Towers of Aghasba: Everything We Know

The 2023 PlayStation Showcase event was the gift that kept on giving. It revealed plenty of upcoming titles, updates, new accessories, and more. Some announcements were to be expected, like Marvel’s SpiderMan 2’s gameplay, which is rumored to release sometime later this year. Others were complete surprises we didn’t see coming. Take the Towers of Aghasba, for example. This is an upcoming open-world builder that received its first reveal trailer at PlayStation Showcase 2023. While so much remains a mystery, here’s Towers of Aghasba: Everything We Know about the story, gameplay, release date, and more.

What is Towers of Aghasba?

Towers of Aghasba is an upcoming open-world builder game confirmed to launch sometime in 2024. An indie video game studio, Dreamlit Games, is currently developing Towers of Aghasba. To quote the studio’s words, they describe Towers of Aghasba as a “unique open world,” where players will get to “experience an upcoming open-world builder unlike any other.”

Story

For now, we don’t have much of a story to go on. All we know is that players will explore a fantasy island. Here, they’ll be free to rebuild their version of civilization. Additionally, players will restore exotic ecosystems, presumably as they see fit. Overall, Towers of Aghasba seems to focus on survival in a world overrun with monsters. 

It gives you tools to build fortitude and resources to set traps or spin windmills. Unpredictable gameplay, like stampedes, will be there. All along, you must keep the fragile ecosystem alive. It’s shaping up to be an immersive adventure we can’t wait to sink our teeth into.

Gameplay

According to Dreamlit Games, Towers of Aghasba is a game that allows you to “rebuild your civilization and restore exotic ecosystems on your own fantasy island.” From that description, we can speculate that players will keep busy with plenty of exploration of an open world, traversal mechanics, gathering resources and collectibles, and crafting useful items like weapons and utility buildings.

On a “Towers” poster, the name Dreamlit Games planned to use before changing it to “Towers of Aghasba”, they highlight, “explore,” “build,” “defend,” and “together” as the core gameplay elements players will engage in post-release. Additionally, the reveal trailer helps to iron out a few details about the gameplay. It seems that Towers of Aghasba will be an RPG, where players are able to control a character in the game. The main character, whom we assume to be the protagonist, is seen gliding through the sky on the back of a whale. 

This is definitely a fantasy world that behaves differently from ours. Early release footage shows monster creatures with one eye and people wearing masks. In fact, Dreamlit Games held a mask fan art contest with as many as over 250 submissions turned in. We also got a sneak peek at some of the towers featured in the game, including some Star Wars theme park concept art. There will be creatures players can tame and mount. Giant skyfish Underwater habitats. You can grow and harvest plants. Or, customize characters with artifacts like masks. It’s a survival game with monsters and lots of gardening. I absolutely can’t wait.

Development

According to Twitter user, Khang Le, the development of Towers of Aghasba started way back before the development of the free-to-play, multiplayer, mech, first-person shooter game, Hawken. While Hawken was released in 2012, Le claims that Towers of Aghasba's crude, unfinished concept art was already at full speed as early as 2009. Specifically, how the protagonist in the reveal trailer glides on sky whales. He recalls how great it is to see that concept art turn into an actual gameplay moment in 2023.

Fun little history of Towers development. This crude unfinished concept art was made in 2009 before Hawken development. The glide onto sky whales finally becomes a gameplay moment in 2023 😅#skywhale #towersofaghasba #towersgame #gameprototype #conceptart #sidetracked #hawken pic.twitter.com/82X01BEYdq

— Khang Le (@KhangLe48675796) May 27, 2023

The transference of conceptual art from so early on into the sight to behold in the reveal trailer is truly a work of art. No doubt it’s largely thanks to the game running on Unreal Engine 5. Dreamlit Games confirms that Towers of Aghasba now runs on Unreal Engine 5, highlighting how the light bounces make the game look so much better. Dreamlit Games constantly updates its fans with the progress in development so far. Case in point, Saiprapanch Adloor’s tweet in April 2022 about some of the concept art, like plants doodled and their growth over time. These give fans a peek into the creatures and surroundings they can expect to see in the open-world game, “Towers.” That’s right. “Towers” is the original name Dreamlit Games planned to use, before changing it to “Towers of Aghasba.”

Dreamlit Games chose to go with Kowloon Nights to support the development of Towers of Aghasba. The video game fund announced the same in February 2021, stating they intend to give Towers of Aghasba’s developers creative freedom and financial independence. We can’t wait to see what the final product looks and feels like.

Trailer

Towers of Aghasba’s reveal trailer was featured at the 2023 PlayStation Showcase event. There’s also an extended version released by Dreamlit Games that you can watch above.

Release Date, Platforms & Editions

The announcement trailer at the PlayStation Showcase event wraps up with “Coming 2024” toward the end. Further, Dreamlit Games reiterated the same, confirming on their official Twitter handle that Towers of Aghasba will launch sometime in 2024. 

As far as platforms and editions go, we know for certain that Towers of Aghasba will make its way to PC platforms via Steam. Even now, you can add the game to your wishlist on Steam here. Other than that, Dreamlit Games is keeping more details on possible additional platforms and editions under wraps. Perhaps they will continue to release more details on platforms and editions further down the road.

For more updates on Towers of Aghasba, keep an eye out on Dreamlit Games’ official Twitter handle here. Alternatively, you can join Dreamlit Games’ official Discord channel to keep track of the game’s development progress here. We will also be sure to keep you updated in case of any new information comes up.

So, what's your take? Will you be picking up a copy of Towers of Aghasba when it drops? Let us know your thoughts on our socials here.