Since the COVID-19 pandemic hit, game demos have grown in importance. Demos allow game players to save money while still getting to try a lot of great games. That's why the Steam Game Festival was such an important part of 2020. Dozens of game demos were made available for the duration of each Steam Game Festival, helping drive up interest in some great 2020 and upcoming indie games. Now the Steam Game Festival is coming back to help kick off 2021 in PC gaming.
Valve announced Friday evening that the Steam Game Festival will be back starting February 3. The official start time will be 10:00 AM PST and the event will last through February 9 at 10:00 AM PST, after which the demos will no longer be available. February's Steam Game Festival will feature over 500 PC game demos covering all manner of game genres. The event will also offer up a full schedule of developer interviews, gameplay livestreams, and more. There will even be an official Twitch stream this time around.
To accompany the announcement, Valve's shared trailers showcasing dozens of games with demos already confirmed for the event. The videos are split by genre on the official Steam Youtube channel. Genres featured include Action, Adventure, Horror, Platformer, Puzzle, RPG, Sports/Racing, VR, Visual Novel, and Strategy. Each video features a ton of great games, so there should be a demo for everyone.
Valve is dubbing this iteration of the Steam Game Festival the February 2021 Edition. Previous iterations of the event have been given seasonal names, so the switch to a monthly branding invites speculation. It's possible that Valve plans to start hosting Steam Game Festivals much more routinely, which is all the more exciting. But for now, PC gamers can look forward to February 3 and the first Steam Game Festival of 2021.
Source: YouTube