Focus Entertainment and Mad About Pandas debuted a new gameplay overview trailer for Yerba Buena during the Galaxies Spring Showcase, giving players a closer look at the upcoming puzzle platformer before its launch on May 26, 2026. Alongside the new trailer, the team released a free Steam demo, allowing players to try out the game’s central mechanics ahead of release.
Yerba Buena is set in a surreal version of 1970s San Francisco and follows Barb, a young woman living as an NPC inside an abandoned video game production. From there, players use a device called the Oscillator to interact with the environment and solve puzzles built around the game’s main Copy and Paste mechanic.
A Puzzle Platformer Built Around Copy and Paste
The core idea behind Yerba Buena is simple, but it leaves plenty of room for experimentation. Using the Oscillator, players can scan objects in the environment, copy specific properties from them, and paste those properties onto something else to change how the space works.
That means you can take a car’s movement pattern and apply it to a housing block to make it slide across the stage, or copy the bounce of a trampoline and place it onto concrete to create a new path forward. Other interactions let you pull gas from a broken pipe and use it to make solid walls disappear. The game also allows players to stack properties on top of one another, adding another layer to how each puzzle can be approached.
Mad About Pandas is also leaning into flexibility here, since players can reset their actions whenever they want and try a different solution without penalty.
The Steam Demo Is Available Now
Players interested in trying Yerba Buena early can jump into the new Steam demo now. The demo includes the tutorial along with the game’s first three levels, offering an early look at its mechanics, characters, and setting.
Progress made in the demo will carry over to the full release, so anyone who starts now can continue where they left off once the full game launches later this month.
Launches May 26 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC
Yerba Buena launches on May 26, 2026, for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam. Pre-orders are now available, with a 10% discount ahead of release.
