Popular Next Fest demos see 1600% increase in Discord messages after launch
But are studios doing enough to utilise this data?
The June Edition of Steam Next Fest wrapped up last week and Steam has shared a list of the top-50 most popular demos from the event.
As always, publications such as The GameDiscoverCo newsletter and the Alinea Insight newsletter have done an excellent job of covering the “biggest winners” by analysing wishlist growth and conversions into purchases.
But wanted to approach Steam Next Fest from a different angle by asking two important questions that we haven’t seen discussed:
Does a successful demo launch during Steam Next Fest cause a rise in Discord activity?
Are game studios doing enough to analyse these messages from new players to improve future iterations of their games?
To find out, we analysed a selection of Discord servers for games featured in Steam’s top-50 most popular demos from the June 2026 Next Fest.
Here’s what we found:
Only 2 of the top-50 Next Fest demos don’t have Discord servers
Smaller studios place much greater importance on Discord as a social platform, as only two of the top-50 most popular June Next Fest 2026 demos didn’t have a Discord server: Echoes of Aincrad (published by Bandai, who don’t engage much with Discord) and IGTAP: an Incremental Game That’s Also a Platformer.
Most games pushed Discord as the primary social platform within the social links on the game’s Steam page, showing the level of importance they place on it over other social media platforms.
This is in stark contrast to the wider PC/console gaming space, where many of the biggest game franchises don’t have dedicated Discord servers and are nested under the developer or publisher instead. Often, this limits opportunities for in-depth discussions around games, causing fans to create their own community servers (Overwatch is a good example of this).
Popular Next Fest games saw Discord activity grow by 1600% in 48 hours
In general, the majority of the top-50 most popular Next Fest demos saw a significant increase in new members and activity within their Discord servers.
Iron Nest: Heavy Turret Simulator saw a 312% increase in Discord messages after launching
EMPULSE saw a 401% increase in Discord messages after launching
Mistfall Hunter saw a 1309% increase in Discord messages after launching
Dust Front saw a 1613% increase in Discord messages after launching
This shows that popular Next Fest demos convert players into joining a game’s community (Discord server), although the growth rates of message activity depend on some important factors:
Whether the game has launched a demo before and already has a well-established Discord server
The discoverability of the game’s Discord server. Studios that frequently shared Discord links on Reddit and other platforms with a high domain authority made them easier to find on Google. This had a massive impact on member numbers.
Whether the Discord server is dedicated to one game or nested within a wider Discord server for the developer or publisher.
How players use Discord servers during Next Fest
Community managers might view Discord servers as an important platform for game studios to build stronger social links with their players. Studio leaders should view Discord as a gigantic player feedback platform, where messages from players can be used to quickly identify bugs and make QOL improvements to your game - without having to conduct expensive player surveys.
As Discord is already such a popular platform with so many players around the world, it’s often the primary platform of choice for players to report bugs and share feedback - especially as they often want to see how their experience of a game compares with other players.
Accord’s ‘Studies’ tool allows game developers to get a comprehensive overview of player messages posted during important periods, such as a new demo launch or season update.
Accord does this by creating ‘Insights’ for five key areas, generating three insights for each of the following areas according to message frequency:
Sentiment analysis
Bugs & issues
Feature requests
Complaints & frustration
Hype & excitement
Of course, Accord can be used to dive much deeper into specific areas such as bugs and issues, but the Insights tool is a great way of getting a quick overview of an event such as Next Fest in less than 30 minutes.
We can use this to find out what the most popular talking points were during the first week of Iron Turret’s June 2026 Next Fest demo:
Bugs & Issues
Numerous players reported that the game stalls and completely fails to load the main menu, requiring them to force-quit the application. Several users identified alt-tabbing as a consistent trigger for game-breaking freezes and crashes
A frequently reported bug involves the game continuing to run in the background after players exit, forcing users to completely shut down Steam via Task Manager to stop it.
Specific bugs include faulty projectile physics and mission progression stalls
Feature Requests
Overwhelming player demand for multiplayer, and particularly co-op, where multiple players could man a single nest.
Players request strategic mobility for the Iron Nest. The Nest can actually be moved, so this suggests that better instructions are needed
Players desire deeper progression via turret upgrades, such as more power or improved/faster performance
Staying on top of bug reporting and player feedback
Iron Nest: Heavy Turret Simulator is developed by a two-person team. As the second-most-popular demo of Next Fest, the studio found itself overwhelmed by the number of player reports that were being manually submitted.
This issue was amplified as the Discord server didn’t have a dedicated channel for bug reporting, leading to a significant increase in manual reports.
While manual reports allow players to submit game log files to aid fixes, studios should remember that Discord will be the primary platform of choice for many players to report bugs, and that Discord can always be used to quickly ID bugs before they become a major issue - especially with tools such as Accord.
The big question: can Discord be used to measure sales conversions?
Wishlist adds are no guarantee that players will pick up your game at launch. And while it’s possible to measure the conversion rates of Wishlists, we wanted to find out if Discord could be used to measure purchase intent in the absence of a pre-order button (which is the case for Iron Nest).
According to our analysis, the Next Fest demo for Iron Nest was highly effective at creating an emotional connection with players, many of whom stated their intent to directly purchase the game.
Next Fest and the importance of Discord servers
If players hear about your game during Next Fest and enjoy it, many of them will seek out a Discord server to join.
If they join, you’ve pulled them into your community. If you’re lucky, they’ll stick around and chat to other players.
If you’re really lucky, they’ll make friends with other players and become an important part of your game’s community, sharing valuable feedback to help you improve the game in the future.
And if you’re really, really lucky, they’ll lock in that day one purchase the moment your pre-orders go live because they’ve formed an emotional connection with your game and want to see you thrive as a studio.
Discord is a massively important tool and platform for two main reasons:
You give players a reason to stick around and join a community, lowering the risk of them simply moving on to the next big game that catches their attention.
As players share feedback on the latest builds and demos, you can use this data as a game studio to improve future iterations of the game.
Specialist tools like Accord allow studios to automate this process so you can spend less time trying to capture and analyse player feedback and more time implementing it.
If you need a hand doing that, get in touch with us at contact@accord.gg
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