The survivors-like style has seen a meteoric rise, however few have achieved the dimensions and success of Soulstone Survivors. Working a triumphant Steam Early Entry interval, developer Sport Smithing is making ready to unleash its “energy fantasy simulator” on an entire new viewers.
On June seventeenth, Soulstone Survivors can have its full world launch, not solely on PC but in addition on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Collection X|S for the primary time.
Described as going from degree 1 to 100 in ten minutes, the sport guarantees near-limitless energy, lots of of abilities, and battles of an insane scale. To seek out out what Xbox gamers can count on after they dive into the chaos, we spoke with Allan Smith, founding father of Sport Smithing and Sport Lead for Soulstone Survivors, in regards to the recreation’s journey, its design philosophy, and the challenges of bottling godlike energy for consoles.
Soulstone Survivors – Wish to know extra?
Please introduce your self – what’s your function at Sport Smithing and on the creation of Soulstone Survivors?
Hello! My identify is Allan Smith, I’m the founding father of Sport Smithing and Sport Lead for Soulstone Survivors!
So promote it to us – why ought to Xbox gamers be desirous about Soulstone Survivors?
Soulstone Survivors is actually an influence fantasy simulator. It’s like enjoying a fast-paced action-RPG, however going from degree 1 to 100 in ten minutes, and you then preserve going till you’re really godlike, whereas rapidly experimenting with totally different builds, mixtures and discovering that excellent synergy the place you simply disintegrate the whole lot.
With nearly 500 abilities, there’s a great likelihood it would have precisely that excellent playstyle you search.
And the way did Soulstone Survivors first come about?
I used to be at all times an enormous fan of video games like Path of Exile, World of Warcraft, Hades… and when Vampire Survivors got here alongside, we felt that there was one thing there that we might make right into a recreation of our personal.
For me personally, I at all times struggled with creating dozens of “alts”, secondary characters in video games like PoE or WoW, to really feel and experiment with totally different lessons and playstyles. Spending lots of of hours to attempt to get these “alts” leveled and equipped, solely to then assume “hmm, I don’t like this class very a lot” – Soulstone Survivors is an try at an answer for that.
There’s a ton of meta development, all shared between all of your characters, the gameplay is quick and rewarding from the get go, there’s a ton of depth and methods to play that permit for a great deal of exploration, and with each match you unlock one thing that makes you assume “hmm, what if I attempt that?” We actually tried to create a “class sandbox” with the sport, with a great deal of freedom and issues to attempt.
All hell will break unfastened
You’ve had some unbelievable success from the couple of years on Steam by way of Early Entry. How essential has that interval been for the event of the sport and is there a particular instance of participant suggestions that led to a major change or new characteristic?
It was important! From the very starting, we developed the sport as near gamers as we might, gathering suggestions (there have been solely a dozen gamers in our Discord at first) and making an attempt to enhance the sport in the appropriate path. There are soooo many examples of options that we got here up with primarily based on participant suggestions, however to provide a key one I might say the Character Ascensions.
We stored getting lots of suggestions mentioning how totally different characters within the recreation didn’t really feel “totally different sufficient” from one another, regardless of every having distinctive weapons and fairly a number of distinctive abilities. So after lots of brainstorming we got here with the Ascensions – these are distinctive powers you unlock for every character that actually empowers the principle playstyles of the character in query. These can fluctuate from taming a panther to experience via hordes of enemies, to summoning a ghost ship that bombards enemies with highly effective cannons, and the whole lot in between, actually influencing how the moment-to-moment gameplay feels for every character.
And now you’re going for a full world multi-format launch in June – have there been any challenges bringing the sport from PC to that of console?
That is the primary time we’re bringing a recreation to consoles so it has undoubtedly been a journey!
At first look, you may assume it must be simple – there aren’t any tremendous practical graphics, ray-traced reflections or no matter happening… however along with all the normal challenges of creating certain the sport conforms to all guidelines from totally different platforms, Soulstone Survivors has a fairly distinctive efficiency problem. The sport has principally no limits to participant energy, so you may simply be throwing hundreds of abilities per second whereas blowing up your complete world. Getting that to run properly on consoles has been an enormous problem!
To offer a fast instance of the insanity, at one level we added a tracker to see what number of targets you can hit per second ultimately recreation – and we counted over 500,000, with physics and complicated injury calculations for every of these.
So after I say the dimensions may be insane, I imply it!
You promise 22 Void Hunters. May you discuss extra about them, how they differ and of any challenges that quantity has introduced by way of preserving the sport difficult but rewarding?
It’s humorous as a result of once we first promised the variety of characters we might have within the recreation, every character was so much less complicated than they’re at the moment. However as I discussed in a earlier reply, there was this large demand to make characters increasingly more distinctive, which inevitably means increasingly more content material for every of them. So earlier than we added any new characters, we labored on the preliminary 14 that had been launched with Early Entry till they felt in a great place. Have been they fascinating? Did they provide totally different playstyles? Have been they enjoyable to experiment with? We stored on including and including complexity to every of them till we obtained there.
Then, we seemed ahead and thought “Man, now we have to make eight new characters with all of this new stuff, too!” I have to admit it was an enormous problem to give you new fantasies and playstyles that felt recent and distinctive, however I believe we obtained there!
Need some choices? You bought it!
