Next Fest 25|3 Day 1

Next Fest proper has begun... and I'm having more trouble than usual finding curious demos to play. I may have spent more time looking for things than trying out stuff, despite the long list of games below (many were short demos for short games). Hopefully tomorrow will bring some interesting goodies, sometimes a good game might just have very poor store presence

Highlights: GODBREAKERS, SECTOR ZERO

GODBREAKERS

GODBREAKERS on Steam

Take control of every fight with ferociously fluid combat as you chain aggressive combos, cancel moves mid-swing, and steal enemy powers to turn them against their masters. Play in up to 4-player co-op to craft the perfect team setup and topple brutal bosses across different worlds.

STEAM

A solo/co-op roguelike, centered around its fast combat. There is combos, there are animation cancels, and most importantly if you kill an enemy with a finisher you absorb their power as a special one-time ability. It's very fluid, the style is clean and simple, and the setting is quite unique, even if it is just ultra-sci-fi

Lead To Gold

Lead To Gold on Steam

​​Lead To Gold​​ is a tech-themed solitaire game collection. Rearrange cards on your playing field to complete a series of challenging missions.

STEAM

A solitaire-esque game focused around manipulating the values of the cards so that you can pair them up to the needed sets. It provides unique twist(s?) to solitaire, but is still bound by the very strong randomness that can get you into an unwinnable position if you're not careful. It's fine, but didn't exactly suck me in like Occlude

Psycho-Kin

Psycho-Kin on Steam

Psycho-Kin is a uber-stylized, top-down tactical shooter set in an alternate-history Cold War. Swap between two linked characters to outwit enemies in tense, strategic combat, while unravelling a deep, psychological story of espionage, trauma, and redemption.

STEAM

A top-down shooter, where after each kill you swap bodies with your partner, alternating murders across the level. This naturally creates an interesting mix of action and puzzle, as you have to make sure to kill people in an order that always leaves a target for the other you. The 2-bit style also works a lot better than screenshots can show, and the only thing that didn't seem particularly noteworthy was the story and the demo's 20min length

Rhombus

Rhombus on Steam

Rhombus is a first-person puzzle game where you build your path through panels controlling platforms. Explore and find your way through a compact environment in this small metroidbrainia.

STEAM

A minimalistic puzzle game with a simple idea it tries to squeeze out to its fullest. By rotating elements of a grid you can move platforms up and down, letting you move between areas old and new. It's simple, but well made, even if a bit short

Project Rebearth

Project Rebearth on Steam

The game is set in a post-apocalyptic utopia where you rebuild society after a global collapse. A massive online multiplayer where everyone plays on an exact replica of planet earth. Grow your town, trade with other players, face challenges and discover the rich history of the planet.

STEAM

A game that intends to let all players build small utopian settlements and trade across a 1:1 replica of Earth. The idea is cool and the small scope of interactions is surprisingly reasonable, but the demo itself is a bit of a disaster. Not only does it redraw the entire map after each building placed, and even failed to render things after a little while, it also only allows solo mode play that features none of the game mechanics that make it anything more than "design your own town" simulator. I can see it having potential, but I don't know how ready it is for a December launch based on what the demo shows

Bloomkeeper

BloomKeeper on Steam

Spread nature and breathe life back into a world of ash by guiding the Pouics, naive and curious little creatures. They dream of reawakening the world, but they can’t do it alone. Guide them, calm them, protect them and help them restore life to a forgotten land.

STEAM

A game about bringing nature back to a gloomy land, by chucking industrial quantities of nature spirits at it until the problem is solved. The game is meant to be relaxing, but I found the struggle to get the nature spirits where you want them to go a wee bit frustrating. It's like herding cats. Still, the game is cozy and can be played solo or in co-op, the latter of which could be very handy if the anti-nature spirits grow in numbers in the full game

SECTOR ZERO

SECTOR ZERO on Steam

SECTOR ZERO is a physics-based, dark sci-fi puzzle adventure where you play as a fragment of an ancient hive-mind entity, awakened by mining operations deep within Asteroid 2031 XT.

STEAM

A physics-based adventure in which you're an eldritch hivemind that was awoken from its deep slumber by a mining corporation. Your goal is to now infiltrate the facility and override its systems. Shame that the lore only plays a surface-level role in the gameplay portion, as it's mainly simple physics-based "puzzles". Regardless, the high-contrast visual style is lovely. Also, this is a demo for a prequel of a game that hasn't come out yet, though in the main thing you're on the human side of things

LightQb

LightQb on Steam

Dash and survive in a grid-like world filled with colored light cubes, lasers, and portals, each with unique mechanics. Play, die, and repeat to master the fastest path to the finish. Time is not on your side.

STEAM

A solid game about quick and precise movement. Different colored elements of the levels act as both necessities and obstacles, while being very readable in the rather simple environment. Level design is a bit more linear than I'd like, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, just means you actually have to get good at the level instead of finding a shortcut that will remove a quarter of your time. Generally worth trying, though the text mocking your every death might not be for everyone