Analysis
What the data says when you measure all of it.
The trade press covers the demos that already won. We measure the whole field — these are the findings, methodology public, numbers quotable.
The ghost-demo study · updated 2026-06-29
Half of Steam demos are ghosts
We tracked roughly 2,100 demos from the day they went live this June — polling each one's live player count, over and over, the way you'd take a pulse.
June Next Fest — data cut · updated 2026-08-13
Buried Gems — nextfest
The demos the crowd missed: peak community followers ≤200 (an absolute demand proxy — genuinely under-discovered, not just outside the top of a big field), with a real reception sample (≥10 demo reviews). 346 qualify — *