing where they take this game. This is another title expected to release by the end of 2022 on Steam.