Eldest Souls is a new game coming towards the end of July, developed by Fallen Flag Studio. The game is a pixel art boss rush inspired by games the caliber of Dark Souls, Demon's Souls, and more within the Soulslike family. Game Rant spoke to Francesco Barsotti and Jonathan Costantini over email about Eldest Souls, which makes up the first portion of this interview; the second part is the transcript from the hands-on gameplay demo with the developers.

There's a certain allure to Eldest Souls for all Soulslike fans and players who look for challenging games, and Fallen Flag Studio is happy to deliver just that. Plus, there's an incredibly deep build customization system in the game that will please RPG and MMO fans alike. Both the email transcript and the demo transcript have been edited for brevity and clarity.

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Fallen Flag Studio Interview

Q: What is the origin of Fallen Flag Studio? Why the name Fallen Flag?

Barsotti: John and I went to high school together, and most of the time we were pretty bored during lectures. One day, we decided it might have been cool to make games for a living. We sketched some logos and names on a piece of paper and Fallen Flag Studio is what stood out to us. From what I remember, most of them didn’t sound good in English. We came up with the name thanks to World of Warcraft. I believe we played a lot and I remember thinking it would be cool to have the animated logo in the middle of a battlefield with fallen soldiers and just one torn flag standing.

Q: Why did you choose Eldest Souls as the game's title?

Barsotti: As we mentioned above, there isn’t an in-depth explanation, except "we thought it sounded cool." I think we had a couple of variations that sounded cooler to us but didn’t make too much sense in English, so we stuck with Eldest Souls. "Elden Ring" was not yet announced when we settled on a name, so we thought "Eldest" would be different enough from the Demon's Souls/Dark Souls series. "Eldest" was a reference to the plot of the game, and for the "Souls," we wanted to obviously attract the Soulslike audience, since we are big fans of the Souls series and the Soulslikes that have come out so far, and thought our game would strike a similar chord.

Eldest Souls coming to Next-Gen Consolesa

Q: What is the story behind how Eldest Souls came to be?

Costantini: Originally, we thought the game would just be a passion project while we finished our studies, so we simply sat down and asked ourselves: "What would be our dream game to work on?" Eventually, the game grew into a demo, and had such a positive and enthusiastic response at various events, that we decided to work harder on it. Soon after we found a publisher, and were able to pause our studies and go at it full-time. I believe we’ve been beyond lucky to have the chance to work on something we loved so much as our first job in the industry.

Q: Why did you choose Eldest Souls, specifically, as your first game?

Barsotti: Eldest Souls started as a student project. John and I were both going to University and decided we would start something that we could use to play and learn at the same time without getting bored. We decided to throw in things from all the different games we have played so far, from MMOs to Action RPGs, to Retro games. Making games is a massive endeavor and we thought making a single-player boss rush would have been an "OK" challenge. It turned out to be pretty hard nonetheless.

Q: What were the sources of inspiration for your work?

Costantini: I don’t think any game has had as big an impact on me as Demon's Souls. It felt like a tiny revolution in the gaming world, and it truly spawned its own genre of games over the years. The whole Souls series has been a huge inspiration, but we took more from games such as Titan Souls and Furi, and our favorite books, Mangas, and movies.

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Q: The main character seems to have some of Guts' traits. Was Kentaro Miura's work on Berserk an influence on Eldest Souls?

Barsotti: I mean… I think we made it pretty obvious we are both HUGE fans of Kentaro and we were very sad about his passing this year. Berserk has been the inspiration for a whole genre, from other stories, comics, Mangas, and games (like the Souls series itself). I really hope more people will find his work (especially the ones that are passionate about Dark Souls and lore), it’s a masterpiece.

Q: The story trailer is very interesting. How do the Moon's shards work? Can you tell me more about the lore of the game?

Costantini: It’s always hard to speak about lore since we’re huge fans of the Souls series' "fragmented" storytelling, and we hope each player will make up their own mind about the history of the world. To keep it brief, the Moon’s shard brought many things to the world, some say Gods, some say Men, but it surely brought life, strife, and change.

Q: What was the world-building process like for you from a development standpoint? Is the world of Eldest Souls similar to Earth?

Costantini: As first-timers, it was a very rough process. We began with an overall story arc of the world, describing the centuries of history ahead of the player, and then slowly hand-picked which bits and clues we wanted to spread across the game world. The world shares some similarities with our Earth, as kingdoms rise and fall, men lust for power and look for comfort in faith, but there’s obviously a huge "fantastical" element within it, with manifest Gods walking among Men, arcane artifacts, and materials, and dark mysteries buried deep beneath.

