The Ballad of the Elements

In development · playable on Android and PC

A realm of elementals, and five animal shapes to cross it in.

Third-person overworld, first-person duels. Catch and raise 75 elementals. Learn the monkey, eagle, bear, turtle and raccoon shapes from the masters who keep them. Draw glyphs to cast. Then duel a friend anywhere on earth with four letters.

Sign up for the beta See it move
The druid and an Air Bear in a white robe climb stone steps to a blue-roofed pagoda on a floating isle, a waterfall dropping into cloud beside it.
In game: the steps to the pagoda, in the Cloud City.
75
elementals
12
elements
31
worlds
5
animal shapes

See it move

The game, in motion.

Worlds

31 worlds, drawn in flat colour and ink.

A meadow, a waterfall you climb, a city on the clouds, a city over the lava, and six worlds with no air in them. None of it is behind a locked door. It is behind what you can currently turn into.

All 31 worlds, and the five shapes →

Races

Bears, monkeys and hawks, each with their own city.

And each with their own writing. The words carved on their walls are real ones, in real scripts, and they glow.

Meet the three peoples →

Elementals

75 of them, across 12 elements.

An ember fox, a stone ape, a koi that swam up the great waterfall and never quite came down. Wild ones hide in the scenery: linger near a tree or a boulder and one may pounce. Weaken it, then fly into it to net it. 25 lines of them evolve.

Concept plate of Cindra, a fire elemental: ember fox.

Cindra

Fire Ember Fox

Concept plate of Boulderk, a stone elemental: stone ape.

Boulderk

Stone Stone Ape

Concept plate of Koirin, a water elemental: cascade koi.

Koirin

Water Cascade Koi

Concept plate of Nyxara, a dark elemental: night panther. ★★

Nyxara

Dark Night Panther

Concept plate of Solriel, a light elemental: radiant owl. ★★

Solriel

Light Radiant Owl

Concept plate of Fulgora, a energy elemental: arc lynx. ★★

Fulgora

Energy Arc Lynx

The whole bestiary →

Arenas

Duels are first-person, and the ground matters.

When a duel starts you are behind your elemental's eyes, dodging in real time, with a spell in each of two slots. Some arenas have walls to hide behind. Some have no floor.

All the arenas →

Online duels

Two phones, two countries, four letters.

Real-time player-versus-player across the internet. One of you picks Host and reads four letters down the phone. The other types them in. That is the entire setup.

  • No accounts, no sign-up, no email
  • No IP addresses shared between players, ever
  • Works on mobile data, not just wifi
  • Full team battles — swap elementals mid-duel
  • A friendly defeat is friendly: nothing is lost
Read the four steps

Where it's up to

In development, and playable. Built in Godot 4.7 for Android and PC. The 31 worlds are in and online duels work today. There's no store page yet — the beta list is how you'll hear when there is one.

Sign up for the beta