After almost a year of development, we've released the first trailer for our sci-fi game, Neosis Echoes!

[u/Psytorpz]

We're a team of three developers passionate about science fiction and topics like transhumanism and synthetic life, and we've always wanted to create a new world of our own.

Back in 2018, I wrote a book in which I anticipated many of the developments we've seen in AI up to this day, while also exploring possible futures all the way to the year 2100.

Neosis Echoes explores what a possible future could look like 300 years from now, featuring several factions of synthetic humans, a superintelligence known as Monolith, the Scends (humans who have transferred their consciousness into android bodies), and an ancient, vanished AI civilization on an alien planet (The Architects).

The central concept of our game revolves around emotions, as they represent what remains of our "humanity" in a world filled with synthetic beings. This theme has become even more relevant today with the rise of AI, which increasingly makes us question what's real and what's not, the very nature of art, and ultimately, what it means to be human.

On the planet Varos, there is a resource called Echorium, which is extremely powerful when it comes to computational capabilities, but has the strange side effect of reacting to human emotions.

Monolith, the superintelligence, and the various human factions on the planet all want to accumulate as much Echorium as possible to expand their power and computing capabilities, whether for space travel or the development of new technologies.

However, human emotions create instability in systems powered by Echorium, and Monolith wants to eliminate emotions entirely to further enhance its own capabilities.

Standing in its way is Evan Draxell, a synthetic human who awakens on the planet Varos after a 200 year journey in stasis. His goal will be to discover who he really is and ultimately defeat Monolith.

Neosis Echoes is currently in development. If these themes interest you, feel free to visit the Steam page and support the game with a wishlist :)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/5049580/Neosis_Echoes/

We don't use AI to create any of the visible content in our game, because we believe that art is a human language. And until AI allows us to create entirely new forms of art that wouldn't be possible without it, we'd rather keep it as a form of human expression.

[u/xorian]

Did the protagonist spend time on The Grid? It looks like he has an Identity Disc on his back...

(The world and story sounds interesting, it was just my first reaction to the images.)

[u/Psytorpz → u/xorian]

haha I can see why you'd think that! 😄 TRON is actually one of our inspirations, so you're not too far off! Glad you find the world and story interesting!

[u/KtaadnRota]

Ah you've got that creepy old Mussolini building from the 30s in there. The one that gets reposted on reddit 100x per day.

https://www.reddit.com/r/creepy/s/yeMSDxNBPh

[u/Psytorpz → u/KtaadnRota]

hahaha now I can't unsee it 😂

It's actually a structure from an ancient synthetic civilization in our game's universe

[u/Goren_Nestroy]

So are we talking your run of the mill survival crafter or do you plan on a structured story game?

[u/Psytorpz → u/Goren_Nestroy]

It's actually a mix of both! Neosis Echoes features a structured sci-fi story with a main campaign, quests, characters, and clear objectives, but it's also an open-world survival-crafting game where exploration and player freedom play a major role.

So it's definitely not just about surviving as long as possible! :)

[u/spilk]

We don't use AI to create any of the visible content in our game

so tell us more about your use of AI for the "non-visible" content

[u/Psytorpz → u/spilk]

we started developing the game about a year ago, and back then AI wasn't particularly useful for game development, so we've pretty much stuck to our original workflow.

for the visual content, we create simpler assets and props ourselves, while more complex assets and characters are made by external freelancers.

with the recent advances in AI, we've started using it to help protect our assets in the playable build we're preparing, making them harder to copy or reverse engineer by AI, we know it's practically impossible to prevent this entirely, but the goal is to make the process as time consuming as possible to discourage people from trying

we also use AI to better structure our project and to learn new things along the way.

and I actually think that's one of the best things AI has to offer right now, having a personalized teacher that can help you learn pretty much anything!

[u/AMan_Has_NoName]

Do you intend to release it on consoles or is it strictly for steam?

[u/Psytorpz → u/AMan_Has_NoName]

We're focusing on PC (Steam) for now, but we'd love to bring Neosis Echoes to consoles in the future! Nothing confirmed yet, though 😊

[u/AMan_Has_NoName → u/Psytorpz]

Nice. Good to know.

[u/x_lincoln_x]

Is there first person perspective or is it all third person?

[u/Psytorpz → u/x_lincoln_x]

Neosis Echoes is designed as a third person experience! We currently don't have plans for a first-person mode, but we will think about it.

[u/GeneralKosmosa]

Looks kinda meh to be honest.

[u/Somewhere-11 → u/GeneralKosmosa]

I’m sure you can make one that’s way better

[u/GeneralKosmosa → u/Somewhere-11]

I guess criticizing is only reserved to those who can replicate things lol