New Turn-Based RPGs to Play – September 12, 2026

Written by Marcello TBL

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New turn-Based RPGs to Play - September 12, 2026

We’re already getting close to the middle of September, so it’s time to take a look at all the new turn-based RPGs and strategy games that have popped up over the past few days.

Last week, one of the biggest releases I featured was actually a demo (Final Fantasy Resonance). I know some of you probably aren’t too thrilled about that; after all, a demo isn’t technically a new release, but in these roundups of mine, I like to include anything new that gives us something fresh to play. And with that in mind, we’re kicking things off this week with another major title making its debut through a demo.

That said, don’t worry: there are also plenty of full releases and Early Access launches from some very promising projects. As usual, you’ll find everything just below. So, without further ado, let’s get into this week’s best new releases.

DRAGON QUEST MONSTERS: The Withered World – Demo

  • Developers: Square Enix, TOSE
  • Demo release: September 9, 2026
  • Platforms: PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2
  • Dragon Quest Monsters on Steam
New Dragon quest Monster Game

Monster synthesis is where I expect a good chunk of my time with this demo would go. Recruiting a useful creature is satisfying, but finding out what it could become opens up a whole other set of party-building decisions.

The Withered World gives you access to that process during Bianca and Nera’s opening adventure, with a demo that runs through the conclusion of the Witherwood section. There is room to recruit monsters, develop their talents, and start experimenting with combinations before the full game arrives.

There is an important limitation for anyone planning to put several hours into breeding a starter team: up to eight monsters can transfer to the full game, but they return to level one with their default talents. Don’t say Marcello didn’t tell you! Also, items and gold do not carry over, and the transfer requires the same platform. The full release is scheduled for December 3, 2026.

Ex Sanguis – Early Access

Ex Sanguis Tactical RPG

The enemy in front of your unit at the beginning of each turn’s queue doesn’t always get to go first. With Ex Sanguis, your Stillae are able to disrupt time and delay or speed up enemies and allies, creating openings for attacks they wouldn’t have had otherwise.

Moving a foe into a hazard or exposing it to another character’s attack is all about positioning and timing. Working through where each unit should be placed, as well as when you want each of them to take their action, is how you fight against the forces of Stasis.

Its roguelite campaign also asks how aggressively you want to advance. Mission selection can prioritize gathering resources and developing the squad or pushing toward tougher confrontations.

Between those route decisions and building individual builds, the challenge extends beyond solving a single battlefield. This week marks the beginning of Early Access, not the finished campaign. You can find our detailed review of this Early Access version.

Effulgence RPG – Full Release

New Turn-Based RPGs available

Effulgence RPG has reached version 1.0, so there is a complete sci-fi adventure to get into here. The ASCII presentation will probably attract the first glance, but its matter printer deserves attention too.

Defeated enemies break down into particles that can be used to manufacture equipment, including during combat. Salvaging an opponent therefore has an immediate practical use: the remains of one fight can help supply the tools needed to get through the next, without always having to return somewhere safe to craft them.

The turn-based battles use a four-character party, with blueprints supporting weapons, ammunition, and deployable mechanisms.

That creates a loop of fighting, salvaging, and adapting the team’s equipment as the adventure progresses. The developer estimates roughly five to seven hours for the complete game, making this a comparatively compact option for anyone who would prefer a finished RPG over another long-term Early Access commitment.

Starfinder: Afterlight – Demo

  • Developer: Epictellers Entertainment
  • Demo release: September 10, 2026
  • Platforms: PC
  • Starfinder on Steam
Starfinder

Another title that absolutely stands out on my list this week is Starfinder: Afterlight, one of the most promising CRPGs currently in development, and now you can check it out for yourself with the newly available demo.

Three actions per turn sound generous, until you need to reposition and still have enough left to attack. Starfinder: Afterlight brings Paizo’s science-fantasy setting to a party-based CRPG, with a shared action budget for movement, attacks, and abilities.

Deciding how to spend that budget is central to its tactical encounters, while the broader adventure follows a crew searching for its missing captain amid a threat to the galaxy. Companion relationships and branching decisions give you something to consider beyond the next fight.

