Splatoon 3 fans have been “dining” in a unique way in February, as not only did the “Side Order” DLC come out, giving them a roguelike adventure to partake in, but also, there was a “weekend” Splatfest that led to Friday beating out the other days! Yeah, we didn’t see that coming, which is why these Splatfests are so fun to partake in! But if you’re already wondering what the next one will be, you won’t have to wait long! In fact, you can start talking about it right now, as the official Twitter handle for the game dropped the “musically inclined theme” today!
Handcrafted "interactive music album" Asterism has a delightful Next Fest demo
09.02.2024 - 19:43 / rockpapershotgun.com / Interactive
Take your protein pill and put your headphones on for the free demo of Asterism, an "interactive music album" exploring a solar system one song at a time. Each visit to a planet lasts as long as the song, whisking us through scenes reflecting the lyrics and mood, rendered with a mix of 3D computer art and a range of handmade physical mediums. I was delighted from the first twang. And impressively, it's mostly the work of one developer, Claire Morwood. Do have a look!
Asterism is about spacefolk in the future investigating mysterious signals across space and time. Turns out, we're looking for data in the form of songs. It's framed with wee adventure game-ish sequences, then we hop in our rocket to travel to a planet and record the data. By which I mean, we listen to the song while interacting with a music video-y bit roaming across the planet.
Skate across a frozen sea pricked with trapped ships. Paint lines across a landscape around a partner. Fold origami. Other things I'll leave you to find for yourself. Interactions are simple, controlling your movement, an action, or just the camera, but I found that plenty to occupy me while delighting in the music and art. It's build upon charming handcrafted art: textiles, painted dioramas, collage, chalk drawings, origami, and more. And as is pretty important for a music-based game, I do dig the music. I was just very pleased travelling through different songs, seeing how the music, lyrics, art style, and scenes reflected each other. I'm looking forward to the full game.
You can download Asterism's demo from Steam. The full game is also coming to Itch.io. No word yet on when it will launch but Morwood has been writing devblogs on her site so there's plenty to read if you're curious.
This Steam Next Fest runs until Monday the 12th of February, so grab the demo while you can. We're playing heaps of Next Fest demos so hit our tag for more recommendations.
The website gametalkz.com is an aggregator of news from open sources. The source is indicated at the beginning and at the end of the announcement. You can send a complaint on the news if you find it unreliable.
Top Authors
Popular Topics
thesixthaxis.com
28.02.2024 / 13:18
Sony has cancelled unannounced games alongside layoffs – reported Twisted Metal live service game
As part of the sweeping layoffs of 900 Sony Interactive Entertainment employees, Hermen Hulst, Head of PlayStation Studios, has confirmed that there have been some game cancellations.
thesixthaxis.com
27.02.2024 / 20:37
Sony has cancelled unannounced games alongside layoffs – reported Twisted Metal live service game
As part of the sweeping layoffs of 900 Sony Interactive Entertainment employees, Hermen Hulst, Head of PlayStation Studios, has confirmed that there have been some game cancellations.
gematsu.com
27.02.2024 / 14:55
Sony Interactive Entertainment lays off 900 staff, closes London Studio
Sony Interactive Entertainment will lay off about 900 employees across the globe, or about eight percent of its total workforce, the company announced. London Studio, which was developing an online cooperative combat game set in a fantasy London for PlayStation 5, will also close in its entirety as a result of the lay offs.
wccftech.com
23.02.2024 / 12:52
Intel CEO Confirms TSMC’s Process Nodes To Power Next-Gen CPUs: N3 For Arrow Lake & N3B For Lunar Lake
In a press and analyst session following the IFS Direct 2024 event, Intel's CEO Pat Gelsinger confirmed that Chipzilla is leveraging TSMC's advanced process node technology to power its upcoming CPUs codenamed Arrow Lake and Lunar Lake.
gamesradar.com
23.02.2024 / 00:32
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's biggest competition as the best-reviewed game of 2024 is the roguelike deck builder darling of Steam Next Fest
Until the sterling evaluations of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth dropped earlier today, the best-reviewed game of 2024 was Balatro - a deck-building poker roguelike that seemed to take over Steam Next Fest.
wccftech.com
22.02.2024 / 16:15
AMD CEO, Lisa Su, To Host Opening Keynote of Computex 2024 On 3rd June, Next-Gen Ryzen CPUs & More Expected
AMD's CEO, Dr. Lisa Su, will deliver the opening keynote of Computex 2024 where we'll get to hear about the upcoming technologies for PC & AI segments.
rockpapershotgun.com
15.02.2024 / 16:29
Supernatural spaceship shooter Underspace shows admirable ambition in its Next Fest demo
I respect a game with wild ambition. Declaring your game "the spiritual successor to Freelancer" is bold and ambitious, considering how the spaceship sim is still so beloved after 20 years that our readers voted it your 16th favourite space game of all time. This ambition is wild when the tiny development team is led by someone best known for replacing Skyrim's dragons with Thomas The Tank Engine. So while I'm not much of a spaceship sort, I had to check out the demo for Underspace, which aims to combine Freelancer shoot-o-trading space action with a dash of Lovecraftian horror.
rockpapershotgun.com
14.02.2024 / 13:39
Fantasy extraction game Dungeonborne was February's most played Steam Next Fest demo
February's Steam Next Fest demo bonanza officially concluded on Monday, and Valve have now revealed the 50 most played games you all tucked into across the week-long event. Ordered by the number of unique players that spent time with them during Next Fest proper (meaning all those early demo plays from earlier in the month haven't been counted), the most popular game of the lot was one that was only formally announced right at the end of January. So congratulations Dungeonborne - your blend of PvPvE dungeon crawling and fantasy skelly monsters clearly struck a chord with this year's Next Festers.
gamesradar.com
14.02.2024 / 00:07
A dungeon crawler RPG, a "next-gen" RTS, and a moody survival game top Steam Next Fest's 50 most-played demos as Valve reveals record-breaking wishlists
Valve has revealed the 50 most-played demos from 2024's Steam Next Fest, and topping the list is the dungeon crawler RPG Dungeonborne, the self-styled "next-gen" RTS Stormgate, and my personal favorite, the moody survival driving sim set in the lush Pacific Northwest rainforest, Pacific Drive.
gamesradar.com
13.02.2024 / 17:43
This Steam Next Fest was dominated by two massive strategy games, and that feels weird for an event all about discoverability
When Valve first announced The Steam Game Festival – the event which would eventually become Steam Next Fest – it was an answer to the damage wrought on exhibiting developers by the pandemic. Launched in June 2020, the Festival was billed to developers as "an opportunity to get early feedback from players and build an audience for future releases." That remains true today, even as Next Fest has grown into an industry-spanning event that Valve rolls out multiple times a year – but it's more true for some games than others.
gamesradar.com
13.02.2024 / 11:53
From Metroidvanias to roguelikes, survival games to strategy games, here are the best things we played during Steam Next Fest
Another Steam Next Fest is over, meaning another collection of indie game demos have vanished into the ether. As ever, with so many options at your fingertips, it can be hard to know what to play, but now that the dust has settled, we've collated our Steam Next Fest coverage to point you towards the games we loved that deserve a spot on your wishlist.