There Came an Echo was (and still is) a unique game, even by our wonderful crowdfunding indie game standards. On its surface, it looks like a fairly standard tactical RPG, possibly even an XCOMM rip-off. But what makes it stand out above others is that it’s controlled entirely through voice commands. That kind of thing has been tried before, but this is one of the first time’s its ever really worked.
Originally released on PC way back in February 2015, a console port of the game was supposed to happen not long after. As you can probably tell, that didn’t quite happen. In fact it looked like the console versions of the game were quietly canceled, ironic considering the title of the game.
But last week, developer Iridium Studios breathed new life into one of the ports, while destroying the other like a particularly bad storm. In a backer exclusive update, the team announced plans for these ports, and why it took so long. Luckily for us, we know what the update was about thanks to Worth Playing.
“It turns out porting games is hard,” stated Iridium Studios CEO Jason Wishnov. “But after some significant period of time, and the help of Sony’s engineers, we managed to bring the exceptionally advanced voice recognition in There Came an Echo to life on the PlayStation 4.”
It was announced that There Came an Echo will be released on PSN this week at $14.99, however, due to the difficulties of porting, the Xbox One version was cancelled. You can’t help but wonder if Microsoft wasn’t interested in helping them port it over, or if Sony is also helping to publish this release to some degree.
That’s a real shame for Xbox One owners, but if you fall into that category you shouldn’t have any trouble with the PC version. It’s the kind of game you should at least considering picking up if our own review is anything to go by, which it is.
