The Demo Thread

cogwheel said:

Surprised you didn't mention this, but Before I Go is slightly broken for UW. The last two main menu entries are off-screen (exit game, then go to Steam page), and whenever the dialogue goes to three lines, the top line is partly (though not unreadably so) off-screen as well.

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• Voidwrought - (link) - A 2d metroidvania that makes some odd choices with the movement and the combat mechanics. Most basic enemies don't suffer and sort of knock back or pause on hit - if their animation is to move forward, they will continue that with nary a pause or a stutter. The game features a dash that doesn't avoid collision (so you can't dash through enemies), but a slide that DOES avoid collision (but only sometimes, with some enemy types). Metroidvania in the sense where paths and areas on the map are gated behind abilities that can be found elsewhere, usually behind bosses. No wall jump at the start, but you can ledge grab/jump immediately - this gives the impression of a wall jump, but it isn't. The platforming is oddly finicky, as is the collision/friction of the ground. There are lots of '1 tile' gaps and blocks you have to land on for jumps, and it can be difficult to jump-dash-land on the block properly - mantling from a ledge grab doesn't seem possible, and jumps upward and forward results in your momentum carrying you forward and generally off or over the single block. There are parts that feel satisfying, and others that feel very much like a collection of odd decisions. Eh. - Note: Doesn't support ultrawide. In fullscreen, it does that awful stretching thing - set it windowed borderless to get a lesser resolution displayed in it's natural state with black bars on the sides.
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• Parcel Corps - (link) - Nothing wrong with this game, not one bit. Just not my particular cup of tea. I've never been a big fan of Trials games or their ilk (a minor influence here, I'm sure), but I like the aesthetic of the game a lot.
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• Beyond These Stars - (link) - The followup city/colony builder to "Before We Leave". In that game, you built a city/colony on a small world, and tried to avoid space whales. This game you build ON a space whale that is moving through the universe. I enjoyed my time with the demo, understanding that there are a lot of systems later in the game that I didn't see due to the short amount of time I played it. It's down here because I don't see picking it back up again - it didn't knock my socks off or do anything wildly out of the norm for the genre to really keep me interested. But if someone gave it to me or if it was free, I'd be okay with that too.

• Amata - (link) - 2d action platformer with precision platformer influences. And speed. The combat and fairly deep systems are a lot more prevalent than I want in a game where I want to primarily focus on the movement. And they lean pretty heavily into the stat management game aspect of RPGs, and I just am not a fan of it's implementation in this game. And I think it looks better as Steam screenshots than it does in game, if I'm honest. Just wasn't for me.
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• Minds Beneath Us - (link) - Second swing at the demo, see if it grabs me this time. And... nope. It really doesn't. I can't really pin it down to why, either.
• Unknown Presence - (link) - It's a first person horror/ufo game. The mechanics are all about exploration and scares, right? No combat. Why is there a crosshair dot? What purpose does that serve? Asset deformation occurs as you move to/around/up to it, like you see in badly coded games. The locations (the house and the woods and the cabins) are more like caricatures for what the devs think these locations should look like - way too much open space, paths that don't make any sense, etc. There are games in this space that do this MUCH better, and are better optimized. The demo is on the right instead of in a banner on the steam page, but don't bother.

• Sophonce - (link) - It's a FPS that a) doesn't support ultrawide, b) only does that awful stretching in fullscreen, and c) only offers windowed borderless on the desktop (not a fullscreen with black bars thing) that doesn't do mouse capture, so you can click onto the desktop. In an FPS. Didn't even bother, left at the menus.

quarlie said:

I wasn't able to get through the tutorial. I forget the exact wording but it gave me a confusing prompt to "aim the left stick behind the bike" or something (?) and double tap A, which never did anything.

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• Cato - (link) - 2d side scrolling puzzle game. Cat + Toast = Gravity defying. It has some pretty cool one-room-puzzles. The toast can jump, the cat can't. The cat can move around by running (stick), the toast can only jump and slide down things (triggers). Combine them? They defy gravity (A button)! It's rather delightful, if a bit crude graphically. There are surfaces that react differently to the cat and the toast, areas that are blocked or open depending on if the cat and toast are separate or together.. I liked my time with it rather a lot! Courtesy of Alpha Beta Gamer.
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• Leximan - (link) - This is a weird damn game! A visually retro inspired wizard casting game where you use words to cast spells… Let me explain. In 'combat', there are word fragments floating around that you click and drag into a spell box, hit enter, and you cast a spell. You can do this in the open world, where you can hit enter and type in a word to move a bookcase out of the way to see a hidden door. Etc. The writing is pithy, the setting is silly, and I don't know why I like it so much!

• Whispers of the Eyeless - (link) - A cult-building game. You build a base under a city, and you go on 'tales' with multiple branching paths taking you to turn based combat, rooms with loot, or 'blessings', or cultists, etc. There is also some hidden object mechanics going on, but it's really mild. Overall, there is some promise here but it all feels still very early on in development. Curious to see where it goes. From a group of Total War: Warhammer modders but with no relation to that property.

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• Beacon of Neyda - (link) - Billed as a side scrolling action/strategy game, sort of in vein of the Kingdom titles, except with a slight more active role and in a post apocalyptic universe. I want to try more, but there are issues with resolution and ultrawide that can't be adjusted. I can't see half the controls in the settings menu - the menu cuts off, no obvious way to move it), and there is no tutorialization or real promps for inputs in the opening section. And the art I can see is serviceable, but I hope they work on it some. This one needs to be cooked some more, I think. Courtesy of Alpha Beta Gamer.

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• Antro - (link) - A 2d adventure platformer. This is a game right up my alley. You run right, simple puzzles, and 'combat' that is basically just another way to interact with objects. You swing, they die. It has a pretty interesting aesthetic. You're running to deliver things in an underground dystopia of what is left after something made the surface of the earth uninhabitable. There are robots, a cult like overseer, and Spanish hip hop. The voice work and a lot of the text is in Spanish with English subtitles - makes sense, as the studio (Gatera Studio) is in Spain. I dig it. Wishlisted. Found courtesy of the Games to Be Excited About Fest (youtube) video put on by Alpha Beta Gamer.
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• Albatroz - (link) - So, ditto everything @Ed209 said just a few posts up. I think the best way to describe it is a chill hiking sim with some minor survival mechanics? There is just enough extra 'game' stuff there to make it more interesting than walking from A to B. And the map orienting was actually kind of neat - the first map is oriented with south being up, and the second map was a list of instructions with a couple of pictures. Think "head south past the creek, then turn up stream, then head north through the little gorge." Like old directions where you take the second right past the gas station, then turn left at the old brick church. I spent a lot longer with the demo than I expected. I know I didn't make it as far as Ed209 did, but I am very intrigued by this game. I'm wishlisting it for now, and I'm very curious to see what reviews say of it when it releases. I will say this - the menu options are extensive. Otherwise, yeah, I enjoyed my time with it quite a bit. Courtesy of Wholesome Direct.
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• Mind Over Magnet - (link) - A one-room puzzle game using magnets and switches. It ramps up nicely, the puzzle concepts are introduced at a decent rate, and it feels pretty good to play. Wishlisting. Made by the Gamer Maker's Toolkit, who has an excellent youtube channel going over the various aspects of game design.

• Wander Stars - (link) - A turn based RPG where all actions are built up using a pool of words. "Kick" is a basic attack that does 2 damage. But a "Special Super Fire Kick"? That puppy does 7 damage AND can cause burn AND changes the damage to that element type. Things like that. In between fights, you are in a very odd world that is hand drawn to reflect a certain era of anime, and you move around on a sort-of Mario Party-esque map? It's interesting, but not enough for me to wishlist. Courtesy of LudoNarroCon and a Remap Radio interview podcast.
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• Broken Lens - (link) - It's a spot-the-difference game. It's layered, so you have to move the screen back and forth to see what is behind the layers closer to you. It's fine. The aesthetic isn't really for me, but the gameplay works. The music is pretty good, there is this weird instruction manual / very weird text you find pages of, and the differences can be both very obvious (a whole creature that is there that shouldn't be!) to more devilish (that tuft of grass is different). It has a timed hint system that resets to full at each level, and if you use it? Give it a little time and it'll refill again. The hint system itself just circles a general area - you still have to spot the difference. If the art was more appealing to me, I'd be wishlisting this. But for now? Down here in 'if you give it to me for free...' territory. Courtesy of Wholesome Direct.

• ILA: A Frosty Glide - (link) - BIAS WARNING: I generally don't like 3d platformers. And THIS is a 3D platformer with unclear rules or objectives. Magic and your ability to glide on your broom doesn't work in some places. Coins can buy cosmetics and spells that are good for... something? The movement feels both fine and also imprecise in the way a lot of 3d platfomers do. This isn't typically my genre, and this game falls right into 'meh' for me. Courtesy of Wholesome Direct.

• Hirocato - The Delivery Hero - (link) -It's a time precision platformer that doesn't feel quite right to me. It's down here in broken because it likes to eat inputs and freeze at odd times - all movment inputs makes your cat run in place. The only way to fix it is to restart the run. Could be interesting, but I'm not really feeling it either. From the Wholesome Direct.

