Ender Wiggin. Admiral Ackbar. That dude who commands the G.I. Joes. These totally rad commanders knew that battles are won not by a single footsoldier, but by issuing precise commands that put their units in position to achieve victory.
In There Came an Echo, follow in those commanders’ footsteps by giving orders to Corrin Webb (Wil Wheaton) and his squadmates in a unique real-time strategy experience. Using an advanced voice recognition system, direct your units through a variety of mission types against foes armed with futuristic energy weaponry and personal force fields. Make your move with standard commands (“All units, advance to Bravo 3!”) or utilize custom variants to express your unique personality (“Everyone, do the worm over to Buttface 3!”). Keep it classy, folks.
Corrin, an ordinary cryptographer, is thrown into a deadly game of secret agendas when a group of mercenaries tracks him down in Santa Monica, California. Guided by the mysterious Val (Ashly Burch), Corrin must escape from a foe with seemingly limitless resources and discover what secrets his own unbreakable algorithm, Radial Lock, is safeguarding...information that, if released, will rattle the very foundations of reality itself. Also starring Laura Bailey, Yuri Lowenthal, Cassandra Morris, Rachel Robinson, and Cindy Robinson.
| Minimum System Requirements | Recommended System Requirements | |
| CPU | Intel Core 2 Duo E4400 2.0GHz / AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4800+ | Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 2.4GHz / AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 5200+ |
| VRAM | 256 MB | 256 MB |
| RAM | 2 GB | 4 GB |
| OS | Win Vista 32 | Win 7 64 |
| Graphics Card | nVidia GeForce 8600 GT / AMD Radeon HD 2600 XT | nVidia GeForce 9800 GT / AMD Radeon HD 3850 |
| Direct X | DX 9 | DX 9 |
| SOUND CARD | DirectX Compatible | DirectX Compatible |
| HDD Space | 5 GB | 5 GB |
| Game Analysis | There Came an Echo is a game in which you, the field commander of a small squad, use your voice to direct your units around a map to accomplish various objectives. There's a list of predefined commands, which might include "open fire," or "Corrin, head to Bravo 3." | |
| High FPS | 200+ FPS ( GTX 1060 ) | |
| Optimization Score | 10 | |
Awesome Soundtrack.
Complete Voice Acting.
Voice control learning curve.
Stiff Animations.
Dull and repetitive environments.
You will be manning the character named Sam, an awesome strategist who aids Val (Voiced by Ashly Bruch) in saving Corrin (Voiced by Wil Wheaton), a dull developer by day but a brilliant cryptographer by night, from being abducted. Along Corrin’s quest for the truth he comes across several characters. While some are awesome and witty *coughAdamcough*, and others who are just plain dull, Miranda, there’s enough voice acting to go around. Every single dialog in this game is fully voice but sadly it’s accompanied by stiff moving animations. If only the models moved a little better you would be able to feel the emotions of the characters. With easter eggs sprinkled here and there and an interesting plot twist, which I had to read up on it online to understand it, it makes the story somewhat enjoyable.
The world that accompanies this story is probably not the most appeasing. Every corridor in the game looks similar but in a different shade of dark. Makes you wonder if the future really is going to be all about dark colors. Most if not all levels are different combinations of big rooms or small corridors with places to cover. This is where each battle begins to get a tad repetitive. With no real variation in areas, they might as well made the entire game horde mode. Which brings me into the controls.
The last voice controlled game I played was almost 10 years ago. So coming into this game I had high hopes that the tech has advanced far enough to make using it enjoyable. It still has its bugs here and there but it is still usable. Iridium Studios tries to alleviate the ailments by giving you the option to rename almost all of the voice commands. They give you a few default alternatives and some of them are funny like, “Party at Foxtrot 4.” But sometimes the issue is not with the commands. The game won’t outright register you if you start to get flustered when the enemies are doing some heavy damage. I ended up having to speak like a caveman to ensure I would keep calm and have the game register me. When its working the game is quite fun to control. Makes me feel like a dictator and the game characters are my peons. It would have been nice to have better keyboard and mouse controls, but in doing so would kind of ruin the story of the game.
This games soundtrack is quite enjoyable. With some awesome guitar riffs and synths, the game feels more like future you would find in an 80’s movie. The soundtrack is composed by Big Giant Circles (Jimmy Kinson) and Ronald Jenkees. If you have listen their work before you would instantly feel at home.
Conclusion: With a few issues here and there, this game is still fun to play. The voice commands are pretty good, with the ability to make your own commands. The story is not the best but still able to keep you interested. And characters that somehow keep you intrigued even though some are just boring. As a little bonus they included what is meant to be used as a Training mode but can be doubled as a Horde Mode. It’s not a bad place to test your might. With this in mind you should still keep this game in mind. Also at the time of this review the game sits at 14.99 on steam, so it’s not a bad game for that price.