Gala Games and Ion Games are pleased to announce that the 4X space adventure, Echoes of Empire, is now live for PC and Mac on the Gala Games platform.
The Empire has fallen. Overcome by greed and ambition, those who controlled the ebb and flow of the entire civilized galaxy have been destroyed by their own mistakes. Its separation into three destructive factions, each with its own ideas of how the imperium should have run, was the beginning of the end. Now the broken pieces of those factions and the technologies they pioneered must all be used to rebuild civilization or else propel humanity into a new dark age, similar to that before FTL travel was invented.
As an Echoes of Empire player, you represent one of those noble families. Your goal is not only to amass power and influence for yourself, but to guide humanity into the future and away from that dark past. You cannot let the Empire’s failure determine the fate of every living soul in the known universe. You must forge out some semblance of prosperity, with or without the elusive peace that your predecessors ironically fought so hard to maintain.
Anyone with a Gala Games account can download the game now through the Gala Games launcher and play for free. The sooner you begin collecting resources and upgrading your Homebase station, the better positioned you will be when all hell breaks loose in the galactic superwars that are inevitable in the aftermath of the Empire’s decay. Glory and wealth will go to those who want them the most, to those who are willing to do anything for what they think is right.
Own Planets and Stars
The Echoes of Empire launch also marks the beginning of the Celestial Claim land rush for all players. All holders of Celestial Claim tokens (ERC-1155) will have the opportunity to claim any available Celestial Object that matches the parameters of their Claim token.
Imagine owning a Legendary Celestial Object like this one!
Celestial Object ownership is not a requirement to play, but every Celestial Object is home to multiple resource mines, which will be needed by all players to keep up with Homebase expansion and Fleet construction. When you are the claimed owner of a Celestial Object, you’re also the owner of its mines, entitling you to a portion of rewards (in the form of StarStardust) when those mines are used by other players. The more your Celestial Object is harvested, the more Stardust you can potentially receive as the owner. Stardust is then used to determine the amount of GALA you will receive in the daily reward distribution. Look for more detailed information about Stardust and rewards in the Litepaper, coming soon.
Starting Building and Conquer the Galaxy
The race to become a galactic superpower has begun, and power beyond measure is within anyone’s grasp.
Your new empire awaits, Commander. What will you make of it?
Before the Empire crumbled, there was a lot of grumbling throughout the galaxy, and everyone seemed to have an idea of what could be done to make things better. This is how the Arbeiters, the Royals and the Garrison turned from what should have been cooperative systems toward similar goals, to factions hell-bent on each others’ destruction.
Each mad with their own takes on what was right and what was ultimately good for the galaxy and the Empire, these factions tore away at one another until nothing was left but ruin. Now that the Empire is over, the factions still remain, and the noble houses attempting to rise from the ashes of the Empire’s destruction must work within the frameworks established by each faction.
The promised result is a new kind of galactic chaos in which every faction must be represented within each and every noble’s Homebase. If each Homebase doesn’t embrace the Arbeiters’ exploratory spirit, the Garrison’s military might, and the Royal’s noble arrogance, no Homebase will have a chance on its own. Hopefully the workers within these factions will set aside their history of conflict for the greater good of the galaxy, but only time and space will tell.
Echoes of Empire launches very shortly, and those who move quickly will establish the surest galactic footing as countless noble houses attempt to establish themselves as planetary owners and figures of power.
Don’t Miss Day 1
The wise will take time on day 1 to build a solid foundation for their Homebase. The game’s robust interactive tutorial will guide you through the most essential actions, and it is imperative that you collect your rewards for each of these actions as you accomplish them.
Prepare for war and galactic conquest at your Homebase!
Your Homebase is everything in Echoes of Empire. It is your lifeline to the galaxy. It contains your Command Center and manages your defenses. It maintains your regular collection of each of the three different types of resources.
The following three resources are required (in various combination ratios) to craft and upgrade ships, build and upgrade Homebase components, to purchase and upgrade blueprints, and more.
