Echoes News

Hey People!

How’s your day been? We’ve got some news for you guys, I hope you’ll like it. This is a short one, sorry about that.

[h2]What we’ve been up to[/h2]
May has been a “slow” month for us. We mainly progressed on the writing, so as you can guess, we can’t tell you anything about it!

First of all, our collaboration with the Bordeaux Dance Crew (Celine’s dance school) has taken a step further. We were able to participate in and take some pictures of an Afro dance lesson by Nayoum, which will greatly help us with our vision.

Check out Bordeaux Dance Crew's website for more information:
https://bordeauxdancecrew.com/



Secondly, we had a little setback this week. Our internet is down for the week. So everyone is working from home!



[h2]Highway to Heal[/h2]
Hey! Our friends at Manufacture 43 have released a demo and a Ulule for their new game, Highway to Heal! We’re so happy for them, and it’s been such a joy to see Nico and their team work together on this game.

You can try their demo here on Steam right now (it's a lot of fun)!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2213710/Highway_to_Heal/

[h2]Artwork of the month[/h2]
Romane Subilleau created this month's artwork during her internship back in 2023. It is one of the very first concept arts that has been produced for our next game (which we will a continuation of our Along the Edge / Across the Grooves series, as the ones with the most keen eyes have probably noticed). It depicts the street entrance one of the recurring places we will get to explore in the new game.



That's all for now!

If you want to subscribe to our mailing list, you can register here:
http://www.nova-box.com/signup

You'll get extra-fresh updates about our projects and our whereabouts once a month, nestled in the coziness of your own inbox (we'll never send spam, and you can unsubscribe anytime).

I hope you guys are doing well. Thank you for following us on this adventure. 

Best,

Ophélie,
on behalf of the team.

Hey People!

How was your day? We have some news for you guys, I hope you will like it.

[h2]Interview on Twitch[/h2]

We’re joining Thomas from UndesJeux on April 17th at 8:30 PM Paris for a live interview in French on Twitch! Dive into behind-the-scenes stories about our visual novels, game dev secrets, and what’s coming next. Got questions? Drop them in chat—we’ll tell you everything!

Plus, catch Thomas’s latest projects and past streams on YouTube! Head over to UndesJeux to watch his content and subscribe for updates. See you there!

Here's the link to Thomas' channel:
https://www.twitch.tv/undesjeux


[h2]Spawn Festival[/h2]



We were thrilled to see you at Spawn Festival! Discussing our games, exchanging ideas with fellow developers, and testing out so many incredible projects was an absolute pleasure. From indie gems to mind-blowing VR experiences, the variety of games to explore was unmatched!

What makes Spawn truly special is how it blends creativity and community. Meeting creators face-to-face, diving into panel discussions, and even catching those quirky video game-themed performances made the event unforgettable. And as always, Spawn’s flawless organization made everything seamless.

Can’t wait to reunite next year for more innovation, inspiration, and maybe a few friendly competition wins!



(Photo credits: Grégory Brandel & Céline Levain)


[h2]What have we been up to?[/h2]

We have the first alpha version of our new game! After months of brainstorming, coding, and pixel-pushing, we’ve reached a milestone worth celebrating. Our friends and fellow creators from our co-working space are diving into the game’s early world. Their feedback will be gold as we polish mechanics, squash bugs, and refine every detail!

Exciting News! We’re buzzing with joy to introduce you to the brilliant Céline Robert-Nicoud, a dynamic force in the world of dance in Bordeaux who will be collaborating with us as a creative consultant on our upcoming game! In the meantime, we highly encourage you to dive into Céline’s world!

That's all for now!

If you want to subscribe to our mailing list, you can register here:
http://www.nova-box.com/signup

You'll get extra-fresh updates about our projects and our whereabouts once a month, nestled in the coziness of your own inbox (we'll never send spam, and you can unsubscribe anytime).

I hope you guys are doing well. Thank you for following us on this adventure. 

Best,

Ophélie,
on behalf of the team.

Hey, people!

We have some news for you guys! Hope you had a good day.

