Echoes of the Eye: A Strange New Adventure

Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye:

Echoes of the Eye: A Strange New Adventure

Echoes of the Eye: Owlelk and the Dreamworld

Echoes of the Eye: The History of the Eye as told by the Owlelk, Nomai, and Hearthians

Time to Beat Expansion: 14 Hours

Just last year Outer Wilds, by Mobius Digital, slotted itself between FromSoftware's Sekiro and Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire, for second place at Awkward Mixture.

As mentioned in a previous article, this year features a three way rematch featuring FromSoftware's Elden Ring, Obsidian's The Outer Worlds, and Mobius' Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye.

Read each review and see if you can guess where each will end up in the end of the yearly ranking, to be released on Christmas day.

Echoes of the Eye, an expansion to Outer Wilds, needs the base game, and a vague understanding of the mechanics, but can be played before, concurrently, or after the original content. The story of Echoes connects tangentially, resolving at the conclusion of the DLC. The experience explains minor mysteries that remain at the end of the base game.

The game opens with a warning about intense sequences. It offers a “Reduced Frights” setting. I experienced the intense sequences with normal settings and in reduced form. At the time I didn't notice a difference. Echoes of the Eye involves discovering the secrets of a new location in the Outer Wilds solar system. This review contains three articles, each of which correlates with a reveal from Echoes of the Eye. The first is a minor reveal that sets up the story. This article will discuss that and related topics. It will ease into the second reveal. The second reveal is more serious, but is unexplained and shrouded in mystery. It's a revelation that poses more questions than it answers. It, and surrounding events, will be the topic of the second article. The third and final article will examine the mind bending twist necessary for the conclusion. It's the key that unlocks the mysteries in Echoes of the Eye.

If, at any point, these articles inspire you to pick up Echoes of the Eye, I urge you to stop reading. Outer Wilds, and its expansion Echoes of the Eye, are wonderful games worth playing yourself. Only read the final article if you have no interest in playing it.

Regardless of whether the player has played the base game, they wake up at the normal spot; the campfire beside the lift to the spaceship. The museum on Timbered Hearth has a new exhibit. A visit leads to a newly built radio tower, also on Timbered Hearth. The museum and the radio tower inform the player of a new satellite photographing the solar system. An inspection of the satellite, and puzzling through the data in the radio tower, leads the player to a new location in the solar system, “The Stranger.”

This isn't a significant spoiler. This requires ten to twenty-two minutes. Previous readers or players will remember a key mechanic of the original Outer Wilds: the sun goes supernova every twenty-two minutes, killing the player and resetting the game. I've made this opening sequence sound simple, but at the time it felt directionless. The developer doesn't point the player toward these points. I've offered a path, without telling you how to solve any puzzles along the way. I'll continue to do that throughout the first two articles. Hinting at a general path, but leaving out details and puzzle solutions.

With the data, the player should be able to pilot their spaceship to a specific location, and see nothing. Nothing, as in, the player sees an invisible object that blocks seeing another object. A sort of invisible hole. It can only be seen, by seeing what it obscures. I'd forgotten how fun flying the spaceship is. Sadly, the trip from Timbered Hearth to The Stranger is the only time you'll experience this joy. Echoes of the Eye is a self contained expansion, entirely aboard The Stranger. The spaceship must remain in the docking bay. A serious disappointment.

Many elements of the original remain true. Exact timing is required for some events, like the ability to find and dock with The Stranger. Other events aren't exact, but have a broader range of achievable time. There are time sensitive events inside The Stranger, but they are few. In the Stranger time can be recorded as before the flood, and after the flood. Also, the sun still goes supernova. Fortunately, the flood always happens at the same time, and the supernova (which also always happens at the same time) warns the player with unique music. Unlike the ending of the original, the ending of Echoes of the Eye is not time sensitive, as long as you do it before the sun explodes. That reduces pressure on the player to hurry.

