Another year, another episode of Day of the Devs livestream to celebrate indie games and their creators. Sitting down with the teams behind some of the games’ details was a blast. I couldn’t help but feel excited and proud. This event serves as a prelude to The Game Awards on December 11 at 7:30 PM ET, offering a dedicated spotlight on some of the industry’s most innovative and imaginative titles.
Last year’s showcase was even more special because Day of the Devs became an official Non-Profit Organization, further cementing its commitment to supporting indie developers at no cost to them or their fans. This year, there is a collaboration with AIAS to support Day of the Devs.
Now, the event returns with a vengeance on another stacked showcase filled with dozens of talented devs. Since launching, Day of the Devs has showcased over 650 games, including Big Walk, Consume Me, UFO 50, Thank Goodness You’re here, Blue Prince, Sea of Stars, and more.
This year, the team working on the showcase revealed 1,100 games were submitted, and 22 were selected.
AWAYSIS
Developer: 17-bit
AWAYSIS from 17-Bit is a dungeon brawler. It utilizes physics to let you jump, slide, and collide on adventures with others in the Awaysis, a floating relic under attack by dark forces. There’s a play test you can join on Steam, with support planned for Xbox Series, PlayStation 5, and PC.
There’s a unique hybrid nature in which physics is used not only for the world and its locations but also for the characters, who can slide, snowboard, and react to the world around them. This makes the world feel reactive and alive. Co-op always has competitive elements that let you steal treasure from others.
AWAYSIS uses Satoshi Matsura as its character designer, French artist Alexander Duban, and Hirokazu ‘Hip’ Tanaka, a famed Nintendo composer.
Wishlist on Steam.
Lucid Falls
Developer: Eldamar Studio
A self-published game from Eldamar Studios, Lucid Falls is a psychological horror game where gravity doesn’t follow the rules of the world. In this case, you might have to shift the world to reach places usually out of reach.
Rock Beasts
Developer: Lichthund
A role-playing management sim from Lichthund, Rock Beast has you in the shoes of a band manager who takes your band to stardom in the 1990s. That means weird haircuts and the MTV generation for those not paying attention.
The means managing the band, planning the gigs, finding venues, and selling tickets while ensuring the band doesn’t self-destruct. You’ll have to constantly reassure them, shower them with adoration, and get them to the big leagues.
Rock Beasts is coming to Xbox Series, PlayStation 5, Switch, Switch 2, and PC.
Stretchmancer
Developer: Triangle Wave
You play as the Stretchmancer in this first-person puzzler, where you can stretch the entire world. You’ll squash and stretch your way through puzzles as you work to save the galaxy from the Claustro Empire.
The right hand gives you the push stretch, and a way to get into small spaces, while the left hand gives you the pull stretch, a way to cross gaps and get high up. You’ll use both abilities to stretch and squash your way through complex puzzles.
Triangle Wave is currently working on prototyping various new mechanics, including water, which fills the changing shape of a level. You even have a sidekick named Walt!
Wishlist on Steam.
Virtue and a Sledgehammer
Developer: Deconstructeam, Devolver Digital
Virtue and a Sledgehammer is a game about realizing you don’t belong in the place you grew up anymore. Deconstructeam says it’s a narrative experience. The idea is explored by exaggerating it with robots and a sledgehammer.
Beastro
Developer: Timberline Studio
Timberline Studio is working on Beastro, a cozy fantasy game where you work in a town to table restaurant. As the heroes of the world, the Caretakers arrive in town, you must ensure you’ve got food by farming, gathering, and fishing for ingredients to support them.
As Pankom, a young chef who owns a restaurant in Palo Pori, however, beasts are invading, and the heroes need food after protecting the town. With the help of the fire god Flambe, she provides the flame for your food. Flambe helps unlock the flavour for the dishes you design for the Caretakers.
By cooking, you prepare each meal, thereby improving your caretaking skills. Each ingredient unlocks a magical flavour card to use in battles with unique special effects. After you’ve fed the heroes, you can watch them as they head off to protect the locals. As they return, you’ll learn about what they were up to in the form of a puppet show where you engage in card battles.
