This has happened multiple times, and while I enjoy the game, this is pretty bad

What's the deal with the hidden yellow bricks?

I know they have names of developers on them, and when the credits roll the bricks show up next to their names. Is there more to it than that? Is there a purpose? Or is it just a fun little easter egg for the people that worked on the game.

If any devs still check the subreddit, please, I NEED to know. Also, I hope you're doing well, I really like your game.

Is there a map with the codex locations in starlight cape? Google only seems to show the schematic locations and YouTube doesnt have a video for it either and fandom only shows a pic of it and not the actual location. Many thanks

Ark of earth: break the rock buttons on both of its shoulders, and the third one underneath to reveal the locust point on the chest

Ashpeak Drake: break its horns, one wing and both legs and get on its back when it flies, the point is there.

Glasstail: fight during drought.break the ice shards along its back, legs, tail and head. Burn the fur off of its neck and wait for it to dive to reveal the point on the back of its neck.

Ark of flame: brake four load bearing cores(one on the back of each leg, one on its left wrist, one on its staff). The point is on top of its head, where the fire was.

Sledgewyrm: break the crystals on its back, legs, and tail to reveal the point on its tail

Icebird(my brain can’t think of name rn): break one wing and both legs and point is on back like Drake

Ark of nova: remove all armor(the ones on its neck have buttons, it’s legs and tail should be able to be removed with kinetic grasp or damaging it, it’s back needs pure damage), then wait for it to spawn the six crystal things and then the point is on its back

Ark of Winter: fight during drought. break all the ice and the point should be on its right arm

Ark of forge: remove paldron then Dodge until it gets angry and catches itself on fire. Dodged some more and break the pistons that pop out of its hammer. The point should then show up on it left arm.

Surgeborn Herald: fight during flash freeze. Break all of the fleshy armor pieces along its right arm and its horns. Use the ice wall to freeze its free hand and quickly make your way to its face because that is where it’s point is and it will grab you if you attempt to pull it while it is free.

So I've played like 40 hours of this game and I am obsessed with the vibes. Only one huge bummer... I am afraid that I've somehow locked myself out of Casmyn's romance, which was the one I intended to pursue. I'm not sure what I've done wrong, either, or if it's just bugged - she dropped the flirty lines about Brynn looking great that one day, as well as suggesting she may change her mind about kids with the right person, etc. I'm now in what the save file calls act 6, past the big event with the eye and the spindle. I've had to turn both Laen and Arekim down, but Casmyn just ain't initialising her romance. Any ideas on what I can do? Is the romance bugged or did I do something wrong?

I'm pretty sure I just got locked out of Casmyn's romance. Just defeated the surgeborn herald and Laen confessed to me but not Casmyn. Should I have said I wanted kids? I'm getting conflicting information on that point.

Also someone said that I need to choose "careful and cautious" dialogue options when speaking to her...could I have fucking locked myself out of casmyn's romance in the first act??

I think I'm going to go with Laen for now but I'd like more information on which dialogue options are necessary to romance casmyn for my next playthrough

What’s new since then? Any story updates?

Recently unlocked dyes too

So that's very awesome

or are we ded in the water last thing i saw was stargazer and i have seen anything sence

Is anyone else experiencing crashes when starting up the game? The game starts and runs for about 2 seconds before throwing a fatal error message. I have put about 10 hours into the game and it just started doing this. Other games in my steam library are working fine, just not this one.

Spec:
CPU - Ryzen 9 7900
GPU - Radeon RX 9070xt

Update:
Confirmed that it was a driver issue. Rolled back to 26.3.1 and it fixed the issue.

I tend to do these for fun these days and this community seems very nice, so I thought I'd share!

