Echoes of the End is the first indie game developed by the company Myrkur Games and published by Deep Silver, Plaion and Prime Matter.

So with such a long development time and introductory videos, it seems like it has potential Echoes of the Endis the game really good or not? Let's learn about the game with MarkGame through the following review!

YOU WILL LIKE

SURPRISED ABOUT THE QUALITY!

Echoes of the End Overall, it doesn't bring anything new to the action-adventure genre, but is still very high quality from the storytelling – especially the interaction of the main character duo Ryn and Abram, to the general gameplay and beautiful graphics!

Story of Echoes of the End The story takes place at a fairly smooth pace, the explanations are easy to understand, although there are no surprising twists, but overall it is done well, not bad at all.

In particular, we must mention the conversations between the female main character – Ryn and her reluctant companion – Abram. They are truly the biggest highlight of the plot when bringing conversations that happen naturally, not forced, jokes that are reasonable, as well as full of emotions in difficult and intense scenes. There's something about the quality of all the dialogue that reminds us of AAA games from Naughty Dogs, such as Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves, The Last of Usetc. even though the game itself is only available at AA level.

Background of Echoes of the End quite diverse, ranging from mountains to mysterious structures hidden behind rich caves. They are created extremely beautifully and in detail, accompanied by flashy effects such as volumetric clouds and global illumination to create an impressive atmosphere throughout the journey that makes the writer's hand constantly press the shutter button to use as a background image!

And according to the writer's experience, the game runs completely stably, whether in “quality mode” or “performance mode” on PS5 and PS5 Pro. Perhaps, this is also one of the rare games using the well-optimized Unreal 5 engine.

gameplay of Echoes of the End The distribution is quite balanced in the interwoven exploration of battles and interesting, intelligent puzzles

The character models from monsters to soldiers and obviously, important characters, all have beautiful shapes. Especially the cutscenes have quite skillful cinematic angles, the story's emotions are well expressed with the “happy, angry, sad” expressions of each character being elaborated, with nothing to criticize.

The sound and background music according to the writer are also “adequate”, not losing any points when looking at the overall picture of the game.

Next, his gameplay Echoes of the End The distribution is quite balanced in the interwoven exploration of battles and interesting puzzles, full of intelligence when taking advantage of the context to bring quality hours of play.

The level design is largely linear, occasionally interspersed with relatively open “slightly” areas such as Uncharted: The Lost Legacy when the player has the right to complete any location first.

Players should also keep an eye out for secret treasure chests hidden throughout the journey because besides helping to increase health and stamina bars, many chests also provide background stories for players to better understand the world of Echoes of the End.

The game's combat system is not complicated and easy to play, revolving around using light and strong attacks to increase Ryn's stamina to be able to perform other magic attacks. At the same time, don't forget to dodge and block attacks to create a way for her to escape, or join Abrams in counterattacking powerful attacks against the soldiers.

Echoes of the End also provides players with skill upgrades from helping Ryn learn many powerful combos or upgrading Abrams' combo skills.

The game's boss battles are quite good, relatively diverse and sometimes bring surprises to players. These levels are also more difficult to fight than regular battles.

Although the artificial intelligence (AI) of the soldiers is not too special, it ensures that there will be no annoying scenes of soldiers rushing to “beat the ground” like Big Helmet Heroes – another indie action game released this year.

Besides the big and small matches, the game's big plus lies in the puzzle segments. They are extremely diverse: from simply lifting objects, to stopping time in time, and even going into the past of the setting to pave the way. Echoes of the End also brings climbing levels and traps that remind us more or less of the game series Tomb Raider renowned.

They are not too difficult, but challenging enough to satisfy players. If you're too confused, Abrams will reveal it to you via a button, but won't automatically tell the player. This is also a “small plus” because there are quite a few good games that guide players on what to do if they get stuck for too long and lose everything!

YOU WILL HATE

SOME UNFORTUNATE EXCEPTIONS!

Story of Echoes of the End Although the writer finds it quite good, there are also shortcomings that are easy to see and hard to ignore.

The first point is the feeling that when you finish playing, you feel like you are playing… a sequel rather than the first part of the game Echoes of the Endeven though the story has a lot of potential for a sequel – if one gets made. Contributing to the reason why that plot is like a “sequel” is because the background stories of both the villain and supporting characters (if they are considered secondary) are only extremely “generalized” on the surface.

Even when those supporting characters suddenly appear and die in the climax of the journey, the writer cannot retain any emotions because who knows who they are? Only… “heard through” by Ryn or Abrams.

Although the villains have an impressive debut before entering the main screen of Echoes of the Endbut they are only “present enough” but not of enough quality for us to praise, contrary to the way the game does for the two main characters.

If only throughout the journey, we could see or play through flashbacks to the past of the characters or experience them as a way to exploit the plot. God of War Ragnarok; can partly create depth or at least make us understand the importance of these supporting and antagonistic characters.

Obviously, comparing with such a “blockbuster” game is unfair, but when experiencing it, players will definitely feel regretful about the potential that the game can bring in terms of plot because the cutscenes and dialogues of the game are very good.

Next, the events and situations of the battles almost only have one pattern: explore, meet monsters, solve puzzles, watch cutscenes and repeat. They are not diverse, such as sometimes getting hit by surprise, or having to solve difficult puzzles while also having to worry about fighting fire soldiers, etc. Not to mention the number of monsters and minions is not diverse enough, plus their fighting style doesn't seem to have enough differences and is repetitive.

Invisibly affects the in-depth combat system Echoes of the End brings, when there is not enough motivation for players to explore unique combos or use other skills to defeat soldiers faster.

Players will somewhat regret the potential that the game can bring in terms of plot because the cutscenes and dialogues of the game are very good.