[h2]What we’ve been up to?[/h2]

After spending time giving some love to both Echoes and End of Lines, we were able to go back to work on our (still unannounced) next game. We're very excited to see it come together, with an Alpha version almost completed.

Following our latest update, the new demo of End of Lines has been downloaded more than 1,000 times. However, we are ten positive reviews short of the 50 we need to be more visible in the Steam store. So, if you have played End of Lines and enjoyed the game, don’t hesitate to leave a review!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1658960/End_of_Lines/

We’re thrilled to announce that a demo for Echoes is out! We wanted to give players a chance to experience the game and bring more attention to this project. The demo features the entire first episode (out of five), allowing you to dive into the world of Echoes and get a feel for the story, gameplay, and atmosphere. Best of all, if you decide to continue your journey after playing the demo, your progress will be saved, so you can pick up right where you left off in the full game. Thanks to the demo, we are already starting to see a little more traction toward it. Almost 1000 downloads!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1775220/Echoes/

[h2]Spring Sales[/h2]

Spring is here, and so are the deals! You still have a few hours to take advantage of the Steam Spring Sale. It’s the perfect time to explore new adventures and expand your collection. Don’t miss out, it will be our last sale for a while! If you want to support us a bit more, you can also buy the bundle! You will have 37% off and don’t worry, the bundle automatically detects games you have already purchased.

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/15195/Novabox_Collection/

[h2]Spawn Festival[/h2]

We are excited to announce that we will attend the Spawn Festival’s third edition on Saturday, April 5th in Angoulême!

The festival will feature about 30 indie studios with projects ranging from experimental games to games with a social or political message, along with a collection of curated games from our friend Camille.

You will also be able to enjoy panels, conferences, and even video game-themed performances.

And don’t worry if you can’t make it—we’ll be sharing a full debrief, complete with photos, in our next newsletter. We can’t wait to see you there!

[h2]Ask the Devs![/h2]

In this section, we answer your most frequently asked questions about our games, development process, and upcoming projects. Have something you’d like to ask? Send us your questions on Discord, and we might feature them in the next newsletter.

“I would like to know what were your inspirations for Along the Edge story? Geoffroy mentioned in the web page that he was raised in France, rural country.”

Well there’s a lot to say about that. Along the Edge was the first story I created on my own and I didn’t know if I would have the privilège of writing more, so I stuffed a lot of the things I loved in there.

I guess the main thing is that when we started working on this project, I was 36 years old and it was becoming more and more probable that I wouldn’t have kids. The idea of transmission, heritage and what we leave behind when you don’t have children was something that was on my mind a lot at this point in my life. Along the Edge helped me explore that.

I also wanted to make a classic “fantastique” story. We have this sub-genre of literature in France, which is neither fantasy nor horror, but something in between, I never knew how to translate it accurately in English. It dates back to the 19th century. The main theme is that you have an unreliable narrator who experiences strange events, but you never know if there really was something supernatural going on or if it’s just the imagination of the narrator at work.

It gave us an interesting way to frame the choices in the game, letting the player decide whether Daphné believes in the supernatural or not at all.

I could talk at length about all of this, I hope this quick answer satisfies your curiosity.

For the second part of your question, well, I indeed come from a very rural area in the center of France, “la Creuse”, which I am very attached to and that’s not very well known, even in France. In fact, it’s one of the places that gets mentioned when a fellow French person needs an euphemism to say “the middle of nowhere”. That was the perfect setting for the story we wanted to tell, so I went there and took a lot of reference pictures for Nico.

If you want a fun fact, the setting is never named directly in Along the Edge itself, but if you make the right choices in Across the Grooves, Frank tells Alice that Daphné is in fact in Creuse.

“And how long does it take for Nico to create a drawing?”

Thank you for your questions. This is an easy one though: it depends!

I think the fastest one took me 15 minutes and the longest ones would take me a full week to polish. Of course, that’s extreme examples, most of the time I can safely rely on 3 pictures/day on average during the game production (that is when I’m done with concept arts, research and references collection).

