Next Fest 25|1 Day 1
Micro-reviews for Day 1 of Winter Next Fest 2025, exploring Buffet Knight, Lingo 2, Dragonhold, Scaling Up, Castle V Castle, and Nekomancer
Next Fest proper has begun, and as always there is a ton of stuff to try out. Right before the fest I saw a concerning amount of asset flip demos, but thankfully there is plenty more real games to drown it out.
Highlights: Buffet Knight
Buffet Knight
Have you ever wanted a Kirby x Zelda crossover? Well this is probably the next best thing. Revolving around conquering dungeons with the contents of your stomach, this game has the style, humor, and gameplay to really sell the meal. A charming buffet worth trying
Playtime: 45min
Scaling Up
Scaling Up has you play as a dragon snake rancher, expanding your ranch to get more snakes which will help you work on the ranch (or just be pretty livestock) expanding it further. The game is slow and chill, letting you take things at your own pace as you explore the first of many weeks on the ranch. There is a fair few minor bugs, but it works well enough as a tease for the full game, being long enough for you to make up your mind if you're interested in waiting for the full thing
Playtime: 1-3h
Dragonhold
I think this demo will be met with a bit of a mixed reception. The game is good, with the ground-based human combat working quite well, and the air-based dragon combat being precise and fluid. I haven't had the chance to test out multiplayer, but I have had the chance to play the game with the dev in the VC. And I am 100% confident that i would not have enjoyed the game as much if he wasn't explaining what I was doing wrong, or giving me pointers on what to (not) do. Despite a large quantity of systems the demo lacks tutorials to explain those systems, and that includes the balancing of the various enemies. What was an hour and a half of scraping by with barely any health when first learning what to do turned into 30 minutes of blitzing through enemies on my level before taking down the boss of the area. If you're a patient dragon fan, this might be a fun game to try out, but otherwise you might struggle understanding the aim of the game
Playtime: 1h+
Castle V Castle
This is a card-based roguelike. Not a deckbuilder as the cards are random, but you do get (de-)buffs after each victory to help you in a run. The premise is simple: demolish enemy castle before they demolish yours. There really isn't a lot more to it as you juggle the three resources, but at least the randomness of the cards prevents it from feeling too repetitive. I just hope the full game will actually expand on the demo's stuff, since what's there is good but pretty shallow
Playtime: 10-30min
Nekomancer of Nowhere
You are a necromancer, and the way you cast spells is by drawing patterns with your mouse. Combined with angry ghosts you need to pacify via resurrection and a portal spell that lets you travel to and from the spirit dimension; the game has a very quick to understand gameplay loop. I do worry that with the small size of the levels there might not be much room for interesting level design, but it does work well as a more casual game
Playtime: ~10min
Lingo 2
Technically this released a little while ago, but the game isn't out and I only learned of it now, so in it goes with other demo reviews. Lingo. Is. Great. It's all about discovering what the puzzles actually ask of you, and if you like word puzzles, you should definitely check out the first game. Surprisingly enough, the sequel requires no knowledge of puzzle mechanics from said first game (probably for the better) and introduces even more confusing movement, expanding the non-euclidian spaces with treating walls and ceilings like floors. The game might look unassuming, but it truly is a special one
