May is oddly stacked with great game releases this year—at least once you step away from the bland mass-market stuff. You already know Subnautica 2 enters Early Access on May 14. So this release roundup is about the kind of games mainstream outlets will probably treat as footnotes, if they mention them at all.

Remember that old playground tag game where one kid stands in the middle, asks "Who’s afraid of me?" and everyone else yells "Nobody!" right before bolting in a panic? In Germany, people know it as "Wer hat Angst vorm Schwarzen Mann?", while elsewhere it’s roughly in the same family as "British Bulldog."

That’s what I want to play today, just with a twist. I, the Summer Drought Man, ask: "Who’s afraid of the summer drought?" Voice from off-screen: "Traffic-chasing journalism!" Hey, that’s actually true. Good—one more question: "Is Mainstream Outside afraid of the summer drought?" Voice from off-screen: "Neeeeever!" Wonderful, also correct. Especially when I look at May’s game releases.

Survival, dating sims, life sims, horror, cozy stuff, adventure, parkour, and more: all of that either landed this month or is still on the way. And yes, I’m talking about games with real potential under the hood—steam, not smoke. So: scroll down, have a look, get excited. Personally, I’ve already got four of these on my list.

A Bumpy Ride (May 1)

• Genre: Cozy Train-Driving, Exploration, Simulation
• Developer: Cosmoporium Games
• Platforms: PC
• Development status: Released (Release date: May 1, 2026)
• Price: $15

Already out, but no less interesting for it: A Bumpy Ride is clearly a cozy little train-driving and exploration game where you run a small railway line. Your train carries passengers as well as cargo through a playful, 19th-century-inspired cel-shaded world. And yes, it comes with a few funny touches too. One highlight is watching your little rail vehicle, carriages and all, get flattened by another train. Yep, that can happen. 🙂

In its normal, "inflated" state, your train gradually uncovers new regions as you respond to passenger requests. Because sometimes they want to go to places you haven’t discovered yet. Despite the cute "choo-choo train" look, A Bumpy Ride seems surprisingly detailed. There are unlockable train parts, paint jobs, upgrades, staff management, and a day-night cycle. I think I might play with a train again for the first time in 45 years.

A Bumpy Ride at:
Steam

Motorslice (May 5)

• Genre: Parkour Action-Adventure
• Developer: Regular Studio
• Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S
• Development status: Released (Release date: May 5, 2026)
• Price: $20

Fancy some parkour with the punch of Ghostrunner? Motorslice is very much in that lane, with Mirror’s Edge and Shadow of the Colossus working as reference points too. The biggest difference: "Someone on the team had a serious thing for anime." Also for third-person cameras.

So yes, it looks a bit like a J-RPG, but it’s almost entirely built around wall-runs, slides, and all that good movement stuff inside an industrial megastructure. Heroine P regularly has to deal with, well, "bosses"—enemies that are just as industrial as the setting itself. Ever gone toe-to-toe with an absolutely gigantic bucket-wheel excavator? Here’s your chance.

Motorslice at:
Steam
GOG

Wax Heads (May 5)

• Genre: Narrative Simulation, Adventure
• Developer: Patattie Games
• Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch
• Development status: Released (Release date: May 5, 2026)
• Price: $15

There we go—creative shop sims still exist after all. After we recently covered a video store sim with Retro Rewind, Wax Heads now lets you run an anarchic record store. This one, however, is far more story-driven than Retro Rewind and comes wrapped in a chaotic comic-book style. So if you like your day-to-day shopkeeping with a proper narrative kick, you could definitely do worse.

It’s being pitched as "Cozy Punk," so don’t expect tycoon-style high-speed gameplay. Your job is to get the struggling record shop back in the black. To do that, you solve puzzles, recommend music, chat with oddball customers, and of course sell stacks upon stacks of vinyl.

Wax Heads at:
Steam
GOG Dreamlist

Mixtape (May 7)

• Genre: Narrative Adventure, Coming-of-Age
• Developer: Beethoven & Dinosaur
• Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2
• Development status: In development (Release date: May 7, 2026)
• Price: -

No, Mixtape does not cast you as a hip-hop DJ. Music does play a major role in this story-heavy adventure, though, especially through a nostalgic lens. The coming-of-age story follows three teenagers spending their last night together before high school ends. So it’s about memories, music, friendship, and that very specific moment when youth already feels like nostalgia, even though it’s still happening right now.

As the Steam trailer shows, the game captures a lot of that ’80s and ’90s movie feeling—and mechanically, it sounds just as linear and cinematic. You play through formative snapshots from the lives of its main characters. Sometimes Mixtape quite literally takes off, because certain scenes unfold like dreams. Flying through a park? Sure, why not. Musically, it’s bringing out some big names too. The soundtrack features Devo, Roxy Music, Lush, Smashing Pumpkins, Iggy Pop, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Joy Division, The Cure, and more.