The free demo opens aboard the Moon of Misfortune before moving to Akiton, where the search for your captain involves gathering information and confronting cultists.

There are three preset protagonists to choose from: Soldier, Envoy, or Operative, each with their Level 1 skills available, plus introductions to companions Kole, Preach, and Sterling. Custom character creation is being saved for the Early Access launch, currently planned for later in 2026, so this is an opportunity to sample the opening adventure.

Save the Forest – Demo

Save The Forest

Knowing what an enemy plans to do is useful. Getting your militia into a position to deal with it is the harder part. I introduced it last week on TBL, welcoming it as a fantasy Into the Breach.

Most enemy actions in Save the Forest are telegraphed, giving you information to work with as each unit moves and then attacks. That makes the order and placement of your own actions particularly important. The campaign wraps those tactical problems in a less serious premise: a village militia defending its woodland home against corruption caused by an evil circus director.

Army development continues between encounters through recruitment and upgrades. Spending heavily on a few capable fighters produces a different force from spreading resources across a larger group, and the available unit types give those choices more substance than simply increasing headcount.

Random events and a deliberately comic setting accompany the battles. The new demo provides an introduction ahead of the full game’s currently planned fourth-quarter 2026 release.

Shroom and Gloom – Early Access

Shroom and Gloom

This week, I have the pleasure of introducing a super interesting dungeon crawler I’ve been following for a while, which has now made its Steam debut in Early Access.

Even the journey between fights has its own deck in Shroom and Gloom. Combat cards deal with the creatures in front of you, while exploration cards shape how you move through the dungeon and find opportunities to improve your build.

You are developing both decks over the course of a run, with progress in one supporting what you can accomplish with the other. All of this unfolds from a first-person perspective, surrounded by hand-drawn fungal creatures that are potential threats and potential meals.

And yes, the meal is often one of those monsters. Preparing enemies to be eaten and recovering health from them is part of the survival loop, alongside developing increasingly powerful cards.

The distinction worth watching is how the two decks support each other over a run: finding better ways to explore matters because exploration feeds back into what your combat deck can do. The game is now available in Early Access.

Forsworn – Full Release

  • Developer: Resummon Studios LLC
  • Release date: September 10, 2026
  • Platforms: PC
  • Forsworn on Steam
Forsworn Tactical RPG

For the group that keeps asking for something tactical to play together, I have something for you: Forsworn is this week’s co-op candidate. Up to four people can take a party into its roguelite campaign, with simultaneous player turns keeping everyone involved in planning and executing the fight.

Coordinating movement and abilities becomes a shared job, especially when one hero can prepare an opening for another. Actions also build toward ultimate abilities, giving the party something else to coordinate beyond its immediate attacks. Solo play is supported as well.

Character development starts with six heroes, each with three subclasses, then expands through equipment and branching ability upgrades. Runs take place in a realm shaped by divine conflict, with death and resurrection feeding into progression.

Difficulty scaling and map modifiers provide further ways to adjust subsequent attempts. Of this week’s releases, Forsworn is particularly relevant for readers looking for tactical battles they can share with a regular co-op group.

PSYCHO CASKET – Demo

Psycho Casket

Here’s this week’s hidden gem, or at least one I’d never come across before. Psycho Casket was completely off my radar, but whenever a game catches my eye right away, as this one did, I feel like it’s worth a closer look. That’s why I decided to include the demo for this striking JRPG among this week’s releases.

A sentient messaging application may be one of the most disturbing environments you can find yourself in with something that has the ability to consume the universe.

That is exactly where Casket finds herself as she tries to rescue her friends from something that wants to consume everything in the world. Conversations and other environmental puzzle-solving, along with the little things you discover throughout your journey, will give you a sense of what is going on. But a few questions hang in the air, including how far Casket will go for her friends if it extends beyond them.

Combat uses a turn-based structure but gives characters their own minigames, while defensive interactions involve dodging or disarming incoming threats. Selecting an action is therefore only part of resolving it.

The Steam demo introduces the first chapter, which the developer estimates at around three hours. This is a playable chapter of the project, not the launch of the complete game; the broader release is planned to develop through an Early Access chapter structure.

