While all eyes this week have been pointed at Hades II's console launch and Pragmata's imminent release, a genuinely ambitious free-to-play tactical RPG has quietly arrived on every platform that matters. Annulus, developed by NirvanaGame, launched worldwide on April 8, 2026 across iOS, Android, and Steam, and after a week of mostly positive impressions from the tactical RPG community, it has earned a spot on your phone's home screen.
This is one of those releases that could have easily flown under your radar. Free-to-play mobile tactical RPGs from Chinese developers do not always lead with their best foot, and the initial marketing for Annulus leaned heavily on comparisons to Baldur's Gate 3 and Dark Souls that felt like a stretch on paper. A week in, those comparisons are less laughable than they looked, and the game is delivering something that genuinely does not have a direct competitor on mobile right now.
Here is what you need to know before you install it.
The Pitch: Mercenary Captain in a Cursed Continent
You play as a mercenary captain leading a growing legion across the continent of Novisess, a gritty medieval-fantasy world cursed with ongoing cycles of conflict between three major races: Orcs, Elves, and Humans. The narrative framing leans Lovecraftian, with cosmic corruption bleeding into more traditional knight-and-sorcery warfare, and the worldbuilding is genuinely denser than it has any right to be for a free-to-play release.
Combat is grid-based, turn-based, and built around positioning and terrain manipulation. You recruit mercenaries, each with their own class, weapon synergies, and inscriptions, and build a squad that specializes in one or more of Annulus's five playstyles: collision, knockback, tanking, decay, and the catch-all control role. The game handles squad composition as a primary strategic decision rather than a menu preference, and it shows.
Why the Baldur's Gate Comparison Actually Tracks
The Baldur's Gate 3 pitch has been a red flag for most free-to-play releases since 2023, because almost nobody lives up to it. Annulus is not the same game as BG3, obviously, but the comparison holds in two specific ways: terrain and environmental interaction matter mechanically, and narrative choice can reshape side storylines in ways that are not purely cosmetic.
Weather shifts, day-night cycles, and vegetation all directly influence how your mercenaries perform in battle. Fighting a goblin ambush during a rainstorm will change the damage output of fire attacks, reduce accuracy on ranged weapons, and open up new terrain interactions with puddles and mud. The Contamination Value system layers buffs and debuffs on top of that, adding an unpredictability factor that keeps repeated runs on the same map from feeling identical.
It is the kind of system design that usually lives in premium strategy games with much narrower audiences. Seeing it in a free mobile release is surprising, and seeing it work as well as it does is why the game is worth a download.
The Mobile Experience: Surprisingly Uncompromised
Mobile tactical RPGs typically make compromises that PC versions do not. Annulus's iOS and Android ports have fewer of those compromises than expected. The touch controls work naturally for grid-based movement, the camera pans smoothly across larger maps, and the Unreal Engine visuals downscale cleanly on mid-range phones without falling apart.
I tested it on an iPhone 15 and a Pixel 8, and both ran at a locked 60fps on the default graphics settings. There is a higher settings tier that pushes for 120fps on phones that support it, and it looks genuinely good, though you will eat through your battery in about two hours on that setting.
The Free-to-Play Model Is Less Predatory Than You Expect
Let's talk about the monetization, because this is where free-to-play mobile games usually lose my goodwill. Annulus runs a gacha-style mercenary recruitment system, where you can pull for rare heroes using an in-game currency that accumulates naturally or that you can buy with real money. Standard genre fare on that front.
What is not standard is that the story progression, the main campaign, and most of the side content is entirely unlocked and completable without spending a single dollar. The game actively tries not to gate story beats behind gacha pulls. If you want to chase the flashiest mercenary designs and their hero-exclusive auras, you will either need to play a lot or spend, but the core experience does not punish you for not opening your wallet.
The login rewards are also unusually generous, particularly in the first two weeks after launch. If you log in daily between now and the end of April, you will accumulate enough in-game currency for around 30 gacha pulls without spending anything, which is more than enough to build a functional mid-game roster.
The Notable Disclosure
NirvanaGame has openly acknowledged that portions of the game's artwork and narrative text were initially drafted with assistance from generative AI tools including Midjourney and GPT. The studio has been clear that all AI-generated content served as preliminary drafts only and went through comprehensive manual revision, refinement, and copyright verification before shipping.
Whether that disclosure is a dealbreaker depends on where you personally land on the AI art conversation. I am mentioning it here because the studio was upfront about it in their press materials and on the Steam store page, which is more transparency than a lot of their competitors are practicing, and you deserve to make an informed decision before you install.
Who Should Play This
Annulus is a great fit if you enjoy Fire Emblem, Triangle Strategy, or any of the Tactics Ogre-descended lineage of grid-based tactical RPGs, and you want something to play on mobile in bite-sized sessions. It is also worth a look if you bounced off Baldur's Gate 3 because you did not want to commit to a 100-hour campaign, and you wanted something that captured the terrain-and-positioning tactical flavor in smaller doses.
It is not the game for you if you bounce off any amount of free-to-play monetization, or if you prefer real-time tactics over turn-based. The gacha is gentle, but it is a gacha.
Where to Grab It
Download links:
- Steam: Search for Annulus. The Steam version is the same game as the mobile version, with cross-progression not currently supported but planned for a future update.
- App Store and Google Play: Free download, no pre-registration required.
One week into its launch, Annulus is one of the genuinely pleasant surprises of the spring mobile release window. Install it, play the first two chapters, and decide for yourself whether the Baldur's Gate comparison lands for you. Mine is still landing.
