Steam Hype Playlist: January 2026

Keeping up with all the new games on Steam can be a job unto itself, and potentially disappointing if you're rushing to grab stuff the second it launches. That's why every month we wait for the dust to settle before picking the best new Steam games we've played and adding them to our Steam Hype Playlist. For your perusal, here's the January 2026's Steam games that kicked off this year with a bang.

While low on big AAA releases, January was still packed with interesting titles, including a new strategy game from the team behind XCom's infamous Long War mod, some great RPGs, the world's most in-depth fantasy blacksmithing sim and the game that defined a whole new subgenre of incremental time-sponge. Let's take a look: