Echoes of Elysium News

Hey, Elysians!
We’ve got a ton of sparkly new stuff to show off! Our team has been hard at work refining and expanding the core features of the game, and we’re thrilled to let you take a peek behind the curtain. Here’s what we’ve been working on:

[h2]Procedural World Generation[/h2]
Elysium is a procedural world that will change with each playthrough. Players will explore five unique island clusters in each version of the world. Island clusters are packed with points of interest, Drydocks, clockwork monsters, and valuable resources.







With a mix of procedural generation and hand designed pieces, each world will allow players to experience the core EoE experience but explore a new world in every playthrough. Islands' layout, resources, POI locations, Drydock locations, and even the floating debris between islands will be different in every world.



Check out this clip from our World Generation Team Stream to learn more!


[h2]New and Improved UI[/h2]

We’ve been hard at work polishing up our game’s UI over the past few months. Our team has made huge improvements to make the HUD and menus not only more functional but more immersive and in line with the lore of Echoes of Elysium. Here’s a few things we’ve added so far!
Immersive HUD: You'll notice that your heads-up display has a brand new look, designed to make you feel truly part of the world. It's sleek, responsive, and we think it’ll make managing your airship and exploration even more exciting.



In-Game Menus: Our team has put a lot of thought into the game’s menus to make sure they blend seamlessly with the world of Elysium. Every button and panel now has a rich aesthetic to pull you deeper into the experience.



First-Time User Experience (FTUE): We’ve also begun implementing a new FTUE for all the newcomers to Echoes of Elysium. Whether you’re a seasoned player or someone starting fresh, the onboarding process will help you get a handle on the game mechanics while immersing you in the world we’re building.


[h2]Airship Upgrades[/h2]

Airships are what make EoE, and we’re thrilled to announce a bunch of new components to help you create the flying fortress of your dreams!
Airship Construction just got a glow up with the addition of several new hull pieces. We've also added the option to use inset power cores and place boosters on corner hull pieces. These new options will open up a ton of new customization options and ship layouts.







[h2]Airship Damage[/h2]

We've also revamped our ship damage, visual damage indications, and ship repair system. You'll feel more immersed in airship building, flying, and maintenance than ever!



We’re looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the new features! Make sure to stop by Discord to tell us what you think and catch our Streams to tell us your thoughts and questions live!


Stay tuned for more!
-🐻

Jeff is currently on vacation so I’ve taken on the important task of providing updates for our latest dev blog. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Ray Soto, Lead Producer of our studio. Some of you may have seen me in our Discord server or posting questions to the team during our live streams. I run the day-to-day overseeing the development of EoE working closely with the team and finding every opportunity to share my love of Castlevania (Simon’s Quest is an amazing game!).

I’m excited to share updates with all of you about the last two weeks of development. If I were to provide a headline, it would be that our game’s airship survival loop is nearly complete as a playable experience. We continued to build on the foundation set during the last dev cycle with a new ore harvesting mechanic, UI, airship flight systems, and more. Let’s dive in!


[h2]Ore Harvesting[/h2]



With our airship wood harvesting loop on the books, it was time to turn our attention to ore harvesting! After loads of tuning and playtesting, we think you’ll have a lot of fun with our harvesting cycle. This week, we implemented our ore harvesting tools and gameplay.



Check out this brand new ore harvesting cycle:

• Fire drills from your ore harvesting turret (see very cool animation, above)
  
• Destroy ore nodes
  
• Nodes drop haulable rock chunks
  
• Shoot your grappling hook at the chunks
  
• Pull chunks up to your airship
  
• Remove chunks for processing in your airship crafting stations
  

You don’t punch trees in Elysium so having an interesting and unique harvesting system is top priority for us! We can’t wait to see y’all systematically deforesting and strip mining the Greek paradise of Elysium!

[h2]Airship Flight and UI[/h2]



Elysian aesthetics got a massive glow up this week! Check out the all new duo of spicy HUD upgrades in the screenshot above.



Up first: Airship UI. You can’t say your speedometer is broken when EoE PD pulls you over for speeding anymore. Airship UI will allow you to measure your speed, wind direction, remaining fuel, altitude, and more! We’ve also added snappy new icons to represent your sails, boosters, and thrusters. Not to mention the best part; it looks really, really cool! We’re so excited for you to check it out.

Pro tip: you can watch our UI evolve in real time if you follow our #official-art channel in Discord



Our second upgrade is a little less flashy but very useful for all you explorers out there. Check out that sweet compass. This puppy will show you all the nearest drydocks, airships, players, and even guide you back to your tombstone if you get jumped by a pack of howlers! You’re probably thinking “Bear, this is an aerial exploration game. I need to be able to dynamically measure the vertical and horizontal distance of the compass marker that I’m flying towards and have the compass indicate whether it’s above, below, or on the same plane as my ship.” You’re exactly right and we got you covered.

[h2]Crawler[/h2]



I’m gonna go ahead and stop y’all before you ask. You can’t pet the crawlers. Please don’t adopt them. These little cuties got added to the game officially this week but they’ve been in the works for a while! They add a new aspect to gameplay that will BLOW your mind. We know you’ll have a BLAST exploring Elysium with the Crawlers around.

If you haven’t already, join us on Discord to stay up to date and to connect directly with our team. We’re excited to hear from you and to answer any questions you might have about Echoes of Elysium.

Stay tuned for more,
-Ray + 🐻

Hello Elysians!

What’s this? Another Dev Blog so quickly? Indeed it is. With so much happening in Echoes of Elysium, we are going to increase the cadence of our updates to you!
Over the last three weeks we have had an intense focus on the wood harvesting loop, flying monsters and our new glider. Without further ado, here is more info!


[h2]Wood Harvesting[/h2]



We’ve got a fully operational airship wood harvesting loop! Harvesting is a crucial player experience that we’re giving a ton of TLC. Check out this (super fun and satisfying new process we added this week)

• Fire sawblades from your wood harvesting turret
  
• Destroy trees
  
• Profit! (trees dop haulable logs)
  
• Shoot your grappling hook at the logs
  
• Pull logs up to your airship
  
• Remove logs for processing in your airship crafting stations
  

We’ve been having a ton of fun playing with this and we know you will too! Make sure to keep your eyes peeled during our trailer for a look at what to expect from wood harvesting.

[h2]Flying Monsters[/h2]



It’s a bird, it’s a plane, no it’s— coming right for us! Prepare to face menacing airborne threats as we’ve introduced all new flying monsters this week. Make sure to get your exploring done before dark, while the islands are relatively safe. Night brings a surge of aggressive monsters.



The Flying Construct, is a very scary, very aggressive, and generally not a chill dude. It will attack any player within range is one of the most dangerous threats you’ll find in Elysium. I wonder why it’s so shiny and powerful compared to the older constructs around… better go speculate in Discord!

Is a single, super powerful flying enemy not your style? How about being swarmed with a dozen smaller ones? Look no further, we’re working on the Siren this week! More updates about the Siren are coming in a future dev blog.

[h2]Glider[/h2]



The glider is here and it’s beautiful. I could talk about how cool it is but honestly, just take a look. On top of being generally awesome, the glider allows you to rocket boost to reach high places when on foot. You can also use the glider to slow your descent when you need to get to low areas. The glider adds a ton of mobility and makes traversal so much more fun. We can’t wait for y’all to take it for a spin!





Stay tuned for more updates, and join us on Discord to share your adventures and connect with your fellow Elysians!

Until next time,
-Jeff + 🐻

Hello again, Elysians! As promised, here is the first of many Development Blogs for Echoes of Elysium and brought to you by the team at Loric Games. The team is super excited to start sharing their work with all of you and hearing what you think.



Over the last month the team has been laser focused on our airships and all things that we are doing to make designing, building, flying and living on them super cool. Lets kick off by talking about one of the most important parts of the game, AIRSHIPS!



As you know, airships are the core of our game, they are more than just transportation, they are the place that you live, where you do most of your gathering and crafting, and a place that you will call home. The team is currently focused on the different kit pieces that players can use to build their ships. Walls, floors, bows, rudders and more are all being designed and placed into the game for us to experiment with.



Here are a bunch of examples of the types of ships that the team have built and flown.













“We have made a dramatic shift away from the standard things you see and do in most survival RPGs. No more punching trees and building shacks. Your airships provide everything you need to survive, but it is up to you to design it, build it and protect it. The sky's the limit, along with your imagination”
-Jeff, Chief Production Officer

We have also been working the design around airship energy systems and the effect of weight and size when you build and fly a ship. The design for Liftium ore, a mystical Elysian resource that enables flight, and the push and pull between small, fast ships with limited space and lumbering mining vessels with giant storage capacity - it's coming together well.

[h2]Flying your Airship[/h2]

What would an airship be without a great flying experience? We have been playing around with a bunch of different control schemes, camera angle experiments, player animations, speed, collision and much more.





You're going to be steering a variety of ships - some heavy, some fast, some outrageous. I wanted to have the player who's in charge of the helm look like they're really working to maneuver these contraptions. For now, we're blending between four animation states (down, up, left, right) using something called a Blend Tree in Unity.
-Sophia, Animator

Airship collision is a big part of the flying system that we are working on right now. What happens when an airship hits another ship? The ground? Trees? Etc..? How much damage does the ship and its various pieces take? All of these questions and more are being posed, answered and implemented into the game as we speak!





"Making our world feel dynamic is important to us, which is why we're working on integrating a Physics Engine. The first step is to generate collision data for the terrain and all of the static structures, giving creatures, airships, and projectiles something to interact with."
-James, Technical Director

[h2]Drydocks[/h2]

Drydocks are ancient ruins scattered throughout the islands of Elysium that do several things; They can unlock new and interesting airships parts and designs. They give hints to the mysteries of the past and story moments. Most importantly, they are the place that you can dock, design, upgrade, build and repair your ships.