Wishlist on Steam.
Un: me
Developer: Shueisha Games
Shueisha Games revealed Un: me, a game where you play as a girl harbouring multiple souls and must escape from a labyrinth of the mind.
Exploring the idea that anxieties are unique to each person, Un: me features four souls tied to one body. You control which soul surfaces at any moment, but they also switch involuntarily as you play. During exploration, each soul’s fears and anxieties are exaggerated, and they attack the girl one after another.
This means that during gameplay, you might see souls change alongside the fear you experience as the player. Staying awake is needed to remain aware of which soul is in control, as they all vie for power and ultimately to take over the body entirely.
Developer: Soundgrass Studio
Solo developer Marcel is working on Soundgrass, a game where you use sound as a mechanic. It is a first-person exploration game set on a semi-open world planet. There are survival mechanics and sci-fi elements.
The plants on this planet emit sound, so you use a sphere-like drone to change the point of listening to the sphere’s location. You can also listen to the depth of a river by sound or find and resonate fracture points in structures. This sphere has a sound mode, a light mode, and secondary functions. It can also be split for advanced exploration and puzzle-solving.
Sounding plants react to light and sound, allowing you to manipulate the flora and biomes. Marcel is originally a musician but learned to develop games, creating Soundgrass, a game about life, death, consciousness, duality, and eternity, all from the perspective of music.
Wishlist on Steam.
The Dungeon Experience
Developer: Bone Assembly
The Dungeon Experience is a first-person dungeon game set in a high fantasy theme park. You work to become successful as a low-level mudcrab, chasing your dreams of financial freedom.
Wishlist on Steam.
Scramble Knights Royale
Developer: Funktronic Labs
Funktronic Labs, the studio behind VR games Fuji, The Light Brigade, and Cosmic Trip, is working on its next game, Scramble Knights Royale.
Mirria
Developer: Mografi
The studio behind Jenny LeClue has a new game called Mirria, an atmospheric puzzle game that blurs the line between dreams and reality. Players use inspection to uncover hidden anomalies across various mirror worlds, with illustrations by Carl Burton, whose work has been featured in The New York Times, The New Yorker, This American Life, and the Serial Podcast.
Each puzzle features a theme and can be replayed at any time with unique solutions each time. Biomes have tons of atmosphere and mystery, all curated by a procedural soundscape.
Wishlist on Steam.
Big Hops
Developer: Luckshot Games
3D platformers of the past inspire Big Hops. In this game, you play as Hop, who can use his tongue to swing and solve puzzles. You can even plant veggie bounce pads, tightropes, hookshots, and much more. Find a way home through a desert, ocean, and mountain worlds and collect bugs, upgrade your backpack, and meet animal friends along the way.
Big Hops launches January 12, 2026—Wishlist on Steam.
Corgi Space
Developer: Adam Atomic, Finji
Adam Saltman’s Canabalt is an iconic game from the earliest days of iPad gaming. I spent hours playing the infinite runner to get a high score among my friends. Now, the creator is back with Corgi Space.
Saltman says all games in Corgi Space have short legs on purpose. It’s a collection of arcade games made with easy controls. One of the games is a Soulslike called Rat Dreams, where instead of walking, you have to dodge roll everywhere. Another game is Dust Settlers, which is a Tetris-style game about terraforming planets. Another is Skeleton Gelatin, which is a Metroidvania with no upgrades or jumping. Kyper Cargo, where you get this run-based upgrade arc, even though it’s a filling block puzzle. There’s also Dinosaur, a logic puzzle game, and Prince of Prussia is about stabbing Nazis, “but in a fun new way.”
Corgi Space is out now on Steam and itch.io.
Into the Fire
Developer: Starward Industries
Into the Fire is a game about fighting a volcano by using extinguishing weapons and retro-punk gadgets.
The world is unstable around you, and you use a water hose to fight the environment. You have access to an extingusher shotgun, water bombs, and the ability to shout. However, you need to move quickly as things get worse the longer you stay.