One gripe about the opening is its repetition. Even experts will require many cycles of life and death to solve the puzzle of The Stranger, and discover the path to the ending. Each rebirth places the player back on Timbered Hearth. They have to climb back into the ship, reset the autopilot to fly to The Stranger, and dock again. It is lore appropriate, but I wish Echoes of the Eye let the player restart in the docking bay of The Stranger after death.

As I played Echoes of the Eye I had to develop a method of thinking through the connections. I devised a terminology to remember locations, events, and items. Returning players will be glad to know that the spaceship still contains the Rumor system. It tracks information the developers deem relevant. It uses its own terminology to discuss Echoes of the Eye. I use terminology that differs from the Rumor system. I would have used the same system, but the player can only access the Rumor system on the ship. Since the player only uses their ship at the start of the cycle, they should be able to access the Rumors anywhere.

Echoes of the Eye occurs entirely aboard The Stranger. From the outside the station looks like a flattish 3d rectangle composed of solid metal. A simple puzzle obstructs the airlock. Inside the player discovers a self-contained ringworld. A single river runs through it, from top to bottom. As you stand on the ground, you can look straight up and see the river flowing on the ceiling, trace it down the wall to you, and then back up to the ceiling. Along its banks sit dilapidated structures, clustered into three centers, along with a massive dam. The Stranger seems large at first, almost unmanageable. After a few cycles the player realizes the river is contained in a narrow valley. There are hills rising up on the edges, dotted with vegetation, but there is no content there. The player travels along the river upon a raft controlled by their flashlight. The buildings are empty of sentients, but hint at a past civilization.

Each village contains a library with a projector and a few slide reels. Place a reel in the projector, and find a source of light. It can't be your flashlight. I was reasonably frustrated, because I couldn't figure out why the flashlight didn't fully light up the slides. Upon realizing the solution you'll be able to watch the reels at each location. Relevant data from each reel is stored in the Rumor section on the ship. The slides combine stylized pictures with bold colors that communicate details and emotions without words. The slides reveal the background details of the aliens (called Owlelk by the internet for obvious reasons); where they are from, why they are here, and what was going on. Inexplicably, some of the slides on each reel are burnt and unwatchable.

Initially each reel doesn't seem to advance the player's position. But reel leads to reel, leads to reel, leads to reel, and so on. Each reel reveals a fraction of the truth, leading to further clues. The information of reels builds on each other.

The early slides connect the expansion to the base game. One shows the aliens seeing the Eye of the Universe from a distant location. They build The Stranger and travel to the solar system. They build temples to the Eye. Upon further inspection they come to fear the Eye. They burn the temples down. They despair, and then, they do something odd. They light these strange lanterns and go into three builds, which I called Shrines or sleep rooms. They never come out. The details, and the player's understanding, is obscured by the burnt slides.

I can't fully express the beauty, the awe, and the emotion of the reels. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and that isn't often true, but here it is. The visual effects are resplendent and communicative.

The mystery of where the Owlelk went is one for the player to resolve. And woah, the first time you find the Owlelk, asleep, or are they dead? A chamber of sleeping aliens is eerie, because you don't know if they will wake. Or is it spookier to stand in a chamber of corpses? You don't know what they were doing, or why they all hold the strange lanterns with glowing green fire. And why is one bed empty! Is it wandering about somewhere?

The next question; how do I claim one of those lanterns? Echoes of the Eye labels them as Artifacts. A few are a few scattered across The Stranger. Unlike normal lanterns, they appear open to the air. Their shape combines a not fully closed circle, and a star. Armed with one, I wonder, can I put fire in it? A reel reveals a secret entrance into The Stranger, which leads to additional reels.

A locked testing room contains two chambers. Reels show a pair of experiments. In one, an Owlelk with a regular lantern sleeps at a green campfire. Nothing noticeable happens. But in a second slide, an Owlelk sleeps next to a similar fire holding an Artifact. Green fire fills the inside of the Artifact.

I took an Artifact, and went to join the aliens in their hidden slumber. Holding the Artifact I fell asleep at the fire. And woke up to WOAH!

The aliens are gone.