Immortals of Aveum is Ascendant Studios’ debut fantasy FPS taking place on the fictional planet of Aveum and bringing players into a world filled with battlemages, dragons, and spaceships. In a time when the main shooter space is dominated by games like Call of Duty and Destiny, Ascendant and EA want to offer something new to players and deliver a bold, fresh IP, unlike anything they have seen before.
Game ZXC recently had the chance to sit down with game director and Ascendant Studios founder Bret Robbins to chat about some of the trailblazing games of the 90s that set the stage for Immortals of Aveum and how he intends to modernize the magic FPS. We also discussed the challenges of making a magic-based shooting system feel good when it doesn’t have the real-world frame of reference that something like Call of Duty does.
Immortals of Aveum Is A New Type of Magic-Based FPS
There has been a huge gap in shooter games over the past 20 years, now where titles like Hexen once stood. Shooters like it dominated the PC gaming scene with magic-based spells and tight, focused levels operating under a fantasy narrative. These days, however, games like Call of Duty, Battlefield, and Overwatch dominate the larger FPS scene with all their modern sensibilities and compelling, realistic gameplay. In the face of this shooter market, Immortals of Aveum almost feels like a return to that old-school style of game, as the main character Jak can be seen firing a slew of spells while traversing intricately designed levels, all within a story that Robbins says is something unique. We wanted to know if those 90s PC shooters originally influenced Immortals of Aveum and if it intends to build upon that legacy. As Robbins said,
Yeah, it’s funny. When I started to think about this game and started to pitch it to my friends, peers, or investors, Hexen would come up a lot because that's really the last time something like this at a big scale had been done. I personally don't entirely remember those games all that well, so I can't say they were a huge influence. I did try to bring in all the modern sensibilities of a premiere, awesome, and triple-A game into a fantasy magic shooter, so the combat system is very intuitive. I think it'll be familiar to shooter players, but we got a lot of new things on top of it to make it unique.
It seems like Immortals of Aveum is not directly influenced by games like Hexen but does intend to modernize the genre with triple-A sensibilities. Recent throwback games like Amid Evil have definitely done a lot to keep the old-school magic FPS alive, but are still--by their nature--throwbacks that do what they can to preserve retro sensibilities for new audiences. Perhaps Immortals of Aveum is that big-budget, natural progression of the old-school magic FPS if that genre had lived on to today. Still, despite not being directly influenced by those old games, it is hard to think of something like Immortals existing without the framework that those old-school PC games laid out for it so many years ago.
Making Immortals of Aveum Play Well Was No Easy Task
In keeping with those modern triple-A sensibilities that Ascendant is keen on bringing to Immortals, we wanted to know how the game actually felt to play. A shooter is nothing if it doesn’t feel good to shoot, and that is one of the big reasons why games like Call of Duty dominate the landscape right now. These games have refined their shooting mechanics for years and have real-life points of reference to take from. In contrast, it can be tough to make a magic-based FPS game that can live up to the same tactile feel that modern shooters do. Games like Skyrim have always been criticized for lacking a good punch, especially in their spells. Robbins says that Immortals of Aveum intends to change that. In his own words,
Robbins: It was really important for us to get the shooting to feel great because, you're right, a lot of times magic can feel soft; it can feel unresponsive. It doesn't have that relatability that an assault rifle or shotgun has. You're inventing something new. Certainly, when we started the early days of prototyping, we went down some roads that were a little more esoteric and a little more complicated. And you know, it didn't just feel that great off the controller, and I made a pretty deliberate decision in almost a year just to say, 'look, we have got to focus on making this a great feeling shooter first.' Once we do that, all these other crazy ideas we have, we can layer on top of it, but that core needs to be really, really strong. And that meant making the spells feel great.
There are some sort of gun equivalent spells in there, but there's also stuff that is different and new. We had to find our own rhythm as to how they were going to feel really impactful, and there are so many elements to that: the VFX, the sound, the feedback on the controller, and the way the enemies react to it and everything. We had to get all that right. We spent a good chunk of time as a team doing that, and when we came out the other side of that, I felt, wow, we've really got we've got something really strong here.
What intrigues us here is how Robbins said there are gun-equivalent spells in Immortals of Aveum. Recent trailers have showcased some of these spells, with a triple burst spell in particular spotted in the recent gameplay showcase, among other magic, like beams and shields. It still has a lot to prove, though, as the translation of real-life guns to a magic system isn't always perfect and can fall flat if done poorly. That said, Immortals of Aveum might be a game to look out for if it really can live up to the same shooter feel that its influences have perfected. A lot of this game does seem to be coming to life thanks to the use of Unreal Engine 5, offering cutting-edge visuals and graphical effects, which Robbins says he is extremely proud of. In a matter of months, fans will be able to get their hands on the game and see how it all comes together for themselves.
Immortals of Aveum launches July 20, 2023, for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S.
