Steam Next Fest demo festival turned into an AI-slop parade - players are unhappy with the abundance of AI-generated games
Some developers actively use modern technologies to create games, but not all players approve of this.
Valve recently launched another Steam Next Fest 2026, where developers presented thousands of game demos. However, for not everyone it is now a demo festival, as some creators are now actively using modern AI technologies to develop their projects.
A player under the nickname Shogo-MAD expressed the opinion that the Steam Next Fest "is completely ruined by AI". He noted that one has to dig through "thousands of AI-slop projects" to find a normal game:
A couple of years ago, Steam Next Fest events were a great opportunity to find a new game. You probably added more than one or two games to your wishlist. You could discover projects you otherwise wouldn't even know existed. And now what? The chance of winning the lottery is probably higher than finding a good demo. You literally have to dig through THOUSANDS of AI-slop projects, masquerading as "games," to find anything worthwhile. In such a situation, what's the point of Next Fest anymore?
Many participants in the discussion supported Shogo-MAD's opinion — the festival indeed has a lot of "AI junk" instead of games, which discourages exploring the list of Steam Next Fest projects.
MadeByTango believes that it's time for Valve to introduce additional tags, such as "game created with AI," "Denuvo/DRM," "Requires EULA acceptance [for the game]," "Requires kernel access."
According to MadeByTango, "this will be better for everyone." These tags will allow removing from the store feed what players don't like, and "Gabe will be able to sell junk, junk producers will be able to sell it to those who don't care, and others will never see it and will be able to find what they need."
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