A three-unit squad, knockback positioning, and a stress sanity system that shape each run.
A new title I want to bring to your attention, debuting right now, is The Bell Echoes. A turn-based strategy RPG that just hit Steam in Early Access.
It comes from the developer publisher 七颗枚, and it leans into that SRPG feeling where story scenes and combat carry the same weight, then ties it to a roguelite run structure meant to stay replayable.
Combat is built around compact maps and dense turns. Fights play out on an 8-by-8 grid with a three-character squad, and each character can bring up to seven skills.
The game wants you to do a lot inside one turn, chaining movement and control into damage in a single sequence. Elevation and cover matter, and positioning is not just about reach. Knockback and collision are part of the damage plan, so you can turn a shove into extra payoff when you line enemies up with obstacles or each other.
It encourages “setup turns” where you create a lane for a chain attack, then “cash out turns” where you convert control into kills.
The Bell Echoes is built around run-to-run growth. Each run has you picking from talents and skill variants, plus equipment and gems, so your squad can tilt toward specific synergies. One character that pins targets and another that converts collisions into damage can carry a whole run if the third member patches the weak points, like mobility gaps or survivability.
There’s also a stress and sanity system. Combat drains more than stamina, and when stress hits the limit, the character can break into Despair or swing the other way into Meditation. Play too safe, and you might grind stress upward anyway. Play too greedy and you might spike into a bad state at the worst moment.
On the story side, it is set on polluted land tied to something called Project Black Needle, with the player caught between groups like the Imperial Army and marauders, plus the usual baggage of old allies.
Early Access already includes a chunk of playable narrative content. The developers say the current build covers the prologue plus Chapters 1 through 3, with three replayable roguelite maps tied to those chapters, six bosses, and close to forty enemy types.
There are five playable characters in the launch roster, unlocked through story progress. They expect Early Access to run about six to twelve months, and plan to expand with a pattern of new chapters, new characters, and new maps while they keep tuning balance and pacing.
The Bell Echoes is available in early access on PC via Steam.
