It was only two weeks ago that the upcoming Immortals of Aveum was officially revealed and announced to launch on July 20, 2023. Fans of fantasy games and first-person shooters should be happy to know that Immortals of Aveum is a mix of both genres with a scoop of sci-fi fixings added to the mix. It was developed by a team of veteran game developers at Ascendant Studios in partnership with EA, and one thing that is becoming clear about the game the closer it gets to launch is how unique its whole premise is.
In an interview with The Best War Games, the CEO and game director of Ascendant Studios, Bret Robbins, sat down with us to talk about his narrative inspirations for the game, the gameplay influences behind Immortals of Aveum, and how the game ties everything together to make something unique. With a team that has worked on massive projects like Dead Space, Call of Duty, and Telltale’s The Walking Dead, we were curious about where the creative spark that launched Immortals of Aveum came from and how the team is launching a brand new IP.
Immortals of Aveum Is Something New in The Fantasy Genre
Before becoming the founder of Ascendant, Robbins already had a rich history of working with some of the most influential and beloved studios of the past 20 years. Some of his earliest projects include Gex on the PS1 and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King for the PS2 and GameCube. More recently, Robbins worked with Infinity Ward before that team shipped Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and has also worked with Visceral Games on the original Dead Space. With such a stacked history of great games in his portfolio, it made us wonder what the creative spark behind Immortals of Aveum was and why it led him to leave the oftentimes safe triple-A space and pursue a risky new IP. In his own words,
The spark really came from my time working on Call of Duty, actually. I had been thinking a lot about a fantasy shooter or magic shooter, and being in that sort of shooter world for nine years, looking around and just going like, “Well, why isn't anyone making something like this in a fantasy genre?” And not hearing about any game like that coming out. No game like that had been made for something like 15 or 20 years. I just got really excited about that idea.
It is true that the last time gamers were treated with a true big-budget magic-based FPS was around 15 or 20 years ago. Back in the 90s, games like Hexen or The Wheel of Time tie-in game were quite popular, mostly on PC, before dying out in the mainstream as games like Medal of Honor and eventually Call of Duty scratched that shooter itch. More recently, retro revivalist games like Amid Evil have kept the spirit of the fantasy shooter genre alive, but there is still a gap in the market for a big-budget magic FPS like the one Robbins is talking about. A gap Immortals of Aveum is set to fill, he says. However, standing out from the crowd in a shooter market that is becoming increasingly full can be difficult. Ascendant Studios intends to deliver something new.
What we ended up making with Immortals is not a fantasy Call of Duty. It's something quite a bit different, but that sort of spark of a fast-paced, cinematic shooter set in a fantasy world where you're using magic instead of guns just really grabbed me during that time. I had a good friend who was also an investor, and he got really excited about it too. So five years ago, in 2018, we founded the company, and it was off to the races.
Immortals of Aveum Takes Its Influences and Makes Something Unique
Going back to the rich history that Robbins has with both sci-fi and fantasy games, we were also curious about the narrative influences that led to the final product that is Immortals of Aveum. Robbins was keen on telling us that this is a story-first game–separate from the current live service games like Destiny that have a more MMO-lite focus.
I think what happened was that I had a period after I left Sledgehammer where I was able to really sit, write, and think about the world, the game, the pillars, the combat system, and the storyline. I wrote for about four months, just thinking about all those things.
In broader pop culture, sci-fi and fantasy are more popular than ever as properties like Dune, Star Wars, and Lord of the Rings have received huge television shows, games, and movies in recent years, all to a great deal of success. Given this explosion of fantasy and sci-fi, we were curious if any of that factored into the rich narrative that Immortals of Aveum is planned to have.
It's hard to avoid something like Star Wars. I t's in all of our DNA at this point, especially when I was growing up. There's some of that; there's maybe some of Doom, some of BioShock, some of Call of Duty, some of God of War. T here was just a lot, and there were a lot of different pieces. This was also my first real opportunity to run my own studio and make my own game, so I think I wanted to put in a little bit of everything–you don't get that opportunity very often. It's quite a mix of different things, of different pieces, which ultimately makes it its own unique thing.
Namedropping massive games like Doom, BioShock, and God of War certainly puts Immortals of Aveum in a place where it has a lot to live up to. All three of those titles are some of the best in their class and are more or less the blueprint for modern triple-A games. As our interview progressed, Robbins also said that the game has Metroidvania elements and becomes something truly unique in its mixing of genres and influences. How Ascendant manages to bring all of these influences together in a cohesive and meaningful way to give Immortals of Aveum an identity and deliver a new type of magic-based FPS will be something fans will have to wait and see.
Immortals of Aveum launches July 20, 2023, for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S.