Ore
Vapor
Composite
Upgrading Buildings
Every building unit in your Homebase is upgradable by spending a combination of the three resources and by taking the required amount of time to build. Every upgrade has a specific requirement of another building’s prior upgrade, keeping you from becoming unbalanced in your building upgrades. Essentially, you cannot allow any particular area of your Homebase to become overpowered while neglecting another.
By clicking the Upgrade button on any Homebase building (each building has a duplicate view on each side of the Homebase for your convenience), you can check the requirements for that upgrade to be possible. If the Upgrade button is grayed out, it means either you a) have not achieved prerequisite upgrades, or you b) do not currently have enough resources to complete the upgrade.
In order to upgrade the Royal Foundry, I must first upgrade the Composite Vault to L4, then I’m good to go.
Check the Upgrade status of your buildings one by one (as described above), tracing back to the next one that can be upgraded, and get moving. If you can help it, your worker drones should never be caught idle for long. Don’t forget to click the ✔ above the building once the upgrade timer has run out in order to complete the upgrade and unlock your next upgradeable building.
Credits
You’ll receive Credit rewards for certain actions within the game. Credits may be used to purchase resource packs in-game, but they can also expedite the upgrade process with any type of upgrade at your Homebase.
If you get impatient with early upgrades, Credits will go a long way early on, but you’ll quickly notice that longer upgrade times require more and more Credits, so use them wisely. A smart player may even wish to save up their Credits until they are in some kind of imminent danger, then spend them all for quick upgrades to catch the enemy by surprise and overwhelm them with sudden defense boosts.
Pro-tip: Start yourself off with an FTL boost by purchasing some Credits in the Gala Games store, which will be held ready in your account, allowing you to level up early and get a valuable head start over other players!
Building Fleets
There are two main types of ships you’ll want to start building on day 1: Flagships and Support Ships.
Flagships (or Capital Ships) are humongous, and regardless of type or faction, each of these behemoths will cost 4000 of each type of resource for every single ship. If you have the resource production to support the effort, you should crank out increasingly upgraded Capital Ships as often as you can through the three Foundries (Arbeiters, Royals and Garrison).
Support Ships are much smaller than Capital Ships. Support Ships are built in each faction’s Workshop, and they are typically built in large batches (hundreds or more at a time, with a limit that varies based on the level of the Workshop).
Harvesting with Your Fleets
I have 3 of 4 Fleets deployed. As long as I have my Homebase sufficiently defended, I should scrape together another Fleet for deployment, even before these ones return.
You’ll learn pretty quickly that because resources are needed for everything, your Homebase Extractors will only get you so far. Larger quantities of resources come mainly from the harvesting of Celestial Objects in your vicinity. You can harvest Celestial Objects outside your immediate vicinity as well, but remember that fleets can travel very slowly through the vastness of space. This is the main reason it’s so important to park your Homebase near some reliable resource mines.
More rare Celestial Objects allow more versatile harvesting and they can hold more players’ mining fleets at a time, but the busiest mines will also carry an increased risk of attack. Remember that everyone is after the same resources, and so everyone wants what you have. If they can defeat your resource laden fleet in a raid away from your Homebase, most players will jump on that opportunity.
If you find a versatile and open resource mine, go ahead and harvest it for everything it’s got, because you never know when the surrounding space will get crowded and resources scarce.
Day 1 Checklist
If you stay busy on the first day, you may find yourself in a favorable position as new players join throughout the first week, the first month and beyond. Once you’ve spent the initial first few hours upgrading and preparing your base, you can just check in every couple hours to maintain and assure your upgrades and deployments are going off without any hitches.
Upgrade buildings and collect resource rewards from tutorial.
Accomplish daily quest items.
Create a versatile collection of Capital Ships and plenty of Support Ships.
Focus on maximizing harvest and cargo capacity when sending ships to nearby planets.
If you have active deployments, keep a Peace Shield Handy, because you cannot Teleoprt with Fleets in travel.
Don’t forget to upgrade your Capital Ship Blueprints
Scrap old model Capital Ships in the Shipyard for additional resources.
Always harvest from your Extractors before they get full
Try to keep fewer resources than the protected amount allowed by your resource vaults.
Don’t go looking for fights on the first day.
Good luck out there, Commander! You’re gonna need it.