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Q: The possibility for players to build characters the way they want seems very intriguing. How impactful is this system? Which are your favorite combinations?

Costantini: Our customization system is kind of a mash-up of all the elements we loved from our favorite games. Players gain "talent points" when defeating bosses, which can be spent in our Talent Tree. The Tree has 3 branches that then branch out into two more, and then each individual branch has a multitude of different choices, so as you can imagine there’s quite a lot of variety. The Talent tree forms the base of the progression, but on top of it, there are the "Shards," dropped by the fallen Old Gods. Shards embody the power of each God, and they can be used actively, kind of like a spell, or "infused" into your base actions, granting passive effects and abilities on top of your kit.

Those two systems combined (Talents and Shards) grant a large variety of builds, progression, and customization for players. Personally, one of my favorite combos is Windslide (A branch all about quick dashes and mobility) infused with the Deer God Shard (A shard all about sacrificing your HP for insane buffs). This combination allows you to use your Windslide multiple times while sacrificing your HP with each use. It keeps you on the edge, as any hit from an enemy could be fatal, while granting insane mobility and damage.

Q: Are there secret encounters or areas in the game? What kind of progression system did you choose for the game?

Costantini: There is kind of a "surprise" encounter (we’d rather not spoil too much), but most of the "secrets" are in the form of items and quest-lines, and mostly reward players with lore about the World, although there might be some... special rewards for seeing a quest-line through. The progression in the game is rather straightforward, as at its core Eldest Souls is a Boss Rush. Defeat the Old Gods, discover new paths, and continue your adventure. Unlike most Boss Rush games, however, there are also plenty of side zones, items, NPCs, and questlines, allowing the players who wish to know more about the world to take their time and explore the Citadel.

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Q: What is your favorite feature in the game and why?

Costantini: Besides the bosses and the world setting, probably the character customization. I really like how there’s a lot of options when it comes to builds, with the Talent Tree providing your overall focus, and then being able to customize it further by infusing the Boss Shards into the various slots. I feel like Character Customization is something boss rush games often skip and I hope ours is a nice addition to the game.

Q: Bosses are a big deal in Eldest Souls, but which ones do you think stand out the most, be it in terms of how challenging they are, art style, or else?

Barsotti: I think I have an affectionate attachment to The Guardian. It was one of the first bosses we made, and the one I spent most of my time on since. I made the whole sprite sheet set for the pre-alpha version that we were presenting at events before we managed to meet United Label and secure a budget to hire artists. It went through all sorts of reworks, we redid the scripts 3-4 times over. This might be cheesy, but I think in a way it symbolizes the challenge in Eldest Souls, if you keep failing, even if it keeps turning out wrong or bugged you keep trying until you make it, and the satisfaction is in a way proportionate to the struggle you put in.

Costantini: For me, it has to be Azikel, God of Light. He was one of the first bosses we worked on and was supposed to be a step-up in difficulty, as players came from the introduction zone of the game. And what can I say, I think we delivered. Azikel has an insane move set, can teleport at will, and combines a series of lightning-fast melee and ranged attacks, and of course lasers, lasers, lasers. It’s always a blast seeing new players face him for the first time, and it is really a “skill-check” to progress further in the game.

Q: Speaking of art style, why did you choose to make Eldest Souls a pixel art game?

Barsotti: We always loved pixel art, I like that it is so minimalistic sometimes, and even if you are using the same medium, most pixel games look very very different. It was easier for us to use pixel art since it was something we could learn quickly (we were, and are, both programmers), and even if some commissions don’t turn out to be perfect we can open the files and make them fit in, in general, I’d guess it has also fewer steps than making a 3d game with models, textures, etc.

eldest souls soulslike boss

Q: What are your plans for the future? Do you have more games in mind or would you rather expand Eldest Souls?

Barsotti: It’s too early to say as this is our first release, so we will be following it closely. We’d love to expand on the Eldest universe, but of course, a big part of that decision will come from players' reception at release. After developing Eldest Souls, we both got an itch for the next project to have some co-op and online functionality, so we will try to come up with something that we can play with friends, and have some fun while developing. You can keep an eye out on Twitter or join our Discord channel where I and John are online pretty much 24/7.

Q: How do you feel about the game finally releasing in July?