Paths might vanish in front of you while others appear elsewhere—exploration rewards the player, like finding a foam grenade in a pinch. You’ll work to find survivors and help them survive. You’ll need to face fire demons, beasts from the world who shaped the island’s mythology.
Into the Fire heads into Early Access on Steam in 2026.
Wishlist on Steam.
Dogpile
Developer: Studio Folly, Toot Games
Dogpile is a roguelike deck builder about merging cute dogs into bigger dogs. Combining two of the same dogs makes a bigger dog. The goal is to combine dogs without overflowing the yard.
There are roguelike mechanics, like being friendly, which allow two dogs in the yard to find each other. An example of a bad trait is the crate trait, where a dog can’t merge for a couple of hands.
There’s a dog tag mechanic, like friendly folds, which makes every pug in the game friendly. So, it wants to match with every pug in the game. And another tag that you can synergize with it is called pug life. That turns every dog smaller than a pug into a pug, which means that you just have a pug factory dog.
Dogpile is out on Steam.
Unshine Arcade
Developer: Mardt
Moomintroll: Winter’s Warmth
Developer: Hyper Games
https://youtu.be/ouiFnHRx5IE
Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley is getting a sequel in Moomintroll: Winter’s Warmth. This time, join Moomintroll himself on a charming but cold winter journey. When Moomintroll unexpectedly wakes up early from his winter hibernation, he finds himself completely alone for the first time, in a world he barely recognizes. The familiar landscape of Moominvalley is now cloaked in the frosty veil of the Lady of the Cold. Initially seeking someone to care for him and longing to banish winter, young Moomintroll reluctantly embarks on a journey into the unknown, learning to forge new friendships and help those in greater need than himself.
Wishlist on Steam.
Demon Tides
Developer: Fabraz
Beebz and her crew are on a journey of self-discovery as they travel the vast oceans of Ragnar’s Rock.
Navigate the open seas and explore each distant structure, uncovering every hidden nook and cranny with your diverse, expressive move-set. Beat challenges or find hidden chests to collect talismans along the way that modify and even expand your abilities, or switch up your drip with a plethora of discoverable outfits.
Demon Tides launches on February 19, 2026. Wishlist on Steam.
Frog Squad
Developer: Panic Stations
Astromine
Developer: Alien Trap
Astromine is a co-op survival game set in a destructible voxel solar system. Every planet, creature, and structure is made of voxels with physics, and you can freely fly between large planets in an open solar system.
Find Your Words
Developer: Capybara Games
Capybara Games revealed Find Your Words, a game about finding a way to communicate beyond speech. It’s a cozy game about making friends where you play as a non-speaking child on their first day at summer camp.
The child is introduced to a new communication tool for the first time. You use a communication binder to combine symbols into short phrases. As you communicate with characters, you’ll learn about them and join in their favourite activities. You might inspire budding artists, play hide-and-seek, or even try a new hobby. As players explore the scenic grounds of Can House, they collect new symbols to add to their communication binder.
Find Your Words was inspired by two dads with non-speaking children, and it helped them connect as parents. It’ll be available for free with an option for the Supporter Edition on PC in 2026.
Xcavator 2025
Developer: Video Game History Foundation
Teaming up with Day of the Devs, the Video Game History Foundation plans to release Xcavator 2025, a finished version of a never-before-seen lost game from Chris Oberth.
Incredible Technologies originally developed it, the company behind Golden Tee Golf, Big Buck Hunter, and more.
“The original Xcavator prototype is a rare glimpse at the struggles of an indie developer trying to break into the console industry during the 8-bit golden age,” said Frank Cifaldi, founder and director of the Video Game History Foundation. “The world wasn’t ready for it in 1991, but thanks to Oberth saving his work – and to his family for getting it into archivist hands – 2026 will be the year that his work will finally see the light of day. This is an important piece of game history and we’re proud to be able to raise awareness for it with the help of everyone involved.”
One hundred percent of the profits will support VGHF’s goal of preserving and celebrating video games. You can pick up Xcavator’s NES cartridge on iam8bit for $100.