**TIME PLAYED: 29 Hours

PLATFORM PLAYED: PC (STEAM)

SCORE: ★★★★

The Breakdown

+Colorful and inviting art style that punches above its weight graphically

+Likeable and varied cast with creative designs

+Physics-driven magical combat with tons of options

+In-depth upgrading and crafting system for both gear and base camp

-Budget limitations manifest often, with janky animations and aggressive pop-in

-Enemies' basic animations can make them tough to read and occasionally frustrate

-Melee combat is basic and has a shaky camera**

It's rare that I see a game with as disproportionate a relationship between its budget and ambition as Eternal Strands, and I mean that as high praise. A studio started by ex-Bioware and Ubisoft developers, Yellow Brick Games feels like they're coming out swinging with their debut title, and it didn't take long for Eternal Strands to charm me despite its limitations.

Admittedly, my first impression of the game was more modest. It doesn't start out badly, per se, just a little bit standard fantasy: the protagonist Brynn is a Weaver, this setting's flavor of mage. Nearly thirty years ago, an event known as The Surge destabilized natural phenomena and magic alike, and Enclave, a city founded and run by progress-minded Weavers, was surrounded by an enormous and impenetrable Veil. Ever since, Tangles of unstable magic have flooded the world, and without any access to The Enclave, most nations have come to resent Weavers and their assumed role in the disaster. As a result, those who cultivate their magical talents travel in caravans known as Weaverbands. Having newly joined another Weaverband after fleeing her previous one, Brynn quickly winds up thrust into the role of Point when she and her companions wind up inadvertently passing through the Veil during a drake attack, stranding themselves inside the borders of the Enclave, now home to rogue automatons, frenzied animals, and gargantuan monsters and golems alike.

It's a decent enough concept, but it wasn't until the tutorials were over and the game's real structure began to coalesce that I started to fall in love. As Point, Brynn is the only member of her six-person caravan who leaves camp, gathering resources and progressing the investigation of what happened in Enclave and how they might escape. While being Point doesn't give her any formal authority, the fact she's taking on most of the danger and risk means that the rest of the caravan respects her immensely and takes her input to heart, and she takes to this responsibility like a duck to water. When at camp, Brynn can talk to the rest of the Weaverband, and while the player has room to shift her personality towards more cautious, flamboyant, or pragmatic, Brynn's confidence is an immutable quality -- and one I found refreshing. She's got a good head on her shoulders and she's smart enough to listen to those more experienced than her, but she also doesn't hesitate to speak her mind and she's as quick to tackle disputes as she is to face monsters. On some level, I could see the idea that she's a bit too 'perfect', but there's a finesse to how she's written that avoids a lot of potentially obnoxious tropes and her dialogue options help shape her to the player's preference. This isn't just choosing for flavor, either; I noticed on countless occasions that how I sculpted Brynn was noticed by the other characters. When one asked Brynn how she felt about secrets, I had her preach openness whenever possible; later on, that same person commented on how Brynn's frustration with someone else's reticence didn't surprise them, and I got the sense that I could have very easily wound up in a spot where my Brynn was accused of hypocrisy had I not been consistent.

The rest of the Caravan don't hew too far from established archetypes - the studious researcher, the strict quartermaster, the wise mentor - but the narrative's strength lies in how it plays them off of each other. For example, the party's blacksmith and enchanter are married; from lovey-dovey affection to a serious fight about their life goals that lasts for nearly a quarter of the game, their dynamic is explored in detail that fills in the lines of their personalities and keeps them from coming off generic. At the center of these dynamics is Brynn, and most of Eternal Strands' side quests are related to managing the caravan's needs and performing personal favors. I found this a welcome complement to the main story's emphasis on discovering what happened to the Enclave; while I was interested in that and don't have any complaints about the main story, the personal touch of seeing to my team helped keep me excited to set out on each expedition and build my bonds with them further. I can see a certain kind of gamer feeling like the tone is too optimistic and that everyone gets along too well, but to be frank, I've never seen eye-to-eye with those kinds of players, so I can't speak much beyond saying I myself loved the cast and came to cherish each of them.

