Currently in development

Current Development Phase: Prototyping 

Active Focus: Currently refining main character's movement physics and ensuring that the abilities integrate seamlessly with the gameplay loop.

Overview

Echoes of Deepcrest is a metroidvania game in which the player controls a wandering forest spirit, whose goal is to fight the plague that afflicted the forgotten kingdom of Deepcrest for decades. Ever since the mother tree, possessed by a cosmic entity, began to produce a sap whose ingestion grants incredible knowledge, but leads to madness and hollowness if abused.

The use and exploitation of the tree have caused the sap to spread throughout the kingdom, polluting water, environments, and creatures, most of whom have now been consumed by the entity that resides in the tree.

Key features:

• Challenging gameplay loop that rewards exploration.

• Multiple combat systems.

• Covenant based side quests system that unlock secret endings and areas.

• Profound narrative centered on pollution and human nature in which lovecraftian horrors meet woods elements.

Here are two of the mechanics I'm working on for the game:

Berries

Berries are harvestable and replantable resources that serve for temporary buffs, heals or for certain NPCs.

Harvesting yields multiple units, one of which can be replanted to grow a new bush over time.

This resource loop is simple but weaves well with the main themes of the game and can be quite satisfying once it is fully utilized, especially during the end game.

Moreover, some berries are area-specific, tying cultivation to exploration.

Across the world the player can also find up to three Weird Berries, unique items that cannot be consumed or replanted and whose purpose is left to the player to discover.

Giving them to different characters leads to drastically different outcomes, one of which permanently alters an NPC.

Strange Lantern

The strange lantern is a rare item obtained by completing the questline of one of the covenants. When equipped, it passively can reveal The Veil, a hidden layer of the world otherwise completely invisible and unreachable. The lantern illuminates only the area surrounding the player, making its terrain, enemies, and secrets tangible and interactive.

It is one of the many ways the covenant system ties directly into exploration, other than with missions involving the retrieval of objects or the hunt of dangerous enemies.

Moodboard

Audience Analysis