For the Steam Winter Festival, I tried out seven demos, with two of them standing out as exceptional and made their way onto my wishlist. A few more ended up being interesting but clearly needed some work for them to be worth exploring, while a few ended up being interesting but clearly not for me. Let’s take a look. 

Floppy Knights

Floppy Knights is a tactical turn-based game with a deck-building element to it. Cards represent characters you can bring into play, permanent or temporary buffs, and all sorts of attacks and movement capabilities. The cards themselves serve as action limiters in various ways and result in some really interesting decisions on who and how to use the characters you have access to. The demo was quick and straightforward, showing off the system and the potential it could have, but I admit to some level of concern over how linear the game is and with how certain cards seem to be locked into your deck. If there are a lot of potential variations and choices for missions and challenges, and they let you really make the deck how you want it, then I see a lot of potential. 

Verdict: Added to wishlist

The Last Spell

This is not the first time that The Last Spell has shown up in one of these festivals, and the demo is largely the same as before, showing off a tower defense style of turn-based tactical combat featuring a variety of characters and buildings you can use to defend your base. While I am a big fan of turn-based tactical combat and find the available options in the Last Spell to be interesting and satisfying, I am a bit less interested in tower defense style games. While this does not leave the Last Spell as a definite no for me, it does leave me a bit cold towards it. If you like tactical turn-based combat with a strong RPG-style building flavor and are a fan of tower defense, this is one well worth checking out. 

Verdict: Not for me

Loop Hero

Loop Hero is one I went into a bit blind beyond the fact that some of my friends were a bit gaga about it. After playing it I can see why. It is a very distinct sort of game, offering a bit of a mix between idle games and strategic builders with a bit of an RPGflair. Essentially, your character travels in a loop around a map, fighting steadily more powerful monsters while collecting gear, resources, and cards that you can use to place or erase terrain features. These features either spawn new types of monsters, help you get around the loop, or generate resources. It results in a very distinct and unique game experience, which some people will find deeply satisfying. It wasn’t quite for me though, and I will probably not revisit it. 

Verdict: Not for me

Obsidian Prince

Obsidian Prince is a roguelike I played briefly during its alpha testing phase but ended up dismissing both because the balance felt off and because it just did not seem to have enough going on for me to consider investing further time into it. The demo changed my mind. The biggest aspect of it is the insertion of several character-specific decks of cards that modify existing actions in exciting and powerful ways. This was just the x-factor the game needed, pushing the play in an exciting and engaging fashion that I find myself quite enjoying. I look forward to seeing what the game’s additional classes have to offer and find myself eagerly awaiting the game’s full release.

Verdict: Added to wishlist

Rise Eterna 

Rise Eterna’s introduction and presentation are excellent, unfortunately, everything under the hood was…. less so. A tactical turn based RPG along the lines of Fire Emblem, the combat is dull with little in the way of choices or options. Now there may be some potential for them to develop it further and provide additional options as time goes on, but if that is the case then they perhaps should have waited to release the demo until they had something special to show. As it is, the demo is boring and does not even give hints of how the full game could be interesting. 

Verdict: Pass

Slipways

Slipways advertises itself as a stripped-down, focused Grand Strategy game, but it really isn’t. Instead, it is a logistics puzzle game, intended to be played over the course of an hour with a bit of a space-based Grand Strategy veneer. This does not mean the game is bad, it looks like it would be quite fun for someone who likes logistics puzzles, but I am definitely not one of those people and this one left me cold. 

Verdict: Not for me

We are the Plague

We are the Plague is a turn-based tactical RPG set in a world where a sentient vindictive plague has saved you from death in exchange for turning you into a tool. You recruit other similarly plague touched and go through a series of battles in pursuit of its overall goals. Customization is limited, coming in the form of tattoos that give you small modifications to your characters. Unfortunately, I was unable to find out much about this one because the demo was hopelessly buggy. I would periodically lose all ability to interact with the map for no apparent reason until I exited the game and reloaded. After the third time, I came to the conclusion that this demo was not quite ready for prime time. I will perhaps circle back around to this one if they release a new demo or once the game is closer to release, but as of now I am simply skeptical. 

Verdict: Pass for now

Conclusion

This wasn’t the best steam demo festival so far, but I did find two games to add to my wishlist and considering the narrowness of my tastes I consider that a win. I hope you enjoyed the available demos and found games that you found to be just as exciting!