Fun fact: the longest one was probably a key art for Seers Isle that we didn’t use in the end because it was not good enough. Somehow, spending more time on a picture does not always make it better.

That's all for now!

If you want to subscribe to our mailing list, you can register here:
http://www.nova-box.com/signup

You'll get extra-fresh updates about our projects and our whereabouts once a month, nestled in the coziness of your own inbox (we'll never send spam, and you can unsubscribe anytime).

I hope you guys are doing well. Thank you for following us on this adventure. 

Best,

Ophélie,
on behalf of the team.

Dear Steam friends,

we're very glad to announce that we just released a free demo for Echoes!

You can download and try out the first episode (out of five) of the game for free, starting now.

Discover the rural town of Greenhearth and its weird and colorful citizens while investigation the murder case of your best friend. Gather clues, interview witnesses and work with (or around) the local police force in this noir visual novel.

And if the demo convinces you to get the full game, your progress will transfer automatically and you won't lose any progress.

We hope you'll enjoy your time in Greenhearth,
kind regards,

Geoffroy,
on behalf of the team.

Hey People!

How was your day? We have some news for you guys, I hope you will like it. 

[h2]What we’ve been up to?[/h2]
We are thrilled to announce the release of a big patch for the End of Lines! Countless hours of effort, passion, and dedication have gone into enhancing this experience, and we can’t wait for you to explore it. So, what’s new? 

• We made some balancing with variables so that branches specific to Nora are easier to unlock.
  
• Your balance of resources will have a more significant impact on certain events.
  
• Managing expeditions during camping will also have more impact.
  
• New images and texts for one of our epilogues have been added.
  

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1658960/End_of_Lines/

We’ve also decided to reopen the demo. If you play it, you'll be able to save your progress for the final version of End of Lines!

Don’t hesitate to share your opinion or critique with us so we can improve our game in the future.

[h2]The Storyteller’s Festival[/h2]

We’re thrilled to announce that The Storyteller’s Festival has selected us and our game, End of Lines, for their 2025 lineup!

We feel truly honored and are so grateful for the chance to participate in a festival that highlights the magic of storytelling, creativity, and innovation in games. A heartfelt thank you goes out to the festival organisers for believing in our work!

To celebrate that, both End of Lines and its soundtrack are -50% off on Steam! Be sure to check out Two Half Studios to learn more about the festival and its amazing selection of games.

Check out the Steam page for the Steam Sale here:
https://store.steampowered.com/developer/TwoHalfStudios/sale/thestorytellersfestival2025

[h2]BlueSky[/h2]
We are on BlueSky! Given the current political situation, we have decided to gradually move away from Twitter and explore new platforms. BlueSky is an exciting new space for us, one that better aligns with our values of open conversation and community-driven engagement.

Change can be tough, yet we believe this shift will enable us to connect more meaningfully and positively, just like we did on Mastodon (feel free to join us there too!). While we will remain on Twitter for a bit longer, we invite you to embark on this new journey with us!

[h2]Q&A[/h2]
We’re excited to announce that we’ll be hosting a Q&A session on our Discord on February 21 at 9 p.m. Paris time (CEST)! 

This is your chance to ask us anything about our work, including:

• The production process – Behind-the-scenes insights into how we bring our games to life.
  
• End of Lines – Dive deeper into the story, themes, and development of our game.
  
• The demo – Have questions or feedback? Let’s talk about it!!
  

We’d love to hear your thoughts, answer your burning questions, and chat with you in real-time! Don’t miss this opportunity to connect with the team and fellow community members. You can already ask your questions on the text channel "ask the devs" so we can answer them on the day of the event!



And in the meantime, all our games are available here on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/15195/Novabox_Collection/

If you want to subscribe to our mailing list, you can register here:
http://www.nova-box.com/signup

You'll get extra-fresh updates about our projects and our whereabouts once a month, nestled in the coziness of your own inbox (we'll never send spam, and you can unsubscribe anytime).

I hope you guys are doing well. Thank you for following us on this adventure. 

Best,

Ophélie,