Echoes of the End developer talks about the game's polarising launch: "The immediate mindset for the team was okay, cancel our vacations"

Last year was certainly no walk in the park for developer Myrkur Games, who launched their debut project Echoes of the End and soon then had to then deal with an unexpected set of circumstances. Long story short, the game didn't live up to the expectations of many fans, with many sharing feedback and criticism often surrounding the combat and basic animations. It led to a troubling launch that Myrkur Games had to address rather quickly, so much so that the Icelandic developer soon kickstarted the process to create a major patch that would rectify many of these frustrations.

It launched a few months later and evolved Echoes of the End into its Enhanced Edition. In the months since this became a reality, the reception has been much better and the mood surrounding the developer has shifted from concerning to much calmer.

As many games that have turbulent launches struggle to find their footing and come back from the brink, with Highguard being the latest high-profile example, we had a chance to sit down with Myrkur Games' CEO Halldor Snaer to get a better understanding as to what happened and how the developer approached the situation.

To begin with, Snaer told us: "So, you know, throughout the launch, as we put the game out from living in a bubble for years and years, and then put the game out and we get like this swath of feedback our way. And I commend the team for this. The immediate mindset for the team was okay, cancel our vacations. We're putting our heads down. We're getting this right and we're getting it right as quickly as we humanly can." He goes on to explain that "it's a sinking feeling, like players have feedback and they want something fixed, and you just put your baby out and there's critique and you just want to fix it."

Talking further, Snaer elaborated: "The team did just that. And what ensued was two months of relentless work. I'm talking around the clock work from the team, listening and reading literally every single article of feedback, every single comment, every single review, every single thing we could find to try and put together a picture of what was the strategic thing we could do in the weeks to answer that feedback and deliver the... because people are saying, it's a great game. I love the game, but there's this and this that detract from it. So we didn't want... we wanted to remove those detractors and make sure that this was an overall very compelling experience and people could kind of enjoy the game for what it is."

To cap off on the matter, Snaer concluded with: "And we shipped. I wouldn't have said it was possible at the beginning of those two months of work and I certainly think our producers would agree, but it's just the spirit of the team that put it in. So the patch that we put out was enormous and we managed to check off and tackle the vast majority of feedback points that came to the team."

As for what the Enhanced Edition patch brought to Echoes of the End, you can read more about this over here, while also delving into the latest update too. Beyond this, for the full and locally subtitled interview, where we also talk about the challenges of AAA development and the benefits of AA production, AI usage in video games, and what's next for Echoes of the End and Myrkur Games, you can simply watch the video below.