Echoes of the Husk is a singleplayer Survival Horror, developed by Hexagony, set in the golden age of Piracy (XVII - XVIII century).

You play as Jago, a stranded pirate on a surreal Mediterranean inspired island, where you’ll explore different biomes, fight foes and terrifying monsters with saber and pistols, scavenge for gear and uncover the mystery of your lost past.

Genre: Survival Horror
Platforms: Windows PC
Gamemodes: Singleplayer, open levels and backtracking
Game Engine: Unreal Engine 5
Development time: 1 year (Vertical Slice, started in September 2024)

Jago arriving on a sandy beach beside a rowboat

Jago aiming at an enemy in a dark cavern

Jago aiming a pistol at an enemy on a rocky island path

Jago fighting an enemy beside wooden crates on a sunlit path

Jago's diary open to a note titled The captain's plan

Jago exploring a blue-green cavern filled with strange growths

A glowing tentacled creature looming over Jago in the darkness

Jago exploring a misty forest beside a stream

Responsibilities

Role: Game Designer
Analyzed similar games, to understand the Survival Horror niche and its Core Mechanics
Responsible for the Combat and 3C Design, translating the feeling of being a pirate into a gameplay system
Coordinated playtest sessions and interviews, to obtain valuable feedback used for achieving a proper Horror feeling
Contributed to pitching the project to publishers

Contributions

Pirate combat & horror

Goal: use Pirate setting to influence not only the game aesthetic, but also the core combat.

Process: creating a slow paced combat, inspired by classical survival horrors like Resident Evil and Silent Hill, while also adding some twists to the formula, by taking advantage of the pirate-era weapons

1. Ranged Weapons

In line with the historical setting, weapons have only 1 bullet in the magazine and a slow reload, creating tension on each missing shot. Also, by making this rule applied to enemies too, combat remained fair and not frustrating.

2. Melee Weapons

Makes the player consume Stamina on each attack, which is also used for sprinting, forcing players to not spam melee hits and using it for finishing already damaged enemies or eliminating weaker ones. Close range attacks are also intended as a way to preserve ammo, making the management of the resources obtained by the player a constant factor to deal with.

Combat flowchart showing decisions between firing, melee attacks, swapping weapons, and reloading — A Combat loop, that showcases the available choices that player faces when engaging with an enemy encounter

3. Hands system

Each equipped weapon occupies one available slot (hand), making players constantly manage the equipment before every fight, while also giving them the possibility to personalize their approach (example: using one pistol and sword vs using two dual wielding pistols).

Jago's inventory showing equipped hand slots and a selected flintlock pistol — Inventory and Hands slots, where the player can change its loadout

4. Items limitations

Players were encouraged to constantly make choices regarding their equipment, to better have chances of surviving, by making items like the lantern, needed for traversing dark areas, occupy an Hand slot, just like weapons, or by making a powerful rifle occupy both slots.

Focal Point & Progression

Goal: guide the player in a non linear-map, reducing the cases where objective is unknown, while also encouraging exploration and backtracking.

Process: setting clear goals for the player, both short, mid and long term, to effectively guide him.

1. Puzzles Pieces

Similar to classic Survival Horrors, Puzzles were used to create a spatial progression goal: player stumbled on a place to interact, requiring additional items (Puzzle Pieces), in order to be able to activate it and trigger a puzzle necessary to advance, forcing player to explore the map, while also backtracking.

Jago examining a ritual element with a missing item in a torchlit chamber — Missing Puzzle Pieces are communicated to the player

2. Lore connection

Hints or information necessary to advance were placed inside notes (Letters) found in the map, reinforcing exploration. Letters can also be read again in an dedicated menu (Diary).