r/puzzlevideogames

Back in 2023, we entered steam Next Fest with an early demo that was honestly much closer to a tech demo than a polished game.

Now we’re releasing our indie puzzle game Lost in Cheese on May 21, and our biggest marketing mistake was getting visibility too early.

We entered Steam Next fest with almost no wishlist, a very rough steam page and a demo that was not polished.

The surprising part: it actually got traction.

• ~16,000 demo downloads
• Steam featured the game in one of their Next Fest videos

At the time, this felt huge.

But it converted very poorly into long-term momentum.

Looking back, I think we made several mistakes:

• The game wasn’t polished enough
• The Steam page/hook wasn’t clear enough
• The core gameplay and direction still changed a lot afterward
• We got attention before people had a reason to really care
• Resulting in a wishlist boost but it quickly resulted in a LOT of deleted wishlists.

Since then, we’ve spent a long time rebuilding, scaling the project down, polishing the visuals/music/vibe, and clarifying what the game actually is: a relaxing 3D sokoban-style puzzle game about a box-shaped cat pushing cheese blocks.

Now we’re close to launch (May 21), sitting at less than 1k wishlists.

A few other marketing observations from our journey:

• Reddit/Bluesky posts gave roughly ~1 wishlist/post from other devs.
• YouTube Shorts surprisingly performed better for us (200–1700 views)
• Trailer got ~1500 views and some wishlists
• Use steam curator and send out keys to matching steam curator before release to get a recommendation - you get to send out 100 keys that way.
• Paid ~$300 for streamer/press outreach, still waiting to evaluate results / still sending out keys .

Big lesson for us:
Visibility is great, but visibility before product readiness can be almost wasted. So if anyone is reading this, our biggest advice would be: Do not use steam as an early testing ground, wasting your one shot at the Steam Next fest, it should really be a late part of your marketing where you have already nailed your hook/steam page and polished a demo.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/layers-daily-word-puzzle/id6762028656

Rules:
• Use each die exactly once
• + − × ÷ only
• Parentheses allowed

Hey!

Since a couple of weeks, I've prototyped this game.
The concept is super simple:
Solve puzzles with tiles, gather ressources, improve your village.

For now, I've focused on the onboarding, and the main mechanics so there's only a few puzzles to solve for now.

I would love to hear your feedback about it, to know what you understand or not, what should I improve or drop ?

You can play it here.

Thank you!

My first game just got approved!! Figured this would be a good place to show it! Let me know what you think, I would love some feedback. Very new to this world!!! Much appreciated.

My friend and I wanted to create a puzzle game that felt like "interactive art" something challenging but visually soothing. It's called Maze It Out.

We focused on hand-crafted levels that get progressively more complex reaching fairly high level of difficulty. It’s been out on Steam for a bit, but as of today, you can carry it in your pocket! We ported it to mobile

Monetization:
Straightforward, free to try first 30 levels and a one time 4 dollar purchase to unlock the 130+ puzzles forever.

I included the no AI in my title because I saw quite a lot of quick slop mobile puzzle game poping out, just wanted to make sure we set our selves apart right away since it's all handcrafted, drawings, design and music.

But I don't want to play the Anti-AI card either, just trying to navigate this landscape, thanks for your understanding.

• App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/maze-it-out-indie-puzzle-game/id6759388943
• Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.godot.mazeitout
• (Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3899320/Maze\_It\_Out/)

Hope it brings some calm (and a little bit of a challenge) to your day!

Immerse yourself in a dark text adventure and escape from the Blackmoon mansion 🗝️

Any feedback will be greatly appreciated ♥️

Hi! I've just finally released my game WorldShaper Idle on Steam!

You can get the game here!

It's a relaxing world building game. Discover new tiles by experimenting with tile placement. For example, four forests around a village would make a treetop village, or a village next to a mushroom forest might create a wizards' town! There's lots of tiles to discover just by experimenting. Use tile bonuses to optimize your production, or just sit back and become ever more powerful!

It is an idle game but I think puzzle gamers may really enjoy it, as finding new tiles and optimizing bonuses is really puzzly!

The game has been developed without any use of generative AI.

Thanks if you check out the game and any feedback is welcome :)

So, steam page here. There is something about the game that is pushing people off because the needle is barely moving. Is it the puzzle combat? the trailer? or perhaps the game is ugly idk. I want your honest opinion. People seem to engage with clips and screenshots I share online but not many seem interested in playing the game by the looks of it.

I’ve been working on a mobile puzzle game for a while and I’m trying to get real feedback before I invest more time into polishing/marketing it.

The app:

Every tile has its own rule.

• Tiles are numbered 1–5
• The number = how many spaces it must cover
• Some tiles only hit corners, some only sides, some both
• You have to use all tiles and cover the board with no overlaps

It turns into more of a planning puzzle than trial-and-error once it ramps up.

I’m at the stage where I can’t tell if:

• it “clicks” quickly for new players
• the difficulty curve feels fair
• or if I’ve just been staring at it too long

I’d really like blunt feedback:

• What confused you immediately?
• Where did you get stuck or lose interest?
• Does it feel satisfying when you solve a level?

I’m not trying to sell anything here — just want to know if this is worth pushing further or reworking. App currently does not have ads and there are no in-app purchases.

If you’re into logic/puzzle games, I’d appreciate you taking a look

https://wordtie.com

I’ve been building a game called WordTie for the last while, and I’m trying to figure out whether the core idea actually sounds interesting to people outside my own brain.

The concept is basically this: an ancient manuscript word slowly emerges on parchment as ink appears in fragmented strokes and brush marks. The moment you think you recognize the word, you stop the reveal and type your answer. Your score is based on how little of the word was visible when you committed, so lower is always better. If you guess wrong, wait too long, or let the whole word reveal, you get 100%.

What I wanted was something that feels less like a traditional word game and more like a perception/recognition challenge. The reveal isn’t left-to-right handwriting or a simple fade-in — the ink appears in uneven manuscript fragments across the word, almost like parts of an old text are being rediscovered.

I leaned heavily into the visual side too: parchment textures, medieval manuscript aesthetics, ambient music, ink sounds, global leaderboards, fullscreen/PWA support, and multiple languages. Right now it supports English, Czech, and Polish words.

I think the mechanic becomes surprisingly tense because you constantly feel caught between:

“I already know it”

and

“if I wait one more second my score gets worse.”

What I genuinely can’t tell is whether this sounds addictive to anyone else, or whether it’s just one of those ideas that only feels interesting when you’re the person making it.

Would you personally try something like this? And does the “recognize as early as possible” concept sound competitive enough to keep people coming back?

Hey puzzle fans!

We’re building Loophole: The Prison Break, a 3D puzzle platformer where you escape by collaborating with physical clones of your past actions.

We’re currently designing our "3-star" reward system. We want to move beyond just tracking "Best Time." The missions you see in the second image are placeholders, but we’re considering things like:

• Resource Limits: "Solve using only 2 clones."
• Speed Challenge: "Solve before 30 seconds"
• Exploration: "Find the secret item."

As someone who plays puzzle games, which of these mission types makes you feel the most like a mastermind? We’d love to hear your thoughts!