LOST IN STEAM

RETRO GAMES are added to Steam every month - so why is no one buying them?

- Kerry Brunskill

Dwarf Fortress sold almost half a million copies in under a month when it launched on Steam last December. Bubbly 2D farming/life sim Stardew Valley currently clears 30,000 concurrent users a day even at off-peak times. Carrion, a small Metroidvania where you play as a faceless monster trying to escape a secret facility, has garnered over 17,000 positive reviews. There are indie hits on Steam all the time, yet the classics they’re often inspired by – some of the best, most timeless games ever made – keep arriving on Steam to less fanfare than a new piece of Euro Truck Simulator DLC.

The passage of time has made crystal clear just how truly great some of these ’80s and ’90s games are. No game in Taito’s Puzzle Bobble series has ever surpassed Puzzle Bobble 2X’s sublime Tetris-like balance between simplicity and complexity. Realms of the Haunting is pretty much first-person Resident Evil years before first-person Resident Evil existed. Twinkle Star Sprites is a wild sugar rush of a cute/competitive puzzle-shmup that’s exactly as brilliantly bananas as it sounds.

But these oldies are swiftly lost to the depths of Steam and only found by a few people like me who already know what to look for. A recent example is Elevator Action Returns. The only other PC release for this action-platformer bursting with Die Hard-level setpieces was 17 years ago. At its peak on Steam, Elevator Action Returns hit ten concurrent players.