Today is the last day of Steam Next Fest, and I’m still in the middle of running through a ton of demos. So, my planning ahead and finding new ways to name these Two-Game Tuesdays is about to pay off. The first two games are He Who Watches and BALL x PIT.
‘hE wHO WATCHES’: on steam in 2025
While covering the Thinky Direct, I put He Who Watches down as a game I had my eye on. My love for games that give me a bow and arrow aside, it’s a puzzle game that relies on spatial reasoning within its puzzle solving. Starting it up, the controls take some getting used to. You move square by square throughout the levels, and you can walk on the walls. And you get one arrow to fire to solve puzzles, but you can recall it at any time after shooting.
The puzzles pretty quickly make use of the game’s movement mechanic and throw you a couple of curveballs. Within a few levels, I was already running into particular types of tiles that I couldn’t walk on, forcing me to find a new way around. The arrows are shot into diamond-shaped eye switches, not unlike those in Ocarina of Time. The demo does a great job of showing you exactly what the game will be asking of you going forward, and I can see this getting more and more intricate as it continues. He Who Watches is releasing on Steam later in 2025.
‘BALL X PIT’: no release date
I stumbled upon BALL x PIT. I was looking for something else that I couldn’t remember the name of (and still can’t, I’m only typing this out with the hope that it hits me as it does). But when I saw the trailer, I stopped what I was doing and downloaded the demo. I remembered all of the brick-breaking games I loved playing on my parents’ computer. Then, I started it. And the wildly dramatic narration hit me in my chest. I love a game that leans into ridiculousness but plays it straight.
And then I got into the game —surprise, surprise — it’s a roguelike. That’s right. Roguelike Papi stumbled into an absolute banger. And I’m not treating this like a hand of spades and saying it’s a possible banger. It is 100 percent, pure heat. Just like those block-breaking games of the past, you can see the initial line of where your balls are going. You fire off four balls at a time, and they return to you afterwards. Meanwhile, all of your block-based enemies are moving closer and closer to you like Space Invaders. If they reach the bottom of the screen or get too close to you, they knock some health off.
Movement is also necessary because there are XP orbs scattered around as you get kills. That’s right, there’s even some Vampire Survivors in there. But the experience is very much all its own. After some time, the gameplay space will open up, and you’ll come face-to-face with a boss fight that tests your upgrades — of which there are many. After some time, you can clearly put together an absolutely floor-melting build. I’m loving my time with this Steam demo, and I can’t wait to get my hands on the full game.
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