Firefly201085
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Jul 19, 2020
- Messages
- 17
Attacking enemies is accomplished by making Ecco ram into them at high speeds. Swimming can be made progressively faster by tapping a certain button, and the speed can be maintained by holding it down. Players can perform a purely aesthetic spin in the air when jumping out of the water.
Two features of the gameplay are based on actual dolphin habits: one button causes Ecco to sing, allowing him to speak with other cetaceans and interact with certain objects. The same button is used for echolocation: holding it down causes the song to return, generating a map of the area. Several levels contain enormous crystals called glyphs, which respond in different ways if Ecco touches or sings to them. Some block paths, and a "Key-Glyph" must be found in such cases to pass. Others give information, and a few in later levels replenish health/air and give Ecco temporary invulnerability.
Additionally, Ecco, being a mammal, must surface periodically for air, or else find an air vent. If the "air meter" runs out, Ecco loses health rapidly, which represents drowning. His health is measured by a separate meter (above the air meter); it is depleted by enemies or when his air meter runs out, and it is recharged by eating fish, "singing" to clams, or, later in the game, singing to special statues or crystals called "glyphs". Ecco's song can be optionally upgraded at two points in the game: one upgrade allows Ecco's song to be used in combination with a charge as a long-range weapon, and the other temporarily disorients sharks and makes minor enemies freeze temporarily. Touching any enemy by any means other than an attack causes Ecco to sustain damage. The enemies range from seahorses to giant octopodes.
The game opens with Ecco, a bottlenose dolphin, as he and his pod are swimming in their home bay. A podmate challenges Ecco to a game to see how high he can jump into the air. When he is in the air, a giant waterspout forms and sucks up all marine life in the bay except Ecco, leaving him alone in the bay. Upon leaving the bay, Ecco swims around meeting other marine life including other dolphins who tell them they have felt the storm and the entire ocean is in chaos. An orca Ecco encounters tells him to travel to the Arctic to meet the "Big Blue," an old blue whale revered by marine life for its age and wisdom, who might be able to help him on his journey. Arriving in the Arctic after a long travel through the ocean, Ecco finds the Big Blue who informs the dolphin the storms occur every 500 years. Though the Big Blue doesn't know what causes the storms, he suggests Ecco find the Asterite, the oldest life form on Earth. He leaves the Arctic and travels to a deep cavern where he finds the Asterite. The Asterite greets Ecco telling him though it has the power to aid him, the Asterite cannot because orbs from its body have been lost. The Asterite tells him to go to the sunken ruins of the city of Atlantis, and use the time machine left behind by the Atlanteans.
Ecco travels to the sunken city of Atlantis, where he discovers an ancient library filled with Glyphs, giant crystals stored with information. From the library Ecco learns the origins of the storms, an alien race known as the Vortex lost the ability to produce food on their planet, so every 500 years when the planets align, they use their technology to harvest the waters of Earth. The Atlanteans fought a long war with the Vortex that ended when a beam struck Atlantis from space sending the city into the depths of the ocean. Learning this, he activates the time machine and travels 55 million years into Earth's past. While Ecco is in the past he learns an ancient song to communicate with a Pteranodon. Ecco locates the Asterite in the past but is immediately attacked by it. Forced into battle, he manages to dislodge a globe from it. This opens a time portal and he is sent back into the present. After receiving the globe, the Asterite grants him the power to turn his sonar into a deadly weapon against the Vortex, as well as the abilities to breathe underwater and to slowly regenerate lost health. The Asterite instructs him to use the time machine to travel back in time to the hour of the harvest. This time he manages to be sucked into the waterspout with his pod. Ecco is sent flying through outer space to a giant tube-like machine. Making his way through the construct Ecco arrives on the planet Vortex engaging the aliens in combat. He makes his way to the Vortex Queen and engages her in a fight. When the Queen is defeated she spits out Ecco's pod she ate and they make their quick escape back to Earth.
