Gaming without battle passes.
Takes without paywalls.
And stories without reposts.
Oh God: This Week’s Steam Oddities (Week 39)
In This Week’s Steam Oddities, Alex doesn’t just showcase games that make you question Valve’s quality control on Steam. No, this is also where we look at game ideas that were probably born either after a major brain meltdown or one hell of an LSD trip. With that in mind: happy gawking!
Steam has more games for sale than shopping channels have knife sets. That does show in the quality of those games, but there’s an upside too: some new releases are so weird they somehow loop back around to brilliant. Here are the oddest Steam oddities from calendar week 39 of 2026.
Woman Simulator
- Genre: Simulation, RPG, Life Sim
- Developer: Sebasa Games
- Platforms: PC
- Release date: September 25, 2026
- Price: $7.99
Some people on this planet probably don't need a woman simulator—women, for example. But Woman Simulator from Sebasa Games does have something to offer modern women: a trip back to, shall we say, a very busy time for the "fairer sex."
You play a housewife, cooking, washing dishes, doing laundry, ironing and cleaning. At the same time, you have to keep an eye on both her mood and her husband's. The developer describes him as tyrannical, and he regularly checks up on her. There's a touch of psychological horror to the whole thing—and, naturally, your goal is to escape this digital version of the 1970s.
Mind you, Woman Simulator is set in the present day. Its ideas about domestic life, though, are at least 50 years out of date. The creators know that, of course: the game is very clearly satire.
Cow Abduction Frenzy
- Genre: Action, Bullet Hell
- Developer: Mysterious Alien
- Platforms: PC
- Release date: September 25, 2026
- Price: $3.99
Fancy a 2D bullet hell challenge across three different maps? Ah, if only this weren't Steam Oddities. 😊 Cow Abduction Frenzy celebrates the trashy sci-fi of the '50s and '60s by putting you in a UFO and letting you abduct adorable cows. Yes, with an actual tractor beam, Scotty.
As you hoover up the cattle, angry butchers and farmers chase your UFO. And they mean business: the butchers fire automatic cannons, while the farmers pelt your craft with apples. To finish a level, you have to abduct a set number of cows. The catch? Every cow adds weight to your UFO, making it harder to manoeuvre.
At least you have slow motion and temporary invisibility to help you dodge. Both consume energy, which you can replenish by collecting energy cubes. Let's hope the developer brings the price down a little—Cow Abduction Frenzy could be good for a laugh at a dollar or two.
Slap the Gamer
- Genre: Arcade Clicker
- Developer: Tired Game Dev Interactive Studios
- Platforms: PC
- Release date: September 19, 2026
- Price: $3.50
Did you ever kill time with little Flash games of questionable purpose? Well, Slap the Gamer lets you revisit those days in a particularly bizarre way. The title of this "game" tells you pretty much everything you need to know.
On screen is a stereotypically hefty, scruffy and not exactly handsome gamer, happily absorbed in his favourite pastime. For now. That's where you come in: in classic arcade-clicker fashion, you click different parts of your victim's body to smack him, trigger various reactions and run up the slap counter.
You can insult him, too, though the game explicitly promises no elaborate story. Which is a shame, really: I'd love to know what kind of plot you could build around beating up a gamer stereotype. Personally, I'd have made it so your slaps "persuade" the chubby fellow to wash himself and eat something with vitamins in it. Still, the faces he pulls when you hit him should be entertaining for a minute or two.
Needle In A Haystack - A Time For Goats
- Genre: Casual, Simulation
- Developer: Red Key Games
- Platforms: PC
- Release date: September 18, 2026
- Price: $5.99
Oh, come on. Seriously? Yep: in Needle In A Haystack - A Time For Goats, you search for the proverbial needle in a haystack. And because the developers apparently came up with the idea at 3 a.m. after several litres of hay moonshine, they even give you some "high tech" to help. We're calling hay-sorting machines high tech today. Just go with it.
You'll have to unlock those handy contraptions first, though. You really do start by searching a gigantic haystack for that needle. Every stalk you inspect earns you "Haybucks" to spend on tools and upgrades. You'll also find other lost items in the haystack, which you can trade in for rewards.
That leaves one question: what role do the goats in the title play? If one of them is hiding in the haystack too, it'll certainly be easier to find than the needle. My design suggestion: put a goat in the pile and have it search for the needle as well. Whoever finds it wins a Nobel Prize for turning probability theory on its head.
Doggy Don't Care
- Genre: Adventure, Simulation
- Developer: Rohan Nowell
- Platforms: PC
- Release date: September 24, 2026
- Price: $14.99
Let's finish with one entry that isn't necessarily ridiculous. In Doggy Don't Care, your owner tells you to "Be a good boy" and leaves the house. What does that tell you? Exactly: you're a dog—or, more precisely, a puppy. But Charlie, as the little yapper is called, has no intention of reading the doggy bible and dozing off over it.
Instead, you cause maximum chaos as Charlie, explore your surroundings, collect items and solve small puzzles. How? By getting into mischief. Charlie can, for example, take a leisurely pee on the family piano or right in a bull's face. He can trail toilet paper through the house, leave paw prints on the car and dress up in various costumes. Your feathered friends even award you Mischievous Badges for your efforts.
I'm still not sure I've found my personal "so stupid it's brilliant" pick in this bunch. Most likely, though, I'll soon be giving a few cows their first flying lesson in a UFO.
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