JDM: Ph4ntom Driver Announced for PC, a Supernatural Spin-Off of JDM: Japanese Drift Master

JDM: Ph4ntom Driver, a standalone supernatural spin-off of JDM: Japanese Drift Master, has been announced for PC. Developer Gaming Factory revealed the game on Wednesday, first as part of IGN Fall Fan Fest 2026 and then via a Steam store page that is now taking wishlists.

Ph4ntom Driver takes the JDM: Japanese Drift Master universe and drops it into a fictional Japanese prefecture called Guntama, which has been taken over by a demon king named Shouten Douji. You drive reinforced JDM cars through an open world, ramming and crushing his Oni armies with no guns, just your car and a supernatural power called Hakai. The Steam page describes a single-player campaign with manga-style storytelling, and multiplayer modes are planned for launch. The game is standalone, so you don’t need to own JDM: Japanese Drift Master to play it.

The Steam store page lists a planned release date of TBA, with system requirements including an Intel i7-11700K or Ryzen 5 7600 CPU and 16 GB of RAM. The trailer premiered at IGN Fall Fan Fest 2026 and is being shared by outlets including Gematsu.

JDM: Japanese Drift Master launched in May 2025 after several delays and has stayed popular with driving fans thanks to its licensed cars and touge-style routes. The studio’s recent Indie Spotlight coverage of BOMBANANA and other picks shows how the indie space keeps offering up surprising pivots, and Ph4ntom Driver sits in that same category. Ph4ntom Driver goes in a very different direction: arcade action with supernatural combat, no track days. It’s the developer’s first announced new project since the original shipped.

The roster of upcoming driving games keeps growing: Boltgun 2 shipped in October, while Over the Hill launched as a cozy off-road take on the genre earlier this month. Ph4ntom Driver slots in as the most arcade-leaning of that group.

Our read: The JDM series has earned a loyal niche audience, but a supernatural spin-off is a surprising pivot for Gaming Factory’s first new project. If Ph4ntom Driver ships with the manga-style campaign and the multiplayer modes the Steam page promises, it could give the studio two distinct audiences: the sim-drivers who bought the original and the action fans who want something closer to a Twisted Metal arcade racer.

Edited by Kerwin Stewart, Editor-in-Chief · How we report