TLDR
- Norwegian Rock Pocket Games has announced its new game, Somber Echoes, a “metroidvania” platformer based on cosmic horror and Greek tragedies, where you play as the warrior Adrestia on the Greco-Roman spaceship Atromitos and try to stop your twin sister, Harmonia, from destroy the universe.
- The game, which will launch on Steam and the Epic Game Store in the fall, has been in development for over three years, with a focus on giving players great freedom of movement, and game mechanics that encourage exploring the spaceship, acquiring new skills and learning more about the intrigue of the game.
- The team behind Rock Pocket Games has previously contributed to games such as Moons of Madness, Shiftlings, Flåklypa Grand Prix and Captain Sabertooth and the Magic Diamond, and will use their experience from these projects to achieve a balance between narrative and exploratory elements in Somber Echoes.
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Sea view
Norwegian Rock Pocket Games has unveiled the game they have been working on behind hidden doors for a few years now. The project is called Somber Echoes, and is a “metroidvania” platformer wrapped in iconography and atmosphere from cosmic horror and Greek tragedies.
You play as the warrior Adrestia who is on the Greco-Roman spaceship Atromitos. All kinds of horrors from another dimension have set up camp here, and it seems that the twin sister Harmonia is behind the dimensional mix. Adrestia must hunt her down before she destroys the universe.
In familiar “metroidvania” style, explore the spaceship, pick up new skills and learn more about what it is like actually happens. Much of the focus is on giving the player a lot of freedom of movement in battle, with opportunities to adapt to their own play style.
Somber Echoes will be released on Steam and the Epic Game Store already this autumn. We don’t know if the game will come to other platforms yet.
From Sabertooth to cosmic horror
In the past, Rock Pocket Games has been behind, among other things, the horror game Moons of Madness and the co-op adventure Shiftlings, and in recent years has helped Ravn Studio on two projects: the new edition Flåklypa Grand Prix and the platform adventure Captain Sabertooth and the magical diamond.
The latter actually led directly into Somber Echoes, in many ways. Lead designer Vangelis Kalaitzis and designer Tom-Ivar Arntzen tell Gamer.no.
– Captain Sabeltann was a project from another studio, but the studio did some work on it. Part of the reason we started Somber Echoes is that we learned part of the process there. When the idea of a “metroidvania” came up, it made a lot of sense to use more of the tools and knowledge we had gained around making a side-scrolling game. So it happened quite organically, says Kalaitzis.
Vangelis Kalaitzis (lead designer) and Tom-Ivar Arntzen (designer).
Gaute Røise Samuelsen, Rock Pocket Games
Somber Echoes has been in development for over three years now. From early on, it was important to create something that could stand out from the crowd. And the mix between the Greek sources of inspiration and the horror elements became a natural crossing point.
– We asked ourselves: How can we twist this a bit so that it doesn’t just become another sci-fi game? And I think that’s when we found out – well, I think we found out even before I joined the project – that some of the old mythological stories can be interpreted in an almost cosmic horror-like way, with a lot of drama and tension, says Arntzen.
Not least, Arntzen points out that the Greek tragedies often play on the fact that the audience knows more than the characters in the story. And that’s something Rock Pocket has had in mind during development.
– It is definitely the case that you as a player recognize and see things that the characters have not perceived, and we use that to build part of the mystery around what is happening here, he says.
What makes a good “metroidvania”?
Somber Echoes is described as a love letter to the “metroidvania” genre – a game genre with several major critically acclaimed features in recent years, such as Hollow Knight, Metroid Dread and most recently Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown in January.
Therefore, the developers at Rock Pocket Games have focused a lot on hammering down the right gaming feeling in Somber Eches. Arntzen says that the most important thing for him is that the player must care about the world they are in, that exploring the world gives you something. If this is not in place, there is a big problem.
Kalaitzis points to much of the same. The world, the secrets it offers, is very important, along with building up a curiosity for the surroundings and what actually happens.
Somber Echoes.
Rock Pocket Games
– What I think is most important in these games are the mysteries and the urge to find out what’s going on, what’s hiding behind the next door, or behind that gate that you can’t get through until you have the right skill. And that is what constantly drives you forward. What happened here? What lies behind this door, says Kalaitzis.
He points out that “metroidvania” games often do not have the narrative in focus, but believes it is important to build a background and setting for what happens anyway. That there is something beneath the surface that gives an urge to explore the world.
– It was something we thought about constantly: to create and maintain this form of curiosity about what has happened in this world, why it is the way it is, and that you recognize yourself and understand more when you come back later with more skills, he says.
Acrobatics with impact
In tandem with the unveiling, Rock Pocket Games has released a trailer (which you can watch below). Here we see Adrestia trotting around in her surroundings – mostly in the air than on the ground – while she throws spears at enemies and knocks them away.
Somber Echoes-trailer.
Precisely the feeling of movement and combat system is something that has been important to achieve for the developers, says Arntzen. He points out that there should be a good sense of flow between the movements and the fights, and that the weapons have a certain physical feeling when they hit the enemies.
– We work to ensure that most skills have a physical presence. The spear that you see in the trailer is an example. You can miss when you throw it, and then you basically have to get to the spear to pick it up to throw it again, he explains.
– But if you actually hit the enemy, the spear remains in them until you kill them, or by using other skills to pull it out of their body by force. This plays into other mechanics in the game that we can’t talk about yet.
Below you can see more pictures of Somber Echoes.
2024-03-03 14:54:50
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