Veterum – Full Release

  • Developer: Crasleen Games
  • Full release: September 7, 2026
  • Platforms: PC
  • Veterum on Steam
Veterum RPG

Veterum‘s battlefields include barricades, trenches, frozen rivers, and human-set fires. The terrain has been changed to create different battle conditions, but it also includes other battlefield factors such as line of sight, fatigue, unit morale, weather, and lighting.

When you fight creatures at night, these factors take on even greater importance. Although no longer in Early Access, Veterum uses an army-based system to focus on tactical RPG battles, so there are many things to think about before you decide that your unit is in the correct location to launch an assault.

Outside combat, you lead the remnants of the Order of Gatekeepers through an open world, recruiting soldiers, pursuing quests, and collecting equipment and artifacts.

Mixing different peoples into the same army introduces friction alongside the benefits of a broader roster. Procedural encounters and quests sit beside editing tools and Steam Workshop support.

Outcast Tales – Demo

Outcast Tales

Can this group of three people really get along? In Outcast Tales, there is another concern beyond class and role. Each person you add to your party has their own personality, and if you allow it, those personalities can develop into friendship, romance, or even rivalry over time.

Depending on the personalities you choose for your party members, they will influence how events unfold. When picking a party of three, you are looking at two things: how well they will work together in battle and how many different ways they will resolve conflicts and disagreements. Encounters during a battle give players the chance to choose from multiple possible resolutions.

The new demo is intended to cover roughly 50–60% of a typical run, excluding endings. Progress can carry over to the full game, making it more substantial than a disconnected battle sample. The complete release is currently listed for 2026.

The Legend of Fancy Realm Remake – Full Release

The Legend of Fancy Realm Remake

A choice regarding a friend could impact your journey for a while in The Legend of Fancy Realm Remake.

The relationships between your friends, their ultimate fate, and where the campaign will end are all part of a branching storyline that takes place across multiple countries that have been severely impacted by a worldwide war. This means the political aspects of the conflict are both personal and strategic.

On the battlefield, formations, terrain, and chokepoints support character-specific roles. Progression includes manual stat allocation, skill learning, job changes, and hidden development routes.

English text is supported, and a separate demo remains available for anyone who would prefer to sample the remake before starting the full campaign.

Deadzoned – Early Access

Deadzoned A Credit Bounty

I’d lost track of this traditional roguelike for a while, but it has finally made its Early Access debut.

The weapon you find halfway through a run might change the plan you had when you entered the dungeon. Deadzoned makes scavenged equipment and limited ammunition central to surviving beneath a planet devastated by a nanite plague.

Classes, talents, and stats give you a starting direction, but randomized zones and whatever supplies turn up along the way can push the build somewhere else. Turn-based encounters give you time to assess the situation; whether you have brought, or found, the right tools is another matter.

Optional side areas offer chances to take on extra danger for more resources, while different modes accommodate different session lengths, including a shorter format aimed at roughly twenty-minute runs.

There is also no inventory weight limit, so carrying loot does not introduce a separate encumbrance-management problem. If you love traditional roguelikes, i think this one is for you.

Infinity: HexaDome Tactics – Full Release

Hexadom Tactics

The focus shifts to competitive arena combat with Infinity: HexaDome Tactics, where twelve heroes provide the building blocks for teams with different battlefield roles. Action points have to cover movement and abilities, while tactical cards and ultimates create opportunities to coordinate a stronger play.

Spending resources on setup can be worthwhile, but you cannot use them to attack or reposition immediately. Controlling space and pursuing objectives therefore sit alongside damage as reasons to choose a particular action.

Despite that competitive structure, this is not exclusively a multiplayer release. A single-player story campaign unlocks champions and cosmetics, while AI challenges provide another alternative to matches against other people.

Friendly and ranked PvP are available for those who want to take their squad online. It sits closer to a tactical arena game than a conventional exploration-driven RPG, but its squad composition and card interactions make it relevant to this week’s turn-based selection.

Seven Blasphemies – Full Release

Seven Blasphemies

If I’m not mistaken, I covered its demo last week, or maybe the week before, and just a few days ago, the full version of Seven Blasphemies finally launched as another highly intriguing traditional roguelike.

