I don’t know if I’m going to get shot for this, but I wanted to write it anyway: AI slop didn’t make the last Next Fest any worse than previous iterations of the event.
Normally, I wouldn’t even bother mentioning something like this, but there were so many low-effort videos from content creators about how inundated the October 2026 Next Fest was with games they described as AI slop. In fact, it was so bad that while looking for recommendations for demos that I missed, I was repeatedly served these videos instead. I suppose, in a sense, these videos were endemic of the same kind of slop that they were decrying.
Regardless, there’s no denying that AI usage was at an all-time high within the October Next Fest. Going by some numbers that were shared by Chris Zukowski of How to Market a Game, there were 7240 participants in Next Fest, and a whopping 35% of them had some kind of AI disclosure.
That said, did this actually matter?
No, like…actually? Did it have an effect on the ability of developers to get eyes on their game compared to previous iterations of Next Fest?
I’d argue that it didn’t.
My reason for thinking that is thus: even without AI, it would’ve been harder for your game to get spotted during this Next Fest. Taking another quick look at Zukowski’s blog post, we can see a graph that shows that every Next Fest this year has had a record breaking number of participants. That means that more developers, irrespective of what tools they’re using, are trying to leverage Next Fest as a way to get their game in front of players. That’s naturally going to bloat the event, and make it harder for any individual game to get spotted.
It’s also worth noting that Next Fest is one of the only free ways to market your game, which is a point that Zukowski himself raises. It costs 0 dollars to participate, and, if you’re lucky, you’ll generate additional wishlists after folks are able to play your game’s demo. This can then help to drive further engagement, which could result in yet more wishlists. Basically, you could stumble into a situation where your game is able to market itself, and you sell more copies than you would’ve with a (more expensive) traditional marketing campaign.
Increasingly, developers are realizing this truth, so we’re naturally seeing more games with each subsequent Next Fest. Hence, the number of games continues to balloon as hopeful developers pray that they’re one of the lucky few who rise to the top of the pile.
Now, it could also be argued that there wouldn’t be as many games if AI wasn’t around, but let’s be real for a second: that’s complete horseshit. For as long as I’ve been using Steam, people have been complaining about how inundated it is with low-effort games. They’re addressed as AI slop now, but they used to go by asset flip, clone, or shovelware. That’s to say, people have been making “bad” games for as long as people have been making games. AI may have lowered the barrier to entry, but pretending like this is a new phenomenon requires a frankly extraordinary level of ignorance.
Plus, AI alone doesn’t account for the volume difference of participating games. Cutting out all of the games with AI disclosure, you’re still looking at ~4700 games, which completely eclipses participation during 2023, 2024, and 2025’s various events. So like…is it still an AI slop problem without the AI games because the event would’ve been just as difficult to navigate regardless going by these numbers.
I’d also argue that there comes a point where adding additional games to the event doesn’t make things demonstrably worse. The average person can not sort through more than a couple dozen demo pages without relying on Steam’s algorithm to feed them relevant suggestions. That being the case, does it really matter if we’re looking at 100, 1000, or 10000 demos? The problem of discoverability is effectively uniform across all 3 of those examples, hence why I don’t think it matters how many demos there actually are anymore. We’re well in excess of what any individual could, or should be expected to process on their own (again, even without the AI stuff).
That’s all a really long way of saying that the problem with the October 2026 Next Fest is the same problem that Steam has always had: there are too many options, so it’s hard to find new products that you’re interested in. To their credit, Valve has attempted to make this easier with additional filters, and the personalized release calendar, but those don’t always hit the mark either.
I also feel obligated to state that my own anecdotal experience with the recently concluded Next Fest was about what I expected it to be. I hopped into the press preview a few days early, spent an hour a day going through Steam pages of participating games, and found over 4 dozen demos I was interested in trying. I then filtered that list down to the 11 games I ended up recommending before I started looking to see what gems other folks had found.
Though, I don’t expect that my experience will matter much to anyone, which is why I started with Zukowski’s blog post. I think his data collection does a great job of highlighting that even without AI developed games, Next Fest would still be an unfathomably large event.
I’m also fairly confident that we’ll continue to see each subsequent Next Fest grow. As was already highlighted, Next Fest offers a 0 dollar avenue to market your game, which is a frankly indispensable tool for a lot of developers. Sure your game could get overshadowed, but that could happen even if you don’t participate in Next Fest, so you might as well shoot your shot.
All of that in mind, no I don’t think AI slop ruined the October Next Fest. I think it was an entirely average Next Fest. There were way too many games, which is always true, but a smattering of great ones arrived at the top of the pile either by going viral during the event, or by being lucky enough to be featured by a content creator who actually covered the event.
Though, as is often the case, controversy proved more popular (and profitable), so a handful of charlatans on Youtube decided to focus entirely on the increase in AI disclosures instead of covering the myriad of great demos that were present throughout the event.
Thanks guys. That does a lot to help increase the visibility of promising, upcoming games that are participating in the event.
Sarcasm aside, if you’re finding Next Fest too overwhelming to navigate then I’d (selfishly) encourage you to outsource the problem of finding demos to content creators (like me) who covered the event. Despite all of the obvious ragebait videos, there were several creators (like CantPause, hotcyder, MagiWasTaken, and Mortismal Gaming to name a few) who highlighted a host of excellent upcoming games that absolutely deserved your attention. As such, I’d encourage you to mosey through some of those recommendations, and consider wishlisting anything that catches your fancy.
Okay. I’ve got that out of my system. Thank you. Good-bye.
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