Ballad of Antara is a free-to-play dark fantasy action RPG from TipsWorks Studio, announced for PlayStation 5, PC and mobile. Sony revealed it during the State of Play broadcast on 30 May 2024 with a stated 2025 launch window.
That window passed without a release. As of September 2026, storefront and database listings have quietly moved the game to 2026, publisher Infold Games has not committed to a day, and the year has roughly three months left in it. Everything below is drawn from the reveal, the publisher's own announcement material and the trailers — not from hands-on play, because nobody outside the studio has had any.
Note
Key Takeaways
- Announced 30 May 2024 at Sony's State of Play for PlayStation 5, PC and mobile. Xbox has never been announced.
- Developed by TipsWorks Studio, the team behind Pascal's Wager, and published by Infold Games, the publisher of Infinity Nikki and Love and Deepspace.
- You play as Dromos, not a character called Antara — a common mix-up, since Antara is the world rather than the protagonist.
- It is free-to-play with optional in-game purchases, which makes it a very different proposition from the premium RPGs it gets compared to.
- The original 2025 window lapsed. Listings now say 2026 with no confirmed date.
What Ballad of Antara Actually Is
Infold Games describes Ballad of Antara as a dark fantasy action RPG built in Unreal Engine 5, set in a world devastated by the invasion of an ancient force that left the land's "essences" twisted and lost.
You play as Dromos, described in the announcement as a mysterious girl on a mission to reunite the sundered world. Along the way she meets and joins forces with Emissaries — powerful entities that wield the force of those essences. That is the extent of the confirmed premise. The studio has not published a cast list, a companion roster, or any named locations beyond the setting itself.
This is worth stating plainly because a lot of secondary coverage, including an earlier version of this article, described a protagonist named Antara uniting broken kingdoms alongside named companions. None of that came from the publisher.
The Reveal Trailer
The announcement trailer is the single best source on the game's tone. It leans hard on scale — large hostile creatures, ruined architecture, a muted palette — and on traversal through open, vertical environments.
Who Is Making It
TipsWorks Studio's previous game is Pascal's Wager, a soulslike action RPG released on mobile in 2020 and later ported to Steam and Nintendo Switch. That matters more than the usual developer footnote: Pascal's Wager was one of the few mobile-first action games to attempt console-grade combat, and Ballad of Antara reads as the same ambition at a much larger budget.
Note that TipsWorks is not the developer of Lost Soul Aside, which several outlets — and a previous version of this page — have incorrectly attributed to them. Lost Soul Aside is developed by UltiZero Games.
Infold Games publishes. Infold is best known for Infinity Nikki and Love and Deepspace, both free-to-play titles with substantial in-app purchase economies. That publishing history is the most reliable signal available about how Ballad of Antara will be monetised.
The Gameplay Showing
What the gameplay footage shows is a third-person action game with dodge-and-counter combat against oversized enemies. What it does not show is a HUD full of progression systems, a skill tree, or any storefront — so the structural questions below remain open.
What Free-to-Play Means Here
This is the detail most coverage skips, and it reframes everything else. Ballad of Antara is free to download with optional in-game purchases. It is not a boxed single-player RPG, and comparing it feature-for-feature against premium RPGs is a category error.
Infold has not published storefront details, so the shape of those purchases — cosmetic only, gacha character acquisition, or progression acceleration — is unknown. Given the publisher's track record with Infinity Nikki and Love and Deepspace, gacha-style acquisition is the reasonable expectation, but it is an expectation, not a confirmed fact.
Everything Confirmed at a Glance
| # | Detail | Status |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Developer | TipsWorks Studio (Pascal's Wager) |
| 2 | Publisher | Infold Games (Infold Pte. Ltd.) |
| 3 | Genre | Dark fantasy action RPG |
| 4 | Engine | Unreal Engine 5 |
| 5 | Protagonist | Dromos |
| 6 | Business model | Free-to-play with optional in-game purchases |
| 7 | Announced platforms | PlayStation 5, PC, mobile |
| 8 | Xbox | Not announced |
| 9 | Release status | 2025 window lapsed; listings say 2026, no confirmed date |
What We Still Don't Know
The unanswered questions are larger than the answered ones, and they are the reason to hold off on any firm judgment.
- No release date. A 2025 window was stated at reveal and missed. No replacement date has been committed to.
- No monetisation detail. Free-to-play is confirmed; what you can buy is not.
- No online requirement confirmed. Whether the game requires a persistent connection has not been spelled out publicly.
- No PC storefront listing. PC is an announced platform, but a Steam store search returns no entry for the game as of 20 September 2026.
- No demo or network test. Nothing has been announced. Games of this scale often run one before launch, so it is worth watching for.
Frequently Asked Questions
Has Ballad of Antara been released?
No. As of September 2026 it remains unreleased. It was announced with a 2025 window that passed without a launch, and current listings point at 2026 without naming a day.
Who is the main character in Ballad of Antara?
Dromos, described by Infold Games as a mysterious girl on a mission to reunite a sundered world. Antara is the setting, not the protagonist — a distinction a lot of coverage gets wrong.
Which platforms is Ballad of Antara coming to?
PlayStation 5, PC and mobile, as announced at Sony's State of Play in May 2024. Xbox has not been announced.
Is Ballad of Antara free-to-play?
Yes. It is free to download with optional in-game purchases. The specific contents of those purchases have not been detailed.
Who is developing Ballad of Antara?
TipsWorks Studio, whose previous game is the soulslike action RPG Pascal's Wager. Infold Games publishes. TipsWorks is not the developer of Lost Soul Aside, despite frequent misattribution.
What other upcoming RPGs are worth watching?
The Witcher 4 and Fable are the two largest western RPGs in development, while Xenoblade Genesis and Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave cover the Japanese side. Our upcoming console games hub tracks the rest, and Marvel's Wolverine and Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet are the closest narrative-driven action titles we follow. If you want something to play now, our PS Vita RPG roundup covers a deep back catalogue.
Sources
- PlayStation.Blog, Ballad of Antara is a world-bending action-RPG coming to PS5 in 2025, retrieved 2026-09-20, https://blog.playstation.com/2024/05/30/ballad-of-antara-is-a-world-bending-action-rpg-coming-to-ps5-in-2025/
- Infold Games, New Free-to-play Action RPG, Ballad of Antara, retrieved 2026-09-20, https://www.infoldgames.com/en/news/5
- Ballad of Antara, Official site, retrieved 2026-09-20, https://www.balladofantara.com/
- PlayStation, Ballad of Antara product page, retrieved 2026-09-20, https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/ballad-of-antara/
- Steam store search for "Ballad of Antara", checked 2026-09-20, returned no listing, https://store.steampowered.com/search/?term=Ballad+of+Antara
Editorial note: screenshots are press and community capture of publisher-released material. Trailers are embedded from the official PlayStation and GameSpot channels.
