Looking at the game – with its high difficulty, slow combat, red health bar and green stamina metre – Eitr has certainly taken its fair share of inspiration from the Dark Souls series.
“The idea was originally to blend elements from games like Souls and Zelda,” Wright explains. “We were also trying to blend things from the RPGs we love like Diablo, Lineage and Path of Exile. It’s a mix of all the games we enjoyed.
"Dark Souls is my personal favourite game of all time and Eitr expresses that clearly. That game shines through when it comes to Eitr’s inspirations. In the last five or ten years, Dark Souls has had a huge influence on the industry, especially on indie studios. The systems that [Souls studio] From Software designed in the game are very old school and we indies love old school games.”
Harper adds: “A lot of releases that you play these days hold your hand. Having that feeling of playing a game where you are not being led anymore and that challenges you is reminiscent of the old school games.
“That’s why it has such a strong influence on us especially because we wanted to make a game that would challenge even us, rather than something that you can play on autopilot. We wanted players to focus on what they are doing. A lot of old games like Mega Man required a lot of focus. We wanted to basically make a game we wanted to play.”