Drydocks also help to design the size and shape of your airships. During your explorations of Elysium, you will find all sorts of drydocks of various shapes, sizes and with different airship part unlocks. We are currently working on the artist look of the drydocks, their size in the game, how they can be upgraded and the tools available to build your fleet of ships.



“We will use this kit to build a variety of clockwork ruins in the game. Our world of Elysium will be getting a lot more clockwork technology in it and this is a big step in that direction.”
-Ilya, Art Director

[h2]Building a ship at a Drydock[/h2]



"Working on airships has been a really great avenue of getting to work with different people across different disciplines on the team, and seeing the results of our work and ideas relatively quickly!"
-Alejandro, Engineer

OK! I think that is it for now. We have A LOT more to talk about in our next update. Would you rather hear and see details on (more!) Airships, or hear about our procedural world generation system, or we could go into detail on the harvesting, gathering and crafting mechanics? Let us know and we will show it to you!

Until next time.
-J

Hello everyone! This is Jeff Hickman, Head of Production for Loric Games. I am here today to introduce myself, the team, and our new game, Echoes of Elysium! We are super excited to finally get to share with you all some details about the game and all the cool stuff we are working on. Along with helping to guide production on the team, I also get the wondrous task of writing these blogs to keep you all informed about what is going on with the game.



Loric Games is made up of 19 awesome people from around the U.S. We are a small, tight knit group of people who love working together and are dedicated to bringing a fun and interesting survival RPG to you all. The team is remote first, though we do get time in person once a month or so. Because we are a small, indie team, we all wear multiple hats. Each of us is focused on our core skills, but we share the load of whatever needs to be done and are super inclusive about ideas and the goodness that we can all bring to the team.







So, let's get down to business! What is Echoes of Elysium? Here is what Bear tells us to say:

“Survive in the clockwork world of Elysium in this 'Sea of Thieves meets Valheim' survival RPG. Band together and embark on an enchanting odyssey through Elysium's shattered landscape. Choose your hero and grow in power while you build a fleet of majestic clockwork airships, explore forgotten lands, and uncover the secrets buried deep in the heart of Elysium. Embrace the skies, defy the odds, and let the winds of adventure propel you towards triumph in this unforgettable open-world survival crafting game. But in the end, can you survive Heron’s malice?”

But what does that MEAN? My best answer…

Echoes of Elysium takes place in the Greek afterlife upper realm of Elysium, home to the greatest of Greek heroes who have reached the afterlife and been deemed worthy of ascending to Elysium. Elysium is overseen by the Titan Cronus, the god of time.

Elysium is an idyllic realm, described in Greek mythology as the golden Elysian fields, a “paradise-like meadow where the most blessed souls live separate from the rest of the underworld”.

But in our version of this realm, Elysium has fallen. Cronos is nowhere to be seen, and the realm has been shattered. What remains is a splintered assortment of floating islands, dotted with the ruins of an Elysium that was.

Not only is the land shattered across many islands, but it’s now overcome with clockwork contraptions. Ancient Greek ruins mixed with clockwork factories and machines, airships, and mechanized creatures roaming the land harvesting the souls of any remaining Elysian heroes.

This is where you come in! You are a hero of ancient Greece, recently fallen in battle and transported to the “paradise” of Elysium. Awakening on your airship, you are hunted and must survive and discover the secrets of Elysium Lost if you have any hope of saving the echoes of tormented souls and returning Elysium to its former glory.

As we are building the game, we break this down broadly into our Three core Pillars of Gameplay:

[h2]Airships [/h2]



Work alone or with your friends to build your fleet of airships and transform them into the agile Carabus, upgrade to the resource gathering Bireme or create mighty Trireme inspired air fortresses; your airships provide everything you need to survive and thrive. Protect and maintain your ships as you and your friends navigate the hostile skies of Elysium. Airships soar in a world designed with verticality in mind and are used to explore clusters of bio-diverse islands and harvest rare materials in your search for answers to the mystery of Elysium.

[h2]Survival[/h2]



Embark on a journey of survival in the enchanting yet perilous clockwork world of Elysium. Gather, craft and survive amidst the mechanical wonders and the serene skies, where danger lurks in the form of soul-powered clockwork monsters. Battle against these clockwork enemies powered by the souls of lost Elysians as you fight for survival. Harvest unique resources to craft vital tools, contraptions, buildings and airships, all aiding in your defense and exploration

[h2]Heroic Progression[/h2]



Choose your hero, grow in power and investigate the mystery of Elysium as you embark on an odyssey through a clockwork world, unraveling the truth of Elysium's past and the connection between its ancient mechanisms and lost souls.



Whew! Hopefully, that gives you all something to get excited about while you wait for our next update. Speaking of, I will be writing an update every 5-6 weeks to ensure you all know what is going on with the game and to get some feedback and your thoughts about what we are doing. We are currently working on Internal Milestone 9, which has a focus on Airship crafting, functionality and overall progression, as well as a bunch of improvements for monsters, hordes and flying monster behavior. More on that next time!


Talk soon,

-Jeff