Building Return Echo

Return Echo started as a 2D space trading game, but it has slowly become something stranger and more interesting.

The big idea is that information matters.

Ships do not magically know everything. Stations act on reports. Radio messages take time to travel. Rumours may be wrong. AI does not act on truth — it acts on belief.

That is the game I am trying to build.

This week's focus

The recent work has been about cleaning up the architecture so the simulation can support that idea properly.

• Player control now points at an object identity rather than a special player-only entity.
• GUI state is moving towards snapshots rather than global events.
• Station views can be driven by state rather than hard-coded screen handling.
• Bubble logic is becoming a proper representation system instead of a hack around the player.

What I learned

The game feels better when systems do not shout at each other. A request is created, a queue carries it, an execution phase mutates state, and a snapshot tells the view what changed.

That pattern is becoming the backbone of Return Echo.