Barsotti: It feels awesome, this was a crazy journey as we didn’t know what we were doing (we still don’t, I think) and we were so busy chasing after the next task and making things work the way we wanted. I’m not even sure how we got here in one piece, but here we are. As chaotic as it was though, I enjoyed it, it worked for us at least. If you’re interested in checking out the game, you can find more information or add it to your wishlist here.

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Eldest Souls Hands-On Demo Interview

Q: Where is the first part of the game set?

Barsotti: You're landing in an area called The Citadel, which is a prison for the Old Gods. You're here to understand what is happening to the world around you because it is dying, nature is dying.

Costantini: Being big fans of Dark Souls, the story in Eldest Souls is told in bits and fragments. There are lots of those to be found around while exploring, and it is up to the players to find them to understand what is really going on.

Q: Is this a sort of tutorial area?

Barsotti: Yeah, the trunks are there to teach you how the immunity frames work while dashing, which is very similar to Dark Souls' rolling. You have these three stamina bars, and dashing consumes one of them. Stamina in our game is not used to attack, and if you use the immunity dash to avoid an enemy's attack stamina will charge up faster.

Costantini: Also, you just found a lore entry, and earlier you picked up a few items. You can open the inventory to check them out, and look for the menu called Key Items. Some of these items provide players with bits of lore from the world of Eldest Souls, but there could also be some quests tied to them, stories and such that are tied to certain NPCs. This is to help you progress through the story, and some of these can become available if you finish some of the storylines.

Q: Are there more weapons to find in the game?

Costantini: No. The sword you're carrying is the only weapon in the game because it is inherently special, but combat can be customized in other ways. There are two systems to do so: the first is a talent tree, and the second we call "Shard Infusion."

eldest souls path of exile

Q: Is this the first boss?

Costantini: Yes. This boss is heavily tutorialized to teach you the mechanics and stuff, but make sure to be careful anyway because it deals a lot of damage. This is because we want to send the right message to players about what the game is going to be like from here on.

Barsotti: The main combat mechanic in our game is Bloodthirst, which is the big red bar just below the life bar. You can fill that by dealing damage with charged attacks, which can be done by holding X while using a controller.

Costantini: Yeah, you can see your red bar is glowing when you make charged attacks. When it's all red you have lifesteal, you deal more damage, and attacks charge up faster. You still have to be careful about being hit, because bosses have much more life than you and they also deal more damage. Then there's Bloodburst, with which you can deal tons of damage, but it requires the whole bar to be filled up. It's up to you to decide if you want to use it and lose the buff or keep it.

Q: How long have you been working on the game?

Costantini: That's a tough question because we never really considered it a job for the first year and a half, or at least something we worked on part-time because we were studying at uni and we didn't think it was going to become our job but rather a hobby. It's almost three years now with United Label, maybe 2 years and a half.

Barsotti: Our first year we wanted to work on something to learn how Unity worked and game design in general to work on something that we like playing. That's how Eldest Souls came to be, and then we started taking part in events, the first of which was in Bologna, Italy, called "Svilupparty." It was a small and yet very fun event, with something like 20 or 30 developers and around 60 people total. There was also Max Schaefer, the developer of Diablo 2.

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Q: What does beating bosses do?

Costantini: It provides you with a talent point that you can spend on the talent tree. There are three branches: Windslide, Berserker Slash, and Counter, and that's the starting point for building your character. Windslide grants the ability to shoot projectiles that deal a lot of damage on their own, and then you have a slide which you can use to slice and dice through enemies to deal plenty of damage while also being very mobile, as you can avoid colliding with enemies and keep moving quickly.

Berserker Slash is the one that deals the most damage, but it kind of requires you to be close to enemies and attack quite frequently in order to keep a new buff up, called Berserk, which improves your damage if you can keep it up. Counter is the most defensive one, but it also is the most difficult to use I believe. A bit like Dark Souls' parry, you have to use it before you're hit or it won't work and you'll deal no damage.

Q: Was there a crusade against the Gods in the lore of Eldest Souls?

Costantini: Yeah, the Gods were basically overlords of humanity and the crusade happened to slay them or at least imprison them.

eldest souls

Q: Are there hidden items throughout the game?

Costantini: I think there's stuff like that in a couple of instances, but it's not something that happens very often throughout the game.

Q: Is this the second boss fight?

Costantini: Yes, this is what we call the real first boss of the game because the Watchdog, who you defeated earlier, we believe is still linked to the tutorial of the game. This boss, the Guardian, is a much tougher one to kill and we made it on purpose a sort of skill wall so that players can't beat him until they manage to learn all the skills and movements you can use. The Guardian has plenty of life, base damage dealt, and life pool. In terms of aesthetics, our collaborators immediately nailed the feel of each boss.

