The calendar for video game fans has a few notable highlights checkered throughout the year–shows like Summer Game Fest and The Game Awards, tentpole publisher presentations, and increasingly, the regular occurrence of Steam Next Fests. The Next Fest has been growing in size and stature for years, and now it’s among the best ways to get a glimpse at future big PC games and sleeper hits alike. It is also now, unfortunately, a regular reminder that the Steam Deck’s sorting features are severely lacking.
As someone who’s naturally curious to see what’s next, both personally and for this job, I’m always excited to check out Next Fest. The biggest draw of Next Fests are the slew of demos, numbering in the thousands. I don’t have the time or the storage space to check out more than a few dozen at most, but I’m always eager to browse and find the ones that catch my eye. Which makes it all the more baffling that Steam’s signature piece of hardware, the Steam Deck, has no dedicated Demos section.
I suspect how Valve envisions this working is that users will browse the store and download demos directly from their Steam Deck, at which point they’ll be added in chronological order to the home screen hub. And that works well enough, if you’re only trying a handful of demos at a time.