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2025 · Yellow Brick Games · Action-adventure · Adventure

Eternal Strands

Fight epic, towering creatures while blending magical abilities with an arsenal of powerful weapons to keep the world from crumbling in this third-person, action-adventure game.

Released: 28 January 2025
Platforms: PlayStation 5 Windows Xbox Series X/S
Genres: Action-adventure Adventure Fantasy
Developers: Yellow Brick Games
Publishers: Yellow Brick Games
Modes: Single-player
Perspective: Third person
Themes: Action Fantasy
Country: Canada
Age ratings: ESRB T PEGI 12 GRAC 15+CLASS_IND 12 ACB M USK 16
Languages: Chinese (Simplified), English, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish (Spain)
Time to beat: 19hmain story42hcompletionist

About

Eternal Strands is a 2025 action-adventure game developed and published by Yellow Brick Games. The game was released for PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S on January 28, 2025. It received generally positive reviews from critics.

›Story

Decades ago, the Enclave unexpectedly sealed itself away from the rest of the world. A once powerful center of magical wonders now lies dormant. After finding a way through the believed-to-be impenetrable barrier, a band of Weavers – powerful magic users who blend sword and sorcery to devastating effect – must peel back the mysteries of this lost land.

Play as Brynn, a young but fearless Weaver, determined to recover her people’s cultural home, in this third-person action-adventure game. Armed with powerful magical abilities and an arsenal of magical weapons, face enemies that range from humanoid constructs to towering beasts. Use the environment and temperature to your advantage in battles against a diverse roster of fantastical creatures, like turning a dragon’s fiery breath against ice-covered minions. Climb every surface and use arcane skills to create new paths. Explore the world in pursuit of the Enclave’s lost mysteries and challenge giant titans on your journey.

A realm of mystery, opportunity, danger, and wonder: the Enclave awaits.

Players say

Media

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Gameplay

Eternal Strands is an action-adventure video game played from a third-person perspective. In the game, the player assumes control of Brynn, a warrior who is on a quest to search for the secrets of a long-lost civilization known as the Enclave. The player has the ability to manipulate elements and temperature using a magical cloak. Freezing enemies can slow them down, while burning them cost them health.

The player's manipulation of temperature will also alter the game's world. Frequent usage of fire abilities will cause an area to become arid, and may result in fires that can spread rapidly in the game's vegetation. Brynn also has access to telekinetic powers, allowing her to perform feats such as hurling objects at enemies. These magical abilities can also be used for exploration.

Development

Yellow Brick Games was founded in early 2020 by Mike Laidlaw and several other developers from Ubisoft, in particular its Quebec studio. Shadow of the Colossus (2005), Dragon's Dogma (2012), and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017) and Tears of the Kingdom (2023) were important inspirations for gameplay, while European visual novels influenced the game's art style. With its physic-based combat system, the studio aimed to make players feel like they are a "fantasy superhero" while playing the game. The game was created with Unreal Engine 5, and the team had about 68 people.

Reception

Eternal Strands received "generally favorable" reviews from critics for the PC and Xbox Series X/S versions, while the PS5 version received "mixed or average" reviews, according to review aggregator website Metacritic. Fellow review aggregator OpenCritic assessed that the game received fair approval, being recommended by 61% of critics.

PC Gamer enjoyed the freedom elemental abilities offered to the player, writing that it felt "natural and improvised". Eurogamer praised the monster encounters in the title, comparing them favorably to Shadow of the Colossus and the Monster Hunter series. IGN criticized the combat, calling it repetitive and noting that many of the small monster fights didn't "evolve in a substantial enough way" throughout Eternal Strands' runtime.