The Game Awards season is in full swing, and with it, a slew of showcases are making the most of gamers’ excitement to announce brand-new releases in what already seems to be a stacked 2026. This year’s Day of the Devs Digital Showcase was no exception, bringing no less than 19 video game announcements. Founded by iam8bit and Double Fine Productions, the curation of independent games is always on-point, showing a varied and creative list of unique experiences that are sure to appeal to a broad audience.
While some of these announcements were previously shown during the Summer Games Fest season, there were a few World Premiere surprises up their sleeve to keep viewers guessing. Here are the upcoming releases to look out for:
Astromine is a co-op survival game set in a fully destructible voxel solar system. Every planet, creature, and structure is made of voxels with real physics. Dig through worlds, collapse walls, burn bases, and carve into alien monsters.
Published by CULT Games, Awaysis is the ultimate dungeon brawler. A revolutionary, physics-fueled throwdown where you’ll jump, slide, and collide on your adventure to restore peace to the Awaysis—an ancient floating relic under attack by forces of great darkness!
Play as Panko, a young, talented chef, helping to run the local eatery. When Panko’s teacher goes missing, a mysterious visitor arrives with warnings of the dangers beyond the wall. It’s up to Panko to step up and take over the restaurant and tend to the ingredients and patrons. But that’s not all; Panko also finds himself serving the Caretakers, brave adventurers, sent to save the world. In this adventure, preserving peace starts in the kitchen!
You are now entering CorgiSpace, where all the games have short legs on purpose. This collection by Adam ‘Atomic’ Saltsman includes more than a dozen action, adventure, arcade, and puzzle games, and each can be thoroughly explored in under an hour.
Dogpile is a roguelike deck builder about merging cute dogs into bigger dogs. Play dogs, get money, customize your dogs with special traits, refine your deck, and PLAY MORE DOGS!
An emotional narrative inspired by two parents’ journey with their non-vocal children, Find Your Words develops during the kids’ summer camp. Boasting a cozy art style while tackling serious subjects, this is a memorable adventure that will be released as a free game on Steam.
A wacky, frog-based multiplayer game, Frog Sqwad will have you jumping through hoops as you battle against 7 other players for the ultimate fun-filled session. Silly to no end, the ridiculous gameplay promises to be the slapstick multiplayer craze.
Face nature’s wrath and fire spirits by an erupting volcano. Use extinguishing weapons and retro-punk gadgets. Expand your base, collect relics, uncover legends, and rescue people and animals in a cataclysm extraction survival.
Trapped inside a lucid dream, the protagonist must fight to survive in surreal, horrifying worlds, uncovering the dark secrets of Lucid Falls. Facing terrifying creatures, shifting gravity to navigate impossible spaces, and solving challenges that bend reality, every moment reveals more of the dark truth behind Lucid Falls.
An atmospheric casual puzzle game where players navigate a strange, cryptic world that blurs the line between dream and reality. Using inspection and memory, uncover hidden anomalies between mirrored worlds.
From the creators of Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley comes a heartwarming new adventure inspired by the beloved Moomin stories by Tove Jansson. This time, join Moomintroll himself on a charming but cold winter journey.
UN:Me is an adventure game where you guide a girl harboring multiple souls within her body through an unsettling mental labyrinth. You engage in dialogue with each soul while making the harrowing choice of which to keep and which to erase in your escape attempt.
Lead a band of misfits on a roller-coaster ride to stardom in the age of MTV, rock anthems, and bad haircuts. ROCKBEASTS is a story-driven, role-playing management game that puts you in the shoes of a manager of an up-and-coming rock band. Your job—take them to the top.
A 32-player battle royale: fight your way in this medieval top-down adventure to gain the favor of the queen. Exploration is encouraged to level up your powers and end up victorious against your competition.
Immerse yourself in unique sound gameplay mechanics while uncovering the mysteries of the planet in this semi-open world puzzle exploration story-driven game with survival elements.
In this comedic first-person puzzle adventure, you are the Stretchmancer. Squash and stretch everything around you to solve fiendish puzzles, defeat the Claustro Empire, and save the galaxy!
The Dungeon Experience is a comedy first-person adventure about a low-level mudcrab chasing his dream of helping YOU experience the true bliss of financial freedom.
Unshine Arcade fuses isometric action-roguelite stealth-shooter gameplay with a story-driven psychological-horror mystery. In an abandoned arcade, you play at an arcade machine to earn the tickets you need to free a mysterious virtual pet trapped in the prize cabinet.
In Virtue and a Sledgehammer, explore the remains of your hometown haunted by the android ghosts of your digitized neighbors. There won’t always be a clear path, so create your own by knocking down any structures that stand in your way.
And there you have them! The Day of The Devs event once again showcased a strong lineup of unique experiences. The release dates of Big Hops on January 12, 2026, and Demon Tides on February 19, 2026, were also announced. While 2025 was most certainly a year to remember games-wise, next year definitely seems like it is not stopping. Here at Pixelbyte, we will be sure to cover and review most, if not all, of the games mentioned, so stay tuned!