Equally, what in regards to the 350 Abilities and 100 totally different weapons? We’d love to listen to extra about these, but in addition of any that missed the mark and obtained reduce…
Developing with the virtually 500 abilities the sport has (now that we’re getting nearer to launch) has additionally been one other large problem. We at all times attempt to make it possible for abilities have one thing distinctive, that they match totally different holes in several synergies and might at all times be used not less than in a number of builds, however it’s an fascinating design problem as a result of it’s important to think about the constraints of the sport, such because the sheer scale.
Every ability is perhaps launched lots of of occasions per second, may cowl your complete display screen, and is launched robotically with out direct enter from the participant… and you then nonetheless need to make every of them fascinating on their very own.
We even ran a number of ‘ability suggestion challenges’ in our Discord, the place we obtained gamers to counsel abilities they want to see within the recreation and vote for them, and people actually helped us so much not solely with cool concepts, however with seeing the kind of factor gamers would need to see within the recreation to tell our future selections.
So once more, I can safely say it has solely been potential to get right here due to the assistance of our neighborhood!
The Summoning mechanic appears like a core a part of the expertise. Are you able to elaborate on the design behind it and the way it all helps escalate the insanity?
Ah sure, it’s undoubtedly one of many favorite playstyles among the many neighborhood.
By now, there are dozens of abilities that summon minions to combat from you, from skeletons to golems to mooses, haha! And if you are undoubtedly NOT compelled to choose summons, they’re often one of many first playstyles new gamers are likely to gravitate to as a result of the summons can tank hits for you, distract enemies, they will deal with bosses to take them out rapidly with out your management… plus it’s simply cool lots of of tigers, boars, snakes, moose and extra simply mowing down enemies! It’s superior to see there are extra minions combating for you than in opposition to you, they usually inherit all of your energy ups, stats and the whole lot, to allow them to scale insanely into the late recreation as properly!
“Unleash Chaos. Develop into a God”, is your tagline. How does the gameplay and development empower gamers to achieve that godlike state?
I’ve touched on this a bit of in my earlier solutions, however the important thing means by which we obtain that is with fast and extra importantly significant development whereas in a match, with energy ups that each one actually make a distinction to your energy degree a method or one other, whereas having this large exterior layer of meta-progression with Character Ability Timber and over 100 runes to decide on that actually focus your gameplay on sure builds.
It’s a two-pronged strategy the place you may really feel glad enjoying a single match, however there’s at all times one thing new unlocked, some new ability or rune or character or weapon that you may attempt, that retains you going ahead within the recreation, and it’s actually superior to see how the participant’s curiosity drives them ahead within the recreation in a pure method.
Instantly they discover themselves extra educated about what’s within the recreation, how issues work, and identical to that they give you a construct that makes the whole lot that they had carried out up to now really feel weak they usually get that tremendous feeling of “I simply broke the sport.”
Soulstone Survivors goes to deliver chaos
Wanting past the June launch, what are your ambitions for Soulstone Survivors on PC and consoles? Are there any plans for post-launch content material or updates that we will sit up for?
Completely, we have already got a few content material updates deliberate for the months instantly after the complete launch.
We haven’t talked a lot about these but however we’ll develop on the programs already within the recreation, such because the newly added recreation mode Titan Hunt, with new bosses, maps and challenges.
However extra importantly we’re additionally preserving an eye fixed at what the neighborhood is asking and can preserve adjusting our plan primarily based on that.
Rogue Soulstone is in pre-production. Whereas it might be early, are you able to give any hints as to the way it may construct upon or differ from the Soulstone Survivors expertise?
I believe the best solution to describe it’s that Rogue Soulstone feels nearer to video games like Danger of Rain 2 than Soulstone Survivors.
It’s nonetheless veeeery early, however we’re tremendous excited as a result of it’s a utterly totally different gameplay expertise, that borrows from the identical universe and the place you will notice a number of acquainted faces, nonetheless with fast-paced gameplay, difficult bosses and what not. However since abilities are in your direct management and the sport is in precise three dimensions, it actually adjustments the whole lot.
It can nonetheless take a short while earlier than we’re able to share extra particulars, however it’s coming, and we will’t wait to point out relatively than inform!
And eventually, Soulstone Survivors lets gamers wield unbelievable powers. In case you might have one ability or means from Soulstone Survivors in actual life for twenty-four hours, which one would you select, and what’s essentially the most mundane or most outrageous factor you’d do with it? 😉
Hahah, I believe I might say Shadow Step – it’s an Murderer ability and possibly one of many extra distinctive ones within the recreation, the place you create two portals (one near you and one additional away) and while you work together with one, you teleport to the opposite dealing injury in an space, form of like a brief distance teleport… you already know, the form of stuff you should utilize to cross the road, teleport upstairs to keep away from you already know… going up the steps…
Man, this reply makes me assume I’m lazier than I believed!
The journey of Soulstone Survivors is a testomony to Sport Smithing’s dedication. Allan Smith’s insights reveal a staff keen about creating the last word energy fantasy; a recreation the place participant curiosity and creativity are the principle drivers of enjoyable.
With post-launch content material already deliberate and with Rogue Soulstone on the horizon, the long run appears to be like vibrant and chaotic. For now, gamers gained’t have to attend lengthy to forge their very own godlike hero – or simply discover a extra environment friendly solution to keep away from taking the steps.
Our due to Allan Smith for his time. Soulstone Survivors launches on Xbox Collection X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC on June seventeenth 2025. A free demo is on the market to obtain now on all platforms, together with on Xbox via the Xbox Retailer.
We’ll observe with a launch article to let you already know as soon as Soulstone Survivors is on the market to play in full. And keep tuned for a evaluation from us too.
