You gotta love that post-Day of the Devs showcase feeling. The organization, founded by Double Fine Productions and iam8bit, consistently highlights top-tier games from independent developers across the globe, providing space for creators to share their stories in both online and in-person events. This year’s Day of the Devs: The Game Awards Digital Showcase was an hour-long celebration of 22 upcoming indie games, including six world premieres and three release date announcements.
Settle in and bask in the afterglow with us:
World Premieres
Virtue and a Sledgehammer – Deconstructeam
Deconstructeam is a small Spanish studio that’s responsible for some of the most cerebral, sexy and darkly philosophical games around, including Gods Will Be Watching, The Red Strings Club and The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood. The team’s next project is Virtue and a Sledgehammer, and it represents a new look with 3D, cel-shaded animations and a third-person perspective rather than the studio’s typical pixelated planar fare. The vibes are just as sinister and introspective as expected, though.
Virtue and a Sledgehammer is a moody coming-of-age experience set in a wooded ghost town dotted with robots and lost locals. Spend quiet moments with old friends and then swing the sledgehammer to raze your hometown and uncover memories that can help you move on. The game’s buildings and objects are highly reactive, which can only help with the catharsis of it all.
Virtue and a Sledgehammer is due to hit Steam in 2026, published by Devolver Digital.
UN:Me – Shueisha Games
Now, this is a horror game. UN:Me comes from Japanese publisher Shueisha Games and developer Historia, and it’s a creepy, mind-bending exploration of primal fear. It stars a young woman with four souls trapped inside of her body, fighting for control of her consciousness. She wanders sterile, illogical hallways and encounters grotesque horrors representing common human fears like heights, authority figures and confined spaces. The souls switch randomly, each one manifesting a specific anxiety. As she wanders, the player has to choose souls to eliminate until only one remains. Whether it’s her real soul or a fake isn’t disclosed until the very end.
UN:Me is available to wishlist now on Steam.
Scramble Knights Royale – Funktronic Labs
Funktronic Labs is mainly known as a VR studio, with games like Cosmic Trip, Fujii and The Light Brigade under its belt, but its latest project doesn’t require a headset at all. Scramble Knights Royale is coming to PC and Xbox in 2026, and it’s a battle royale with adventure game twists. You begin on a boat with 30 to 40 other online players, make your way to land on the back of a turtle, and then it’s essentially Naked and Afraid from there. Find resources, fight creatures, upgrade your gear and play your own game, only battling other players when you encounter them in the wild.
Don’t let the sweet, clay-like animations fool you, either — Funktronic says the combat mechanics are incredibly deep and finely honed. Scramble Knights Royale also supports local split-screen.
Mirria – Mografi
Mografi made a name for itself with the adorable Jenny LeClue detective game, but now it’s time for something different. Mirria is an atmospheric puzzle experience from ISLANDS: Non-Places artist Carl Burton, published by Mografi, and it looks like a delicious mix of Kentucky Route Zero and Monument Valley. In Mirria, you explore mirror worlds and attempt to make the two realities match, paying attention to small details and making minute adjustments until the unsettling environments are perfect reflections. It looks and sounds like soul-soothing stuff.
Mirria is due out in 2026 on Steam.
CorgiSpace – Finji
In recent years, Finji founder Adam Saltsman has been involved in high-profile indie games like Overlands, Night in the Woods, Tunic and Usual June, but his new project taps into his simplistic and mechanics-driven Canabalt roots. Corgispace is a collection of 8-bit games with off-kilter premises, including the soulslike Rat Dreams where you can only dodgeroll, the no-jumping platformer Skeleton Jeleton, and Prince of Prussia, an adventure where you stab Nazis “but in a fun new way,” according to Saltsman. Also, he says there are no secrets in this game, which leads us to believe there is at least one secret in this game.
Corgispace is out now (!) on Steam and Itch.io.
Frog Sqwad – Panic Stations
If the former Fall Guys developers at Panic Stations know how to do one thing, it’s make a silly-physics multiplayer game, so that’s exactly what they’re doing. Frog Sqwad is a co-op experience where you and your fellow frogs search the sewers for food in order to satiate the swamp king. You can eat food to grow bigger and become the mega frog, vomit to shrink, and use your long sticky tongue to swing, hang and slingshot your friends. The sewer levels are procedurally generated, so your froggy playground will always be different, and each run gets harder as the swamp king requires more food.
Frog Sqwad is coming to Steam in 2026, with a playtest beforehand.
Release dates
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Dogpile by Studio Folly, Toot Games and Foot: Today, like literally right now
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Big Hops by Luckhsot Games: January 12, 2026
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Demon Tides by Fabraz: February 19, 2026
And the rest
The stream featured a dozen other in-development titles, including the super spooky Lucid Falls, a 90s-grunge-band rhythm game called Rockbeasts, the soothing alien musicality of Soundgrass, an impressive-looking follow-up to The Invincible called Into the Fire, and Unshine Arcade, a creepy game about the secret lives of tamagotchis and claw machines.
Day of the Devs: The Game Awards Digital Showcase 2025 wrapped up with a neat little announcement. Day of the Devs partnered with the Video Game History Foundation to release Xcavator 2025, a finished version of a long-lost game from legendary programmer Chris Oberth. It was originally developed by Big Buck Hunter studio Incredible Technologies but never found a publisher. It’s been revived by Mega Cat Studios, Retrotainment Games and iam8bit, and an NES cartridge of Xcavator 2025 is available to pre-order now on iam8bit. Proceeds will benefit the Video Game History Foundation.