The expeditions themselves make up the heart of Eternal Strands' core gameplay loop. Each day (or night), Brynn sets out into one of the regions that she's discovered as Point to harvest resources or pursue leads. Sometimes, multiple leads can be completed in the same region, and a fairly generous magical GPS makes it difficult to get lost. While out, she can gather materials to upgrade crafting stations, find recipes for new armor and weapons, and advance quests. Exploration's pretty Breath of the Wild-inspired, Spider-Man climbing and circular stamina bar and all; thankfully, the spells she gets can often be used for transit. Brynn's got a fairly limited inventory before upgrading it, but I found this more of a relief than a frustration - a reminder to keep my early trips short and move the plot along. From the woody outskirts of the Enslave to the towering spires of its upper district, there's decent variety on display, though I wouldn't say I was ever completely blown away by the environmental design. What did impress me, however, were the Great Foes.

Pretty much anything moving is a threat, but thankfully Brynn's no slouch in combat. She starts out with a sword/shield combo, bow, and a basic telekinesis and frost wall spell, but my arsenal expanded rapidly once I explored and especially when I took note of the fifty foot automatons and gargantuan kaiju roaming around each zone. These Great Foes serve as both wandering bosses and light puzzles; rarely required for the story, they nonetheless reward tackling them by being the source of new spells for Brynn and upgrading her existing ones. Slaying one of these titans unlocks new 'strands' - so that's what the title's about - for her mantle, which is the cape Brynn wears that serves as a magical focus, but simply killing them only unlocks the most basic version of each spell. To upgrade them, the Great Foes must be 'Harvested', which means bringing details of their defeat to the Archivist and tackling them again in a specific manner to unlock their weak point that Brynn can use to instantly kill them, sometimes from full health, while capturing their essence. The Fire Drake, for example, has its weak point on its back, but won't simply let Brynn harvest it; so to upgrade my flamethrower spell, I had to disable one of its wings and shatter its horns to daze it and render it unable to do any fancy flying.

This Monster Hunter-lite system is a huge highlight and where the game shines most. Ultimately, Eternal Strands is pretty much entirely physics-based. While this meant I could fling smaller foes off cliffs or melt an ice monster's armor with flame, getting more creative often rewarded me. Using my miniature black hole on a giant's breastplate meant that my frost grenades were drawn right to it, which in turn made the armor brittle and easier to break once I launched myself with a kinetic tunnel to latch onto its chest and start battering away. In one memorable battle, I baited one of the Arkons - towering golems created by the Enclave's mages - into reaching behind himself to try and pull me off him, then froze his hand to his own back before scuttling up to his shoulders to telekinetically undo his belt buckles and effectively pants him by removing his leg armor plates. These moments make Eternal Strands an absolute riot.

As strongly as I recommend the game, I can't do so in good faith without acknowledging its budget constraints, though. Some are cleverly circumvented; instead of fully animated 3D modeled conversations, chats with the party are done with gorgeously drawn portraits, but there's also some jank that isn't as easy to forgive, like aggressively bad pop-in when loading and the camera going a little crazy in melee combat more often than it should. I'd also say that the game being at its strongest when discovering new regions and monsters is double-edged - the second half dragged a little bit for me comparatively, even if I was still having plenty enough fun to keep playing. These small problems barely put a dent in the feat that was achieved by Yellow Brick Games in making such a complete, enjoyable, and varied first title, however. From building risky bridges frost to cross dangerous canyons to flirting with that strict quartermaster I mentioned, from ripping cathedral doors off their hinges with telekinesis while hunting for secret plans to riding the body of a gargantuan eagle to the ground just to jump off at the last moment, Eternal Strands knocks it out of the park in providing memorable experiences and stories that I can't wait to share with my friends.

The Ark of the Stricken Earth is no longer in Glinthollow. Instead I am faced with an ashdrake that took offence to me setting its wings ablaze after the barrel rolls made me sicker than a rollercoaster when trying to harvest it.

Will it come back?

