After a prolonged period of inactivity, Early Access racing title Drift Stage seems to be moving forward again: The game will be playable at Indie Game Fest in Cologne this May.
At a glance, Drift Stage looks like a visual throwback to the early days of the first PlayStation as well as the Super Nintendo - which has its own charm. The title has been in Early Access on Steam since January 2023, and despite there not being an update log, Steam claims the latest update has been made eight years ago.
An early teaser video of Drift Stage's Sunset City.
Little Perspective & Years Without Progress
The game's inception dates all the way back to 2014, but now, there is new life in the project: Super Systems' Charles 'DelkoDuck' Blanchard has posted a lengthy update on the long period of silence in March of 2026, explaining what happened:
"The long gap between the last updates was due to the project coming very close to end-of-service. After the Early Access release on Steam, and the publishing deal falling through, the circumstances left no path forward. There were no new interested publishers, and my personal health issues were becoming pressing; I needed to step back and get my financials and health in order - and the funds needed to hire a new programmer were more then I was able to raise without turning back to problematic crowd-sourcing, which brings its own set of issues.
Without any kind of developer support or extra visibility, it was hard to justify keeping momentum on new updates, as there was no real plan or ability for me to work on the game by myself. I chose to step back and reassess rather than drag things out with nothing substantial to share
."
It did not help that according to a statement by Blanchard, the game's previous programmer Charles Pettit went rogue, going missing for extended periods of time, not meeting development goals, and not sticking to the original concept of Drift Stage, which led to the project and dev separating in 2018.
In a different turn of events, the game's art was stolen in 2019 according to the same statement, with suspicions of the source code having been stolen as well. Blanchard also fell out with the game's musician, leaving the rights to the soundtrack hanging in the balance as well. Legal back and forth led to Blanchard obtaining control over Super Systems Softworks as well as Drift Stage in 2022, but that did not prevent him from losing a publishing deal in 2023. It seemed that the Drift Stage project was never going to be finished.
Blanchard summed up the whole ordeal as follows:
"I cannot express my regret and frustration enough in regard to the behavior and negligence of my former business partners. Their actions lead to the development of Drift Stage dragging out to almost 10 years, with my original obligation only being for 1 – 2 years of work. With the help of a legal team, spanning from 2019 to 2024; I was able to disseminate a limited release of the last uploaded version of Drift Stage on Steam."
Renewed Interest Revives Drift Stage - Playable At Indie Game Fest 2026
In late 2025, however, newly-formed publishing company Storm Electricity approached Blanchard, and with Joerg Droege (PR/Project Manager) and Martin Wisniowski (Programmer/Leading Publisher) on board, the Drift Stage project was revived. Active development resumed, with the main focus being a port to a more modern version of the Unity Engine, as the game was still running on version from 2016.
To showcase the latest progress, Drift Stage will be playable at Indie Game Fest 2026 in Cologne. Taking place on May 8 and 9 in Cologne's Wasserturm Hotel, the event showcases the works of independent creators, highlighting their projects.
In Cologne, visitors will have the opportunity to play the ported demo version of Drift Stage, which is now running on Unity 2021.
Meanwhile, Drift Stage remains available to purchase on Steam, with the Early Access version costing €9.40 at the time of writing. We'll be sure to keep an eye on the retro-style arcade racer now that things are starting to move along again.
What are your impressions of Drift Stage? Will you be giving it a try? Let us know in the comments below!