Demo round-up for Summer Steam Game Festival
The Summer Steam Game Festival is upon us, and with it comes a treasure trove of adventure game demos! These demos will be available only as long as the festival runs, ending Monday, June 22nd, so those who hesitate are lost. Below are just some of the many adventures available to sample free. For the complete list, visit the festival's Adventure Game page.
The Almost Gone
A narrative game of exploration and mystery, where a little girl must understand her own death, allowing herself and others to pass through to the other side.
Asylum
In the long-awaited new game from the creators of Scratches, it has been years since you left the Hanwell Mental Institute, finally cured, and you wouldn't have returned to it for anything in the world. It was a despicable place filled with hatred and pain; the inmates often more human than the doctors in charge. But there is no denying it, you are recognizing the faces in your visions, the stories are becoming too familiar and they are unbearable. Something terrible happened there and it has somehow affected you. It was dormant in your memories for years until today. You can no longer discern reality from the imaginary, and you will not be able to live in peace until you unravel the past and find out what happened to you. It is time to go back and face the horrors awaiting in the asylum.
BEYOND: Two Souls
Live the life of Jodie Holmes, a young woman who possesses supernatural powers through her psychic link to an invisible entity. Experience the most striking moments of Jodie’s life as your actions and decisions determine her fate.
Children of Silentown
From the creators of Little Briar Rose, Children of Silentown is a dark adventure game that tells the story of Lucy, a young girl growing up in a village deep into a forest inhabited by monsters. People disappearing is nothing uncommon in the village, but this time, Lucy is old enough to investigate on her own. Or so she thinks.
Crowns and Pawns: Kingdom of Deceit
Milda, a smart, good-looking girl from Chicago is in her room Skyping with her friend Dana, when she hears a knock on the door. The postman hands a large letter to Milda and leaves. It’s an official letter from a law firm informing Milda that her grandfather has passed away and she has inherited his house and all of his belongings as she is the last living relative. Milda’s life is about to make a surprising and adventurous turn.
Detroit: Become Human
In this neo-noir thriller set in the near-future city of Detroit, androids who look exactly like human beings have replaced humans in most tasks: they are workers, babysitters, gardeners, nurses, teachers, clerks. But an unexplained incident begins to affect the androids. Some disappear without any explanation, others have unexpected behaviors and strangely show signs of emotions. The rumors of “deviant” androids start spreading, but no one seems to know what’s really happening…
Dragon Audit
A battle accountant storms the castle to rescue a princess, but accidentally rescues an overly friendly dragoness instead. This is a humorous adventure story in the vein of the point-and-click classics, told with an anime-inspired 3D visual style and modern controller-friendly input.
The Dreamcatcher
Your daily life will affect your dreams. However, what if your dreams can also affect the environment when you are awake? You play a young man who has just graduated from college and are starting to earn a living. One day in your mundane life, after having a strange dream, you wake up and find that things in real life have changed. Somehow your dreams and reality have become intertwined. You now need to travel into the dream worlds time after time and make everything right again. In Sigmund Freud's theory, the dream is the fulfillment of the dreamer's wish. Therefore the question is: "What is the main character's wish?” With the main focus on narrative and environmental storytelling, the game explores the topics of dreams and reality, human subconsciousness, and also love and relationships.
ENCODYA
The adventure is inspired by a short film made by the same company and director, the award winning Robot Will Protect You. ENCODYA has the same main characters and setting. It’s 2062. Tina – a 9-year-old orphan – lives with SAM-53 – her big clumsy robot guardian – on a rooftop makeshift shelter in Neo-Berlin, a dark megalopolis controlled by corporations. The protagonist is an urban jungle kid who has learned to live alone, scavenging dumpsters of the dystopian city, eking out a living of scraps. Her funny robot is always with her, programmed to protect the girl no matter what. One day the little girl discovers that her father left her a very important mission: to finish his plan and save the world from its grayness! The two then start an incredible adventure, jumping into different realities, full of bizarre robotic creatures and grotesque human beings. Through lots of puzzles and exciting dialogues, they’ll find out the true meaning of being alive.
Exit: A Biodelic Adventure
Having entered a surreal biotech world where computers can be fed and cured, spores of mutant insects revive memory, gene-locks are opened with DNA-passwords, household objects are born in animal bio-factories, gene-modified molds generate a virtual reality, and the artificial neural net epidemic is ravaging the human race and turning people into slaves of the mysterious Worm, can you find the exit?
Framing Dawes, Episode 1: Thyme to Leave
Framing Dawes is a dark modern day fairy tale where you play the role of Bay Dawes, a teenager suffering from memory loss who is thrown into compelling adventure with her dead pet rabbit Dink to not only learn who is framing her for the murder of a missing boy, but also to rediscover her identity and her sanity.
Ghost on the Shore
Ghost on the Shore is a story exploration game where you play as Riley. Craving adventure she escapes her abusive father to sail a rickety boat across the high seas. When one night a storm forces her to drop anchor at the deserted Rogue Islands, she encounters the ghost of Josh, dead for as long as he can remember. He gets trapped inside Riley’s head and is unable to let go until she helps him remember his life. And death. To make it out without losing her mind, Riley will have to uncover the darkest secrets of the islands.
Growbot
Nara is a student growbot on her first day of captaincy training on board a space station. Before she can learn more about her new home’s ecosystem of alien flowers and strange creatures, an attack by an unknown force infests the station with large and quickly growing crystals. Communication is cut off, and so she ventures out of her room in search of her captain. Along the way, she must make new friends, fix the station’s strange machinery, and discover the origins of the crystalline force spreading throughout the station.