Mixtape at:
Steam
GOG Dreamlist

Directive 8020 (May 12)

• Genre: Sci-Fi Horror, Interactive Drama
• Developer: Supermassive Games
• Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S
• Development status: In development (Release date: May 12, 2026)
• Price: $50

Directive 8020 takes the Dark Pictures formula into third-person sci-fi horror. So no haunted houses, ships, or forests this time, but deep space, isolation, crew drama, and probably plenty of decisions that can come back to bite you later. As usual with Supermassive, the focus is on multiple playable characters, branching choices, and the very real possibility that people won’t make it out alive.

Since Bandai Namco is attached as a bigger publisher on this horror drama, the previews so far amount to useless promo clips and empty cinematic deserts that barely say a thing. Not even the promotional screenshots offer a proper look at the gameplay, so for now you basically "have to" trust the Dark Pictures developers. Personally, I love sci-fi horror, but this is not how you sell me a game.

Directive 8020 at:
Steam

Project: Mist (May 19)

• Genre: Open-World Survival Horror, Survival Crafting
• Developer: Chicken Launcher
• Platforms: PC
• Development status: In development (Early Access release date: May 19, 2026)
• Price: -

All right: Project Mist definitely won’t win any innovation awards, even if it does send some kind of blue whale streaking across the sky. Japanese team member, maybe? 🙂 こんにちは. It’s one of those open-world survival horror games set on a remote island, playable solo or in co-op. What stands out, though, is its seemingly fast, heavy-hitting pace—paired with surprisingly polished spooky visuals.

Played from a first-person perspective, the game sends you into a sprawling, foggy world full of abandoned facilities and sometimes enormous creatures. You survive through crafting, gear upgrades, and above all a mobile "train base," which the trailers conveniently leave out. There’s also a Half-Life 2-style gravity gun that lets you manipulate objects and enemies. Nothing new, then, but it does look like it’s been put together with real heft.

Project Mist at:
Steam

Coffee Talk Tokyo (May 21)

• Genre: Visual Novel, Barista Simulation
• Developer: Toge Productions, Chorus Worldwide
• Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch
• Development status: In development (Release date: May 21, 2026)
• Price: -

Did you spend time tending bar in the "Booze ’em Up" VA-11 Hall-A ten years ago? Then the name Coffee Talk probably rings a bell too. The basic setup is very similar: You stand behind the counter at night, prepare drinks—mostly different kinds of coffee—and lend an ear to customers carrying plenty of baggage. In Coffee Talk’s pixel-art world, you also create latte art, which is a discipline I am absolutely hopeless at.

Coffee Talk Tokyo is basically "more of the same," except the setting moves into Tokyo’s concrete jungle this time. The series isn’t really built around huge twists. It’s about (low-key) conversations, atmosphere, quiet melancholy, and the feeling that sometimes a café can be a kind of confessional.

Coffee Talk Tokyo at:
Steam
GOG

Paralives (May 25)

• Genre: Life Sim, Building, Character Creation
• Developer: Paralives Studio
• Platforms: PC, Mac
• Development status: In development (Early Access release date: May 25, 2026)
• Price: -

Yes, the Parafolks are almost here. That’s what the "indie Sims" from Paralives are called, and the game is a serious alternative to The Sims. You create your own character, optionally add more folks, build and decorate homes, and manage life in an open neighborhood. Also included: shops, parks, workplaces, and hangouts for Parafolks—basically all the important stuff you’d expect from the genre’s big role model.

Sure: As a community-funded, independently published life sim, Paralives won’t be as huge as EA’s The Sims 4. It also almost certainly won’t be as expensive—and it still offers all kinds of customization options, including freeform wall lengths, angled or curved walls, measurement tools, adjustable colors and textures, and resizable windows and furniture. I do think the visual style is painfully timid, but I’ll definitely give it a look. No multiplayer mode, by the way.

Paralives at:
Steam
GOG Dreamlist

My Summer Love: Memories (May 27)

• Genre: FMV, Visual Novel, Dating Sim
• Developer: Soul Shell
• Platforms: PC
• Development status: In development (Release date: May 27, 2026)
• Price: -

If you drop by Mainstream Outside from time to time, you might already know this game from our article 6 of the Best Dating Sims Coming Soon (2026). My Summer Love: Memories is basically a romantic visual novel in the style of old full-motion video games. It does have one twist, though: The dialogue isn’t conventionally prewritten, but generated through a locally integrated LLM. In other words, it doesn’t need a third-party service.

Other parts are much more traditional, such as the backstory. Once again, you play a new student, this time at a Korean art university. There you meet main character Kang Yuna, an "intelligent and charming" fellow student. Naturally, the goal is to win her heart, and retro minigames play a role in that too. Speaking of retro: My Summer Love: Memories celebrates the ’90s, so CDs, arcades, Tamagotchi, Walkmans, and rock bands are very much a thing here.

My Summer Love: Memories at:
Steam

Alex Nitschke

I’ve been into video games since 1982, spending 12 of those years in professional games journalism. I’ve also been developing games since the early ’90s, starting with a humble C64. Outside of code and keyboards, I’ve been a musician since 1989. Man, I have no idea how I can still be alive...

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