These Steam Next Fests have gotten so over-stuffed that a huge number of developers are dropping their demos a week or two early just so they can have a LITTLE bit of oxygen and visibility before the tide rolls in.
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Next fest always feels punishing when there's over 3K demos each time. Half the time I've completely missed when a game I was interested in was in it because there's just so much to wade through.
Games can just have demos though, right? I'd like Next Fest to highlight a certain kind of game and then the demos to stay up afterwards so I can actually have time to play them.
Ah, so that's why I see so many people talk about "next fest demos" despite next fest not being there yet on steam.
Kinda sucks, not gonna lie, but I'm not sure, what would be the solution to this. A greatly improved discovery/recommendations system?
Yeah, but it's also just kinda what internet is? Everything is in competition with everything, to some degree, so I guess you could only do so much to get someones attention in the first place (on a limited budget), and it doesn't get easier.
I miss when it first started and it was a manageable curation. It's so overwhelming that many fests ago I decided I just can't cover them. It's too much.
Considering how many demos drop during that single week period, it really does feel like devs revoking access to their demos after the fest is kind of shooting themselves in the foot a little. I just want to play your games man!!!
its gotten to the point where even i dont feel like going thru the list of 2k games anymore and waiting a couple days to see what ends up at the top of the trending demos tab on the steam next fest page
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Kinda sucks, not gonna lie, but I'm not sure, what would be the solution to this. A greatly improved discovery/recommendations system?
Unfortunately if you try to sell anywhere else, people start hurling abuse at developers, so it's fucked no matter what now.
I dropped my demo two weeks early to try and hit new/trending demos, and weed out any bugs (successful on both counts)