Steam games of 2026 against 2024: fewer set in science fiction and the near future, more in fantasy and medieval worlds, and cozy games more than doubled from a small base. The moves are small; the card has each one. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

I compared 1,430 Steam demos with the full games that followed. A demo with many reviews means a bigger launch. It says nothing about whether players will like the game: there it is a coin flip. The demo's score tells you that, even with 10 reviews. #steam #gamedev #indiedev

Three receipts: Loftia, Cozy Game Restoration and County of Fortune all peaked inside their forecasts in week one. 20 graded: 15 inside, 5 above, 0 below. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Steam demos at 95%+ positive before launch: 86 in 100 full games ended at 85%+. Demos under 70%: 26 in 100. The number of demo reviews said nothing about the full game's score. #gamedev #steamdemo #steam #indiedev

Put Your Toys Away Together! launched with 17,314 wishlists. After 7 days it had sold 7,348 copies on Steam, equal to 42 in 100 of its wishlists. Some buyers never wishlisted it, so this is a ratio, not a conversion rate. #wishlists #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Most Steam games that reach 1,000 reviews already have 200+ in their first week: 608 of 711 from 2025. Of games with under 50 in week one, 1 in 100 got there. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Steam reviewers do not mind dying. Games where players say they could see why they failed: 7 points more positive reviews than games like them. Games where deaths come out of nowhere: about the same. Games where the dice get the blame: 1 point more. 1,374 games. #gamedev #gamedesign #steam

Three Steam launches this week: DREADMOOR, Football Manager 27 and Main Sequence. Each forecast on the card was logged before launch, from where launches with a similar following landed. Each gets graded after its first week. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Every year about 250 unknown devs break through on Steam (1,000+ reviews). Same in 2016, same in 2025. Five times as many try now, so the odds went from 1 in 10 to 1 in 44. A liked game by an unknown: 1 in 3 made it in 2015, 1 in 10 in 2025. #steam #gamedev #indiedev

Steam launches of June to September 2026: the top 1 in 100 got 64 of every 100 reviews written in the first four weeks. A year earlier, 78 (Silksong launched in that window). Without the 10 biggest launches each year: 52, down from 61. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Free browser game. You work at an unnamed store's review department. Fifteen working days, each a real period from 2006 to last week, with the real number of games that came out then. steammaho.com/desk #games #gamedev #browsergames

Feels good when your revenue calculations are pretty close to reality #steam #polden #gamedev #analytics

Two receipts. Phantom Blade Zero peaked at 833,921 players in week one, far above its forecast of 5,437 to 248,530. ATMOSFAR: 1,622, inside its forecast of 148 to 37,590. Emberville moved its launch, so no grade. 17 graded: 12 inside, 5 above, 0 below. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Idle games doubled on Steam. Of games released January to September 2026 with 10+ reviews, 13 in 100 carry the Idler or Incremental tag. Same months of 2024: 6 in 100. The mechanics read from the games agree: idle progression in 4.9 in 100, up from 2.2. #idlegames #incremental #gamedev #steam

What an hour of a Steam game costs: the price divided by the hours reviewers had played when they wrote their review. Under $5: $1.25 an hour. $10 to $20: $2.12. $50 and up: $3.18. Typical hours at review time: 2.7, 8 and 20. #steam #pcgaming #gamedev #indiedev

How many wishlists does one Steam follower stand for? Across 1,843 tracked launches, about 23 (middle half 17 to 31). Followers show on every store page, wishlists do not: 1,000 followers suggests roughly 17,000 to 31,000 wishlists. #wishlists #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Steam games that disclose AI-generated content, launched June to September 2026: 35 in 100 got no review in their first four weeks. Games without the disclosure: 22 in 100. Reaching 50 reviews: 9 in 100 against 19. #gamedev #AI #steam #indiedev

Epic says a free week on its store lifts a game's Steam peak by 40%. Across 470 giveaways since 2018, the typical game gained 10% that month, and 4 in 10 had a lower Steam peak than usual. Games with 5,000+ Steam players: +1%. Epic's 40% is the average, pulled up by a few. #epicgames #steam

Next week's launches. Where 8 in 10 similar launches peaked: Loftia (Nov 3) 215 to 42,799 players. Cozy Game Restoration (Nov 4) 45 to 8,659, forecast Sep 14 before its date moved. County of Fortune (Nov 5) 106 to 20,253. Graded a week after launch, misses kept. steammaho.com/reports/scorecard

Horror launches on Steam almost double in October: about 310 a year, against about 170 in other months (2022 to 2025). October horror games reach 100 reviews a little less often: 22 in 100, against 24 in other months. This October so far: 291, up from 268 last year. #horror #halloween #gamedev

Three numbers the store page does not show: hours at review time, share who reached the ending, price per hour actually played. Now on a Steam curator for 196 games; follow it and the line shows on the store page: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/46658913/ #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Half the story games on Steam tell a dark story and half a light one. Dark ones pass 1,000 reviews a bit more often: 14 in 100 against 12. Light ones get kinder reviews: 86% positive against 81% for the typical game. Horror stories: 95 in 100 dark. Comedy: 9. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Steam reviews get a little harsher after launch. The typical game is 86% positive in its first two months and 84% over the rest of its first year. 3 in 10 games drop 5+ points. Of 74 games that started under 40% positive, 60 went up 5+ points. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Three in four paid Steam games launch with a discount, usually 15% off. That is 77% of 11,391 games released January 2024 to June 2025 with 10+ reviews. Games that went on to 10,000+ reviews: only half did. The next sale came about 50 days after launch. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Of paid Steam games released January to June 2026, 12 in 100 priced $15 to $19.99 have passed 1,000 reviews. At $20 to $29.99 it is 25 in 100, twice as many. Under $5: 1 in 200. This is not price alone: games at $20 and up are usually bigger productions. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Steam got 76% more new games this September than last September. August: +40%. October so far: +55%. From January to May the gap was 10%. Most of the extra games come from developers with a single release. A release weekday now has about 110 new games, up from 75. #steam #gamedev #indiedev

Next week's launches, forecast Oct 24. Where 8 in 10 similar launches peaked in week one: Emberville (Oct 27) 742 to 71,073 players. Phantom Blade Zero (Oct 28) 5,437 to 248,530. ATMOSFAR (Oct 29) 148 to 37,590. Graded a week after launch, misses kept. steammaho.com/reports/scorecard #gamedev

Four receipts, four hits. Valor Mortis peaked at 5,182 players (forecast 742 to 60,538). Planet Zoo 2: 45,101 (238 to 46,409). Castlevania: 21,745 (346 to 52,694). Tenebris Somnia: 1,141 (84 to 15,270). 15 graded: 11 inside, 4 above, 0 below. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

Who writes Steam reviews? For the typical MMO, 13 in 100 reviewers are writing their first review ever, and 27 own 100+ games. Action and adventure flip it: 7 first-timers, about 40 with 100+ games. Free-to-play: 11 and 30. #gamedev #steam #indiedev

A year after launch, the typical Steam game keeps 15 in 100 of its players (month 12 against its best month of the first three). One in three keeps fewer than 10. PvP games keep 28, free-to-play 26, co-op 21. RPGs 13, horror 12. Games played together hold on best.