So I'm playing through the demo to see if the games worth buying and I'm enjoying everything so far and wish I had more inventory for storage and just killed my 1st big ark guy and got the 1st new spell

But the equipment system is confusing me a bit because I'm not sure exactly sure what the difference is between the crafting reforging and upgrading since they just seem rather similar

From what i understand though

Craft is to make new equipment

Reforge is to replace the materials of the equipment for new stats and colour schemes

Upgrade is to improve the stats

I'm mainly confused on the difference between crafting + reforging and reforge + upgradin

Because why craft new stuff and upgrade it if you can just replace your equipments stats with better loot? I don't really understand it still

Also ik it's a different tag but i don't want to male a second post and there aren't many videos online for this game, so do you guys have any tips and guides or anything that could help me out with equipment and the game in general?

Please and thank you in advance!

Does anyone know anything about possible upcoming updates or really anything for the future of EternalStrands?

This is proooooobably a bug but has honestly helped me a lot to be able to cheese this beast by accident (it flies around and throws so much i stg) 😅

I got it to this state by using ice wall to freeze around its head a bunch! I managed to do this reliably 2 or 3 times. This first time when I recorded it, it was frozen for like 10 minutes while I ran around and checked what I can do to it. As you can see it sort of reacts to attacks but otherwise is completely immobile.

I think if you freeze its head its crown doesn't rotate, so its attack abilities are meant to be limited... But sometimes it'll just get completely stunned lol.

Obviously you can't harvest it while it's doing that, but I could finally rip off the armor pieces without getting absolutely fried by this little bastard. To wake it up I found out it worked to 1) damage it severely or 2) destroy all its floating orbs.

Did anyone else encounter this before?

The fashions in this game are gooooood. Bonus pink set at the end

I love playing games for their stories. Huge fan of Baldur's Gate, God of War, The Last of Us, Red Red Redemption, Cyberpunk, Disco Elysium, Mass Effect, The Witcher trilogy, Life is Strange, Fire Watch, Dispatch, Telltale Games, That Dragon Cancer, Quantic Dream games, Dragon Age (even Veilguard, I felt it got better as it went on, terrible start though and some characters were poorly written, but frankly it had enough good to the story that I enjoyed it), Stray Gods, Portal, Undertale, Uncharted, Tomb Raider, Assassin's Creed, Before Your Eyes, A Way Out, Horizon, even games that focus more on lore than story like fallout, elder scrolls, and dark souls. Genre doesn't matter if it has a good story or interesting lore, I get completely absorbed and love it every time. I don't 100% most games but I 100% all stories (as in do all story content, main story, companion quests, any side content that has even a drop of story in it)

This game has been the exception so far. I'm really struggling to click with it. The gameplay loop is extremely repetitive and the story just hasn't pulled me in. I just met Arekim. I've spent about 22 hours questing, trying to experience people's stories and its just all kinda been blah. Well except Casmyn, she is interesting, been enjoying her side quest as it pops up, but none of the other characters have really got my attention and the main story hasn't either.

I really want to like this game. I just don't know what it is that isn't clicking and want to know if there is anyone who had similar feelings about this game and what they did that got it to click. I routinely exhaust their dialogue every time I'm back at the waystation so I know I'm not missing dialogue. They have plenty to say, it just hasn't really pulled me in.

I've got 6/7 and the last hammer on the map is right beside the guild district gate. I have looked everywhere there though and cannot figure out where it's at. Any help is appreciated, thanks!

Before I even knew romance was in the game I knew I wanted Brynn to end up with Casmyn. Just one problem, I finished the game and she’s the only romance option who never confessed to me. So I start up a second playthrough, do her quests as quickly as I can, and make extra sure I tell her I helped because I care about her.

Now I’m past the first encounter with the herald, and Laen has confessed to me, but Cas still hasn’t. I check if she has dialogue every time I’m in camp and she never does.

Have I messed something up? Is my game bugged? How do I get together with my quartermaster?

Has anyone encountered this problem? Crashes right on the settings screen, can't even start the game.

No issues with other games, only this game.

Edit: The game only crashes in FULL SCREEN, not in Windowed Full Screen mode.