Palaye publishing agency has announced the dates of the fifth online festival Ukrainian Games Festival 2026. The largest annual event dedicated to the Ukrainian gaming industry will traditionally take place on the Steam platform from August 17 to 24.
Palaye publishing agency has announced the dates of the fifth online festival Ukrainian Games Festival 2026. The largest annual event dedicated to the Ukrainian gaming industry will traditionally take place on the Steam platform from August 17 to 24.
The organizers have already opened the acceptance of applications from developers, which will last until August 1. Participation in the festival is completely free, and you can submit your project through the official form of the Ukrainian Games initiative.
During the festival week, gamers from all over the world will be able to buy Ukrainian games at discounts, try free demos, add upcoming releases to their wish lists, and get acquainted with new releases from domestic studios. The event will once again bring together both projects from well-known Ukrainian companies and hundreds of indie games from independent teams.
This year, the organizers are adding new interactive formats to improve the visibility of projects. In particular, the event will debut UGF Direct — a special video show with a selection of new trailers from participants, the premiere of which is scheduled for the first day of the festival. Also, a separate shelf for games released during the festival week will appear on the main page.
«During the festival, we hold various activities that help developers gain more visibility. Please note that for participation in some formats, we approve each game individually,» Palaye notes.
To participate in the festival, the organizers put forward several mandatory conditions. Game pages on Steam must not have obvious technical errors or incomplete descriptions. In addition, developers must use exclusively licensed materials for which they have copyright. The use of generative AI on the game page is not prohibited, but this may affect the organizers' decisions regarding the inclusion of the project in individual festival activities or promotional blocks.
Special attention is paid to ethical selection criteria. Games that are sold in rubles without a good reason, have Russian localization without an existing Ukrainian version, as well as projects by developers who continue any cooperation with Russians or promote their products in Russia are not allowed to participate in the Ukrainian Games Festival.
Exceptions are considered to be situations where the publisher was involved in localization without the authors' consent, or if the developer is mobilized into the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and is currently unable to update the game’s page. If developers limit sales in the Russian Federation until August 1, their games will be able to return to the list of participants.
Recall that the Ukrainian Games Festival was launched by the Palaye team in 2022 to support and promote Ukrainian game development on the international stage. In previous years, this platform was the first venue for the announcement of projects such as DDoD, The Road of Dust and Sorrow, Valkyrie Iteration, Soul Shuffler, Comix Zero, Boxville 2 and dozens of others. Last year, the UGF 2025 page on Steam was visited by over 2.4 million unique users from around the world.