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• Rift of the Necrodancer - (link) - A RHYTHM GAME I ACTUALLY LIKE! It's guitar hero, but each button press on the track attacks a monster. I spent a rather large amount of time retrying the first two tracks in order to slowly work my way up the score/ranking until I felt good enough to move one. Changing difficulties slows or speeds up the beat and affects monster type. Different monsters require different button combinations. Some die in one hit, some get knocked back a beat and you have to basically double tap a button to beat them, some get knocked back but also jump to an adjoining lane, others you have to hold... You get the idea. There is a surprising amount of depth here. You can also double map the controls. Each track has three lanes, and you can map each lane to two different inputs. Makes it pretty easy to deal with crazy combinations on a controller or a keyboard. It also does both visual and audio calibrations with your input / sound device of choice. I like it rather a lot, and that's RARE AS HELL for me and rhythm games. Actually freaking wishlisted!
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• Looped - (link) - What the fuck did I just play? So this is an interactive fiction thing. Sort of. Some scenes are interactive - look for wiggly things on screen or subtly blinking ones. It has a hand drawn art style, and features a story that has anthropomorphic canine(?) people, traveling through a wormhole into someones apartment then dancing and building a rocket. Fuck it, I'll wishlist it just to see what the absolute hell is actually happening here. From Alpha Beta Gamer.
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• Times and Galaxy - (link) - It's a detective style game. You are a brand new ReporterBot, and you investigate goings-on for the news for the paper equivalent that you are interning for. You can run around, talk to people, and look at various things to get context and clues for the story you are building. Once you think you've gotten everything (or people won't talk to you anymore - asking some questions will mean you can't ask others!), you can stitch together a story using a headline, lede, a key quote, some color, etc. These options are either neutral or lean towards a 'informational', 'sensational', or 'alien interest' axis. Each story you make will also reflect on the reputation of the paper, and the readership. I thought it was a pretty neat way to do a reporter/investigative game, and I like the angle it's taking. Wishlisted. CONS: There is no general button tutorial, make sure you look at the controls. And it doesn't play nice with 3440x1440 - bottom and top of the screen are chopped. Set it down to the next resolution (1920x1080) and you get a fully visible play area with black bars.
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• GlitchSPANKR - (link) - I played this two ways, Foe first, then Friend. Your new (old) game is corrupted, and you play the antivirus software as a wand with a hand on it. You spank the virus to make it go away. It has rudimentary graphics. Is it worth your time? Imagine The Stanley Parable written by someone who used to work on Aqua Teen Hunger Force. It's a silly, SILLY game. Almost a 'Yeah', but I'm not sure if I'd ever play it again. From Jesse Cox and Weekenders.
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• Through The Thorns And Curses - (link) - It's a deckbuilder, but a VERY interesting one. Imagine you are playing a single player table top roll playing game based on several of decks of cards. One is the path you take and features a mixture of terrain types, combat, treasures, towns, and events. Every monster has a limited number of cards they can draw. You can accumulate cards that provide passives, and you have a combat/item deck. This is what is played in combat. It features spells, healing items, weapon attacks, and any items you have gathered that you would like to sell (which you do in towns). Each combat round, you are dealt a hand and you play that hand until it's empty or you choose to end turn. Every action on the 'map board' ticks down a 'timer' for that particular set of location cards - you have to reach the 'end' before that step counter goes to zero. It's a very interesting take on the deckbuilder, and I'd highly encourage people to at least give it a look. I like it, but I also feel that I got enough out of the demo to satisfy me. Courtesy of Dodger and Weekenders. DISPLAY WARNING: You don't get quite the whole screen with 3440x1440 - set it down a notch, get the black bars, able to see everything.
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• Bullet: Surge - (link) - It's a simple but complicated pattern matching game. Like connect 4 but with a dose of extra difficulty and LSD and guns. I was lost in the tutorial, but by the time I lost my Score Attack run, I felt I was getting the hand of it. Sort of. Eh. Courtesy of Dodger and Weekenders.

• Professor Doctor Jetpack - (link) - So, think that old Lunar Lander game where you manage thrust direction whether thrust is on or off, but now put it in a cave with slightly wonky controls and a man who has legs that no longer work, so he can't walk. Now add in coins to buy upgrades, a 3-star-per-level rating system that results in a certain amount of stars needing to be gathered to open up new levels. Each level is a single room, and stars are given for number of objectives completed - these tend to be coins collected, time completed in, how much damage you took, etc. It's interesting, but I got enough out of ten minutes to convince me that I'm pretty much done with it now. Interesting isn't necessarily fun, and I wasn't having the latter.
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• Myth or Reality: Mystery of the Lake - (link) - Hidden object puzzle / adventure title from an outfit out of Cyrpus that seems to be converting a bunch of mobile games to PC. There are much, MUCH better options out there than these.
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• Trash Goblin - (link) - This a busy-work style of game. You clean items using various clicker/mouse wiggle mechanics. You sell those items. You buy new things to allow you to do more busy work. This isn't MY kind of game, but if you are the kind of person who gets into the whole 'cozy minutia', it might be for you. DISPLAY ISSUES: Does not display properly at 3440x1440 ultrawide. In order to have it render another resolution properly (black bars on the sides instead of gross stretching), you have to set it to windowed fullscreen, then select one of the non-ultrawide 1440p options. Courtesy of Dodger and Weekenders.
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• Globulu - (link) - Ostensibly it's a metroidvania of sorts. What it actually is? A boring twin stick shooter with STUPID (at first) control mapping and entirely too many long conversations breaking up the action in the first part of the demo. So much exposition mashing. No controller support, KB&B only, only 1080p resolutions at the moment. Pass.

• Fowl Damage - (link) - Supposed to be a precision platformer. Attempts to adjust visual settings results in the game repeatedly crashing in the menu. From Alpha Beta Gamer.
• Besotted - (link) - Holy terrible camera, Batman! Oh yeah, nope. Stopped after the worst opening camera shot I've seen in a long time, followed by about 30 seconds of navigating the world and the camera. No idea how it plays, that was enough to make me nope out and probably never, ever try it again.