Ex Astris, a turn-based 3D RPG announced by the studio behind Arknights

Publication date of the original Japanese article: 2021-09-15 14:39 (JST)
Translated by. Ryuki Ishii

On September 15, Chinese game developer Hypergryph announced their first premium game Ex Astris. The game will be available for iOS/Android, and it will be a one-time purchase game. Hypergryph describes the game as “an exploration of episodic narrative and 3D RPG gameplay.” You can check out the announcement trailer and the pre-alpha gameplay trailer below:

The game takes place in an alien civilization on a “tidally locked planet” and the protagonist from the earth is assigned there for an investigation. According to the official website, creatures are “rarely seen on this planet as polar nights and polar days coexist, but a highly advanced civilization exists and remains untouched by any foreign invaders.”

The wording of the FAQ tweet is slightly different between English/Japanese, and the latter version of the tweet has an additional information stating that the scale of the story won’t be unnecessarily large. Instead, Hypergryph explains that they see value in depicting “the small stories that takes place in the big world.”

The plot of the game will be “like a road movie about stories of the human investigator and her traveling friends on a journey across the planet.” The story is divided into multiple chapters, and it will unfold in linear fashion.

In terms of gameplay, Hypergryph is aiming to “build a turn-based combat system that occurs in real-time. Players can block, parry and set combo attacks to launch, fixing the target in the air and strike it down. Players can also employ customized skill combinations to defeat different enemies.”

According to the FAQ tweet, the developer is planning to include “cooking, alchemy, and nonlinear character progression” as well. FAQ also mentions that in addition to the two characters that are already announced, there will also be “4 upcoming characters available for the ally.”

Hypergryph is known as the developer of Arknights, a Free-to-Play tower defense RPG. Arknights is well received by players for its challenging gameplay, and we are curious to see how Ex Astris will turn out. As mentioned above, it will be Hypergryph’s first premium title.

The development of Ex Astris is still in the prototyping stage, and the release window is unannounced. The game is planned to support multiple languages, and in terms of platforms, Hypergryph explains that they “will first make sure it is playable on both iOS and Android devices.” For more information, check out the official website of Ex Astris.