Behind the Curtain – Let’s Talk About Demos

Steam Next Fest has passed us by, but a lot of games are still vying for our attention. As a game review site that covers both news and reviews, a lot of things are grabbing our attention at any moment. Let’s talk about things like the Steam Next Fest and the larger scope of demos on Steam.

I grew up in the age of demo discs, where you’d buy a magazine and get a free demo disc. Sometimes you’d get demo discs in the mail with your magazine subscription, or you’d simply get them from following promotions from places like Pizza Hut. Those demo discs are remembered fondly because, for some people, that was the only chance they had to play certain games.

I played the Ape Escape Demo thousands of times, because it was always rented out at Blockbuster (ask your parents), and I was a bit too poor to buy the full copy unless it was a Birthday gift or Christmas gift. I have fond memories of playing that limited demo disc, but the culture and atmosphere of demos now are much different.

Now, demos are an event. The Steam Next Fest encourages developers to toss out a demo, hoping that people will swim through the noise of thousands of games to find that developer’s demo. The demo is usually between 1-3 hours long (on average), and sometimes, after you have played for a certain length of time, it concludes, and you can’t play anymore.

On the other hand, sometimes demos become unplayable after the Steam Next Fest is over, because the developers pull them from Steam. I see two issues with this, one as a reviewer and one as a gamer in general.

As a reviewer and journalist, we often have a lot of things going on in our work schedule, not to mention our daily lives. We may have review embargoes to hit, or we may be covering things like Summer Game Fest or Gamescom that require rapid news coverage. Because of this, sometimes demos have to sit at the back of the proverbial content bus because they just aren’t a priority.

That isn’t to say that we don’t want to cover a demo, or that we aren’t interested in a game. It just means that we have other things at the front of the line that take priority.

As a general gamer and customer, the other issue is similar to what developers face. There are so many games releasing at any given moment that sometimes we just miss a game or a demo until after the Steam Next Fest is over. That doesn’t even take into account that the average player has work or school/college to deal with.

These problems lead to an issue where people may want to play a demo or explore a game, but due to the demo disappearing or becoming unavailable, they can’t. Granted, some Indie developers have figured this out and leave their demos up for a while.

Some even update their demos over time thanks to player feedback. In doing so, they use it as a sort of mini Early Access to enable them to refine systems or tune various things. I am always grateful for that, because sometimes even if a game has fully released, I like to download the demo and play just to see if I’m even interested without purchasing a full copy.

I’m sure that as a developer, it takes a lot of time and effort to produce a demo. However, there are benefits to it, because people will remember your game more if they have a chance to play it ahead of time. This isn’t feasible for every game, but if you can produce a demo, try to at least make it available for more than a week or two.

Those of us in the content creation and journalism space will thank you if you make demos available long-term. We are then able to fit you into our schedules better and not regret that we had to put your demo to the side for more pressing concerns.