Each new day of survival doesn’t mean it’s been a successful one in Seven Blasphemies. With each passing day, you will gain an additional permanent curse as you progress through the game.

These curses can include increased enemy danger, reduced visibility while exploring dungeons, and weakened healing options. Because these curses remain with you throughout your playtime, what may have initially seemed like a manageable dungeon at the beginning of your adventure now becomes a very different, less forgiving experience.

The seventh blasphemy will end your current world, and thus this playthrough, which again does not provide a countdown to the seventh day; however, it creates a high degree of urgency for utilizing your time wisely.

Underneath that mechanic is a traditional grid-based, turn-based roguelike with scarce resources and permadeath worth considering if you want to suffer.

Heads Will Roll: Reforged – Revenge of the Black Prince – DLC

Heads Will Roll: Reforged - Revenge of the Black Prince

Tired of spending an entire campaign keeping your medieval soldier alive? Revenge of the Black Prince has added many different ways to build a career in Heads Will Roll: Reforged.

Players can choose from going after the game’s version of Edward into Aquitaine, joining up with John Hawkwood’s White Company, or going off with the Count of Savoy to the Balkans; alternatively, players may find it easier to pursue better prospects in Paris as long as they’re accompanied by some old friends.

This new expansion mainly adds more campaign paths and stories for characters, giving returning players more options for whether their soldier goes one way or another based on whose interests he supports.

The expansion also continues the story of Grace and Glory and revisits Cambrai with additional quests, characters, battles, and branching paths. Its appeal is therefore clearest for existing players who want more possibilities within the RPG’s medieval campaign. This is paid downloadable content rather than a standalone release, and ownership of Heads Will Roll: Reforged is required.

Master of Luna – New Demo

combat system

Recovering a forgotten God’s powers is likely to require some level of urban planning, as Master of Luna will guide the process of recovering said powers by way of a fantasy 4x game model.

As such, it would appear that the recovery of those powers will be accomplished through both an exploratory layer (which includes the establishment of settlements) and the development of new spells.

The places of power in the world are where you will gain additional areas of influence. While battles for heroes and armies take place on a completely separate tactical battlefield, gold, mana, and other rare resources serve as a connection point between the upper strategic layer and lower tactical layer, with how you develop these resources serving as an indicator of which units or spells may potentially be brought into play during combat.

This week’s news is a new demo build added in update 0.15.0, not the original release of the paid game, which is already in Early Access. The demo uses a fixed map and a forty-turn limit, providing a bounded introduction to the strategic layer.

Its save can carry over into the paid version, so reaching that limit does not necessarily mean abandoning the position you have spent those turns building.

Roguecraft DX – PC Release

Roguecraft DX

There’s also space for a shorter dungeon crawl over the weekend. Let’s close the recap with Roguecraft DX aiming for runs in the region of thirty to forty minutes. This brings modern Amiga-styled rogue-like gameplay to PC through three playable characters:

The Warrior is focused on close combat, the Rogue uses teleportation and backstabbing, while the Wizard uses magic as opposed to health for long-range damage. While the procedural floor generation and permanent death add an element of uncertainty to each playthrough, the game’s small size allows you to start again much more easily compared to losing your way mid-campaign.

Familiars add a useful tactical resource: once rescued, they can be summoned for a limited number of turns to fight or retrieve otherwise inaccessible loot.

Alongside the fifteen-level Classic Mode are an Endless Dungeon and a Chicken Run mode. The emphasis is on learning a small set of rules and using them carefully, with much less inventory and command-management overhead than the more elaborate end of the traditional roguelike spectrum.

Now I’d love to hear what you’ll be playing this week and whether any of the games above caught your eye. In the meantime, have a great weekend. See you next time. Ciao

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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Marcello TBL

Italian Dad in love with Turn-Based RPGs and Indie Games. In 2018 he started Turn Based Lovers and now he can't live without it. A huge fan of RPGs in general, raised on the glorious video games of the '90s that shaped who he is today. Always hopeful that XCOM 3 will arrive one day.

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