Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey instantly stood out with its eye-catching announcement trailer, and its attention-grabbing mixture of thriller, exploration, and crafting, so we reached out to developer Snowcastle Video games to seek out out extra.
We chatted to Snowcastle Video games’ lead artist Fredrik Dahl, who was sort sufficient to reply all our questions on upcoming journey crafting recreation Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey!
What’s Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey?
Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey is an journey crafting recreation set on a magical island, which mixes collectively components of exploration, constructing, and crafting, whereas additionally tasking you to befriend the island’s creatures. It’s in improvement from and revealed by Snowcastle Video games.
When does Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey launch?
We don’t but have an Xbox launch date for Ikonei Island, which first arrives in Early Entry for Steam, however the devs presently plan for the total launch to happen in 2023. We’ll hold you posted!
What’s it about?
“Ikonei Island is a recreation about rebuilding a abandoned island and making a life for your self, and in your associates,” Dahl begins. “The principle characters are down on their luck children in a port metropolis making an attempt to eke out a dwelling enjoying music on the road when a mixture of alternative, dastardly hog-pirates and a sure boy in a frog swimsuit (however don’t inform him it’s a swimsuit) finds them and desires them to have an journey.” Together with that greater than intriguing premise, we’re instructed, “The Amri is one thing that may be very a lot an undercurrent within the universe we’re creating in our video games right here at Snowcastle. I assume it may be finest described as our most potent pure pressure. It’s naturally benign, serving to crops and animals get bizarre talents. Whether it is exploited, nonetheless, it will probably additionally trigger fairly an quantity of chaos.” That is what’s gone mistaken on Ikonei Island: in response to the sport’s Steam web page, “an overabundance of magical amri is corrupting the flora, turning crops into harmful monsters,” whereas “pirates are capturing and buying and selling wildlife for revenue.” We’re thrust into the midst of this chaos, to attempt to restore order and stability to the island.
What’s the gameplay like?
We’ll be stored busy throughout our journey on Ikonei Island: exploring, gathering sources, crafting, constructing workshops, preventing pirates and liberating trapped creatures, taking good care of our farm, and constructing our house. “There are additionally some enjoyable little puzzles to determine,” Dahl provides. “I’d additionally say that after you rescue the creatures they’re comfortable to assist out too! They could know a factor or two the children don’t — each serving to you to new locations and pay money for stuff you would have a tough time getting by yourself.” It appears we’re not fully alone on Ikonei Island, both: “With out spoiling an excessive amount of,” Dahl says, “I can reveal that it’s not solely pirates round. There is likely to be another folks round that may fill in some blanks, and doubtlessly be of some use each in rebuilding and making the island house.”
So, we all know pirates function fairly closely on the island, and that we’ll must face them to free the creatures they’ve captured, nevertheless it appears they’re not the one risk. “The hogbunny pirates are maybe not the most effective pirates on the market (they do attempt although), and once they received grasping and tried extracting amri out of the bottom issues may’ve gotten somewhat out of hand,” Dahl says. “So they’re definitely not the one risk, and I’d wager they’re actually not the largest both, regardless of how robust they view themselves as.”
We’ll even have our personal base, that we’ll must construct up from its ruins, and we questioned whether or not this base may also develop to incorporate the island’s locals. “Yeah, you’ll get to know the locals and a few those who are also discovering themselves on Ikonei Island. Some very attention-grabbing ruins present a superb base for constructing a roof over your head,” Dahl explains. “As soon as folks get previous the primary hurdle of getting a spot to remain, they’re inclined to need to do what they’re good at. I’d undoubtedly say you is likely to be effectively off lending them a hand or two.”
We’ll be armed with instruments for farming, crafting, useful resource gathering, and constructing, nevertheless it appears we received’t simply must depend on these. “Properly, you possibly can craft your approach out of numerous conditions in case you’re intelligent in fact,” Dahl says, “however the animals have been there a very long time and undoubtedly have a trick or two up their…fur? One instance can be that one thing that has a set of horns, or an axe beak, might for certain be an efficient assist if you’re making an attempt to get by means of a rock, or there’s a very huge tree stump in your approach. We’ve seen colleges of fish within the rivers and lakes across the island too,” Dahl provides, “and I ponder if there is likely to be a four-legged pal that would assist out with issues like that too… they’re a diverse bunch and I believe there’s quite a bit they’d show themselves helpful for.”
What’s the world like?
“Ikonei has change into a fairly sizable place as we’ve been constructing this recreation,” Dahl says. “When the gamers first arrive, it’s possibly not the most effective place to dwell. It’s very wet and drab, there’s numerous stuff that wants clearing out and the slimes and different monsters do not make it any simpler. However I believe all of the attention-grabbing stuff you’ll discover whereas exploring, and battling the monsters will make it value it!”
We’re instructed that Ikonei Island was once inhabited by an historical folks generally known as the Onurasi, however that “they’ve been dormant for a superb whereas. However frogs and magical forces are nonetheless round and will help get in contact with them.”
Ikonei Island is a mysterious place, and sees numerous variety between its areas. “As you get into the sport, you’ll span the whole lot from lush inexperienced areas by means of deserts, swamps and to the chilly aspect of the island the place the solar is hidden behind a mountain ridge,” Dahl says. “We’ve tried our greatest to create a richly diverse place for the gamers to discover and expertise! There may even be a number of secrets and techniques to be discovered within the nooks and crannies round our little world.”
Any information on the Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey achievements?
We don’t but have the Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey achievements, however Dahl gave us a number of hints on what to anticipate! “We would like a superb mixture of issues which might be very concrete targets for the participant (story progress for instance), and issues that may reward the participant for possibly pondering a bit exterior the field,” Dahl explains. “Our recreation is fairly various and we’ve discovered multiple approach to make use of our gameplay mechanics in-house, so we’re making an attempt to leverage that as effectively. We’ve tried to make one thing the place the gamers are allowed artistic freedom and we’re hoping that our achievements can reward and replicate that.”
Ikonei Island: An Earthlock Journey appears to be packed filled with secrets and techniques and mysteries — out of the whole lot the sport gives, what’s Dahl most excited for gamers to expertise? “There’s a LOT of stuff I’m very excited to see folks check out and do in our recreation. As a completely biased and subjective reply; as lead artist I can’t anticipate folks to see all of the stuff we’ve made and put collectively for everybody to see,” Dahl begins. “I believe we’ve made a handsome recreation, because of my pretty artwork crew who retains knocking it out of the park, and that’s undoubtedly a giant one for me. It’ll even be tremendous enjoyable to see how folks will use the issues we’ve made for them to craft and embellish with too! I’m optimistic our gamers will do issues we’ve by no means considered! I’m into the fight in our recreation too, even at this early stage of it. Throughout early entry, it’ll be very thrilling to get suggestions from everybody about what they like and work to develop these programs collectively.”
What do you assume? Will you be diving into the magic and thriller of Ikonei Island when it launches for Xbox One? Tell us within the feedback!