It’s considered one of my favourite occasions of the yr – when sport builders come out like Santa’s elves and showcase what they’ve been engaged on of their hidden little workshops. That’s proper, it’s time for one more Steam Subsequent Fest, and for the February Steam Subsequent Fest of 2026, there are over 3,500 demos for folks to attempt.
With all these demos to attempt, nobody can play all of them. However that will help you out I’ve spent the previous few weeks attempting a bunch of them, and I’m right here to level out 10 of the demos you actually ought to try. A few of them are in style, a few of them are obscure, and I’ve tried to seize quite a lot of genres right here in order that there’s one thing for everybody.
With all of that listed below are ten of the very best and most attention-grabbing February 2026 Steam Subsequent Fest Demos.
Vampire Crawlers
There have been two dungeon crawlers on this Subsequent Fest that fought for house on this high 10, and Vampire Crawlers beat out the boomer shooter impressed Dungeons of Nightfall by New Blood in a messy match. Vampire Crawlers’s sheer vitality and magnificence performs close to completely mixing dungeon crawlers, roguelite deckbuilding, and the Vampire Survivors IP right into a cascade of enjoyable.
It has some distinct and distinctive concepts that play otherwise in spots just like the Crawler playing cards, and it feels actually good to play. This was a demo I misplaced hours in, in a approach that I by no means actually have with Vampire Survivors itself.
Voidling Sure
I initially got here throughout Voidling Sure final yr, as they launched their demo initially final spring. I’m pleased that I can now speak about this monster taming/gathering sport on this article, as a result of it’s loads of enjoyable. It takes that concept of discovering and gathering monsters and turns it right into a third-person shooter as you are taking management of the little creatures, known as Voidlings, and discover and battle on completely different missions.
The controls are snappy, the fight fluid, and the variation in creatures and skills intriguing. Voidling Sure is at its finest in its exploration ranges, however there’s enjoyable in its hoard ranges as effectively, and the combination makes for a compelling proposition.
Bobo Bay
Sticking with cute little creatures, if you need a much less action-packed sport with little dudes, Bobo Bay may be up your alley. This can be a sport that takes inspiration from elevating sims, and the Chao Backyard from Sonic Journey and has you elevating these little creatures round and placing them into competitions.
Get them educated up, fed up, and put them into competitions that their abilities are finest suited to and ultimately into even larger tasks. Past that there’s a cheerful vitality that infuses the sport, and it is enjoyable to maneuver round in a approach that loads of video games simply don’t have.
Battlestar Galactica: Shattered Hopes
From the persistently cheerful realm of Bobo Bay, we go to the darkness of house, and that no much less of the 12 Colonies. In control of a small fleet escaping the Cylon destruction, you have to information them by powerful choices and tough battles as you try to rejoin the Battlestar Galactica with your personal ship and the civilians you’re defending. Greater than something, Shattered Hopes captures the texture of the fashionable Battlestar Galactica with the grimness, the desperation, and the fixed have to maintain transferring.
It’s not the best manufacturing tie-in, nor are its battles extremely difficult, however they’re tense, brief, and designed to press you to make choices and settle for tradeoffs earlier than you’ll be able to leap away.
Fading Echo
This can be a fast-paced action-adventure RPG sport the place you end up accountable for components and in a position to reshape the world round you with it. Flip right into a ball of water like Samus’ morph ball and use that to place out fires or bounce round and thru the water.
Add in some cheek, and different components to play with and Fading Echo is loads of enjoyable to maneuver round, to discover, to resolve puzzles, and battle in.
Celestial Return
A narrative-driven RPG expertise, Celestial Return posits a darkish, and intriguing world the place you play as a burnt-out detective who decides to care one final time. Disco Elysium meets Blade Runner with an intriguing approach of dealing with luck by treating cube as a useful resource used for nearly the whole lot, and so they are available in quite a lot of kinds. Mix that with a singular aesthetic and it is a must-play sport.
Darkhaven
Like a lot of my era, I grew up with Diablo 2, and that sport remains to be shaping issues with its new growth and the whole lot else. Someplace alongside the best way although, the ARPG style kinda determined that it had already reached peak and simply started doing small tweaks on the identical format. Don’t get me fallacious, I like video games like Torchlight too, however I additionally surprise if anybody was going to ever transfer the road.
Properly, among the Diablo and Torchlight crew are again with Darkhaven and their huge concept is basically to combine the ARPG with survival video games. Take the objects and quests and blend that with the constructing and destructible world of Minecraft, and what it? It really works. The entire a part of the world being so changeable creates important variations in how the sport performs, and new exploration choices. Constructing right here is saved easy so that you aren’t monitoring 30 issues, and it offers the sport a definite really feel.
Darkhaven’s demo right here is rawer than others, as the sport can be presently on Kickstarter looking for funding for one more yr of growth. Proper now what you might have is a pre-alpha the place you possibly can see loads of the seams and uncooked edges exhibiting, however there’s loads of promise right here and room for one thing that may be very completely different from what got here earlier than.
Titanium Courtroom
Probably the most surreal sport I skilled all through Subsequent Fest, Titanium Courtroom is on the market and it’s bizarre in lots of some ways. The fourth wall will get leaned on, the world in it’s odd, and its obtained weird-as-hell characters and interface interactions at occasions that delight of their surreal absurdism.
Whereas that may be sufficient to get curiosity, what you’ll discover beneath is a deep technique matching sport that’s distinctive in the way it performs. The closest in someways is one thing like Drop Dutchy, however this focuses on match-3 kind mechanics, and the way various kinds of blocks and your topics all work together as you attempt to maximize returns, decrease invasions, and discover your approach by a weird and compelling narrative.
Windrose
One of many attention-grabbing issues you possibly can watch at occasions on Steam is the inhabitants of survival-craft gamers. They emerge from one and can seemingly migrate en masse to a different sport. Typically you possibly can even predict what the subsequent one shall be – and Windrose appears prefer it.
And I imply, why not? It appears good, it is a golden age of piracy themed survival sport, and it performs fairly effectively too. It has a bit extra fight depth then many of those video games, however options all the identical tracks you’d anticipate whereas having just a few various things and a concentrate on crusing and discovering treasure that you just don’t see elsewhere essentially within the style. Arr Matey, hoist the jolly roger and put together to battle as we search revenge on Blackbeard himself!
Vultures – Scavengers of Dying
Have you ever ever questioned, what would Resident Evil be like if it was flip primarily based? Properly you don’t want to essentially surprise any extra, as Vultures – Scavengers of Dying right here presents a pitch-perfect tackle the ’90s horror styling became a ways kind expertise. Search what’s inflicting the contaminated mutants (completely not zombies) to trigger issues whereas managing your scarce sources and gathering extra.
Keep away from fight the place you possibly can, beat enemies the place you have to, and surprise – what’s that round that nook?