Heavy Rain
Heavy Rain is a dark, immersive and emotionally-engaging experience that expands upon the innovative ideas of 2005’s acclaimed Fahrenheit to create a noir-thriller where decisions are charged with importance and actions can have drastic and unforseen consequences. Breaking with traditional game conventions where necessary, the gameplay is based around story, emotional involvement and the player’s decisions and interactions, rather than high-scores, combat and competition.
Lord Winklebottom Investigates
Set in an alternative 1920s where humans don’t exist, you play as Lord Winklebottom, the gentleman giraffe, aided by his hippo companion Dr Reginald Frumple. You are invited to an isolated island only to find your host, Admiral Gilfrey, is dead! Suspecting foul play, you will search for clues, solve puzzles and interrogate suspects in order to solve the crime!
Metamorphosis
You awaken one morning to discover that you have been transformed into a tiny bug. This is rather inconvenient, as your friend Joseph is being arrested for reasons unknown and he can’t recognize you like this. To save Joseph and to find the answers you seek, you must embark on a perilous journey through a strange world which, like yourself, has turned twisted and unfamiliar.
Mutropolis
A sci-fi archaeological post-apocalyptic adventure. In the 25th century, the great humankind achievements, such as pyramids or Humphrey Bogart’s movies, were completely forgotten. Henry and his nerdy team of archaeologists have been working hard for years, on the ground, digging for treasures with the extremely rare hallmark “Made in China” and watching weird Indiana Jones documentaries. Until some dog-looking God comes to ruin everything.
My Beautiful Paper Smile
My Beautiful Paper Smile is a story about children who are raised to be perfect. Any child who doesn’t live up to this calling is taken away. You are one of the Joyous; a child who is part of an operation conducted by the authorities. You have been locked away with other Joyous in a facility where you are tested daily. But you do not appreciate everything that has been done for you. Why don’t you see the immense good that you have taken part in? Why can’t you taste the sweet potential that perfection could hold? You do not want perfection. You want to escape.
Nine Noir Lives
Welcome to Meow Meow Furrington. Capital city of cats, cartels, and crime. A city that will just as soon claw your eyes out as lick your face. Explore the hangouts and high points of this feline furtopia. Discover characters both kooky and dangerous. Solve the mystery of a murder that threatens to spill into the city like an overturned saucer of milk and ignite a war between the powerful Montameeuw and Catulet families.
Ourea
Ourea is a cinematic puzzle game about discovering the harrowing past of a long-forgotten world. Play as the last of the Oreads and unravel the mysterious history of your people.
Paper Beast
From Eric Chahi, creator of Another World, Paper Beast lets intrepid player-explorers discover a blossoming virtual world where the environments and quirky animals have independently evolved from lost code and forgotten data. Following an unspoken narrative, players will interact with fascinating wildlife that adapts its behavior to the player’s actions.
Papetura
Once in a while, the light reaches and awakens a world made entirely of paper. Guide Pape and Tura as they discover this paper world, with all its hidden mysteries waiting to reveal themselves, covered with paper-darkness. During the journey, many obstacles and creatures will arise, and you must not only survive, but also save the world from the devastating power coming from the fire of a merciless creature.
Paradise Killer
Paradise Island, a world outside reality. There’s been a murder that only “investigation freak” Lady Love Dies can solve. Gather evidence and interrogate suspects in this open world adventure. You can accuse anyone, but you’ll have to prove your case in trial to convict. It’s up to you to decide who’s guilty.
Paradise Lost
A journey through five stages of grief, reflected in dialogues, interactions and environment, Paradise Lost is a non-linear narrative driven adventure game, with meaningful, kinesthetic interactions dynamically changing both the environment and the story you are experiencing. Your choices will gradually affect the game’s characters, but also its visual style, environment and sound effects.
Relicta
Play as a top physicist stranded on an eerie, derelict moon base. Find your way around the enigmatic, terraformed biomes by bending gravity and magnetism to your will in order to solve physical puzzles. Will you rush straight ahead and try to reach safety, or will you take your time to gather clues and unravel the intrigues of 22nd century orbital politics? Buried in the eternal darkness of the lunar craters lies a secret that might cost your daughter her life – and possibly change the fate of humanity forever. Are you ready to face the ultimate consequences of your research?
Suli: Fallen Harmony
Welcome to Harmony. Here on this island, birds and humans live together in peace. One stormy night, Suli discovers a prophecy that will change his life forever. Explore the island's various locations, interact with colorful characters, solve many puzzles and bring back peace to Harmony!
Slender Threads
“Discover scenic Villa Ventana, the hillside community of empty stores and emptier people.” Not the ideal backdrop for a bestselling novel, but as every writer knows, inspiration can strike in the unlikeliest of places. Within hours of Harvey Green’s arrival, that inspiration takes the form of foreboding dreams, impossible coincidences, and hidden motives that set Harvey on the path to uncovering a chilling, fateful truth. Guide Harvey through Villa Ventana as nefarious, unseen forces exert increasingly more sway over him and the town’s residents.
TOHU
On a small distant world floating in ether lives an unusual little girl who keeps a secret: she can turn into a Cubus – her alter-ego, who can carry big things and perform big deeds. They spend peaceful days in their cozy house, until one day someone breaks the Sacred Engine, the heart of the planet. All living beings are in danger now and our brave friends decide to start their journey to find someone who can fix the Engine and save a planet from dark chaotic terror.
The Uncertain: Light at the End
The Uncertain: Light at the End is a new title set in the world established by 2016's The Uncertain: Last Quiet Day – a lonely and abandoned Earth where humans have "disappeared" and machines rule the world. As Emily, one of Earth’s only free humans, players will unravel the mystery behind humanity’s disappearance while being pursued by the same machines which once served humankind.