Barsotti: Exactly. We wanted the first two bosses to look more like classic bosses from other similar games so that players could gradually adapt to our top-down view. Sometimes it's hard to figure out the spacing, and so we wanted them to be more straightforward. We do have some strange, crazy bosses too as the game progresses.

Costantini: Maybe this is a good time to mention it, but in the demo, you're playing we also have a mode called "Arena Mode," which allows you to fight any of the game's bosses. In the final build of the game that's unlocked by completing the game once, while in the demo it's free from the get-go. We also have a new game+ system, but we don't simply have improved stats on each boss, and they also get new moves, new mechanics, and new stuff to make the fight different. By playing the Arena Mode and defeating a boss, its new game+ version is unlocked as well, so you can go and try that one too. We wanted to capture that feeling of struggle when you keep failing against a specific boss, but also that sense of gratification when you finally succeed.

Barsotti: In the previous builds of the game we didn't even have lifesteal available, and thus the bosses had to deal much less damage because players usually make at least around 10 mistakes in a fight, so it had to be a bit forgiving. We didn't like that because fights lasted too long, and then if players managed to get the boss under 30% remaining life or something like that without being hit, they could play more mindlessly until they killed them. The addition of lifesteal allowed us to make fights more dynamic.

Q: Has anyone been able to have deathless runs?

Costantini: I don't think any of our testers tried that, but a few months back we had a contest with the first three bosses only, and the task was not to be hit at all. Some players were successful, so I do believe there could be deathless runs when the game is released.

Barsotti: Even speedruns with the first few bosses were extremely quick, with players killing the Watchdog and the Guardian as well within something like 2-3 minutes.

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Q: Was Dungeons and Dragons ever an inspiration for the game?

Costantini: I never played DnD, but I did play a similar game called Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, so that may have been a source of inspiration.

Barsotti: I played lots of RPGs online, and not all of them were fantasy games. While growing up I was more into fantasy, with stuff like Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, but then I grew fonder of sci-fi.

Costantini: Yeah, same. Up until a year ago, I was more into fantasy, but now I'm learning to love sci-fi too, like, Asimov and other classics.

Q: Was there a boss you had concepts for but didn't make it into the final game?

Barsotti: Yeah, there was this sort of huge necrolord with minions spawning around and stuff, and it had tons of mechanics to deal with. We didn't deem it fun, though, and so we ended up not including it in the final build.

Q: Which are your favorite games?

Costantini: Furi and Titan Souls, obviously, in terms of boss rush games. I played lots of MMOs as well, like World of Warcraft, EVE Online, League of Legends, Path of Exile, and such. I am eagerly waiting for Elden Ring to come out.

Barsotti: I played a lot of MMOs as well. World of Warcraft was one of the best, I would say, especially for PvP players. Lately, I've been playing a bit of Guild Wars as well, which I didn't touch in a while. As for single-player games, I particularly liked the Devil May Cry series, and especially so the second, the third, and the fourth game.

eldest souls

Q: How do you feel about the release of the game and its reception?

Costantini: I am not sure how to feel, honestly. I mean, we participated in a few live events and the game was always well-received, especially by Soulslike fans. However, we're a small studio, and players thinking this is a sort of Dark Souls 4 or something like Elden Ring should keep their expectations in check.

Q: Did the pandemic have an impact on the development of the game?

Barsotti: Not really. We were already accustomed to working online, remotely, so it didn't really change anything in those regards.

Costantini: Probably the main impact was that we couldn't take part in live events, which we always liked. It was great to see people playing our game and hear their feedback, whether it was good or bad.

Q: Is there anything else you want to add?

Costantini: I don't think we had a chance to talk about the Infusion system. There are these Shards you get when you beat the Guardian and the other bosses after that, and these shards are a physical manifestation of their powers. What's interesting about the Shards is that you can use them actively like spells or skills, or else you can Infuse them in your basic actions like your dodge, your melee attacks, and such.

Based on the boss who dropped the Shard, the Infusion process changes how the skill or action works. This system, together with the talent tree, makes up for tons of different playstyles and combinations. We think it's sort of unique when it comes to boss rush games, where progression can feel somewhat absent. It's not too dissimilar from Path of Exile, for example.

Eldest Souls releases on July 29, 2021, for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

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