Steam Next Fest October 2026: cut a demo trailer with captions

Cut your Next Fest trailer from raw gameplay captures: trim three moments at $0.02 each, join them in Timeline 1.0 ($0.10), and burn short cues with video-captions ($0.20). That is $0.36 plus music. Steamworks lists the October 2026 event as running from 19 October at 10:00 Pacific to 26 October, with the demo required to be live when it starts.

Dates that decide the schedule

Make the trailer

Record gameplay without UI clutter, then trim the best three moments with POST /v1/video-trim using precision: "exact" for hit-frame cuts. Join them in one Timeline render with fit: "cover" and 0.5-second dissolves. Because gameplay is usually silent in captures, add your music bed and burn text with caption cues; a silent source would otherwise fail STT with caption_no_speech. Put the title and the words 'Demo out now' in the last two cues.

{
  "cues": [
    { "text": "Your game title", "start": 0.5, "end": 3.0 },
    { "text": "Demo out now", "start": 25.0, "end": 29.5 }
  ],
  "style": "punch"
}

Limits

Steam has its own trailer and store-asset rules, so check the Steamworks documentation for format and content requirements before upload. Sume renders the file; it does not submit it to Steam. Disclose AI-generated assets in the Steam store page if you used generated art. Keep real gameplay in a gameplay trailer.