Echoes of Mora is a narrative game that takes place as you swim through a sunken village. Developed and published by Selkies Interactive, the first game by this team of young developers, Echoes of Mora was released on September 21st, 2026. The story follows the tale of two siblings—older brother Dario who is a troubled teen and younger sister Mora that wants to help. Players need to swim around through the water, exploring the town to find echoes of memories, allowing them to slip through time and see the past. There is a small handful of puzzles needing to be solved, but most of the time will be spent experiencing the narrative.
Before I continue, I should start with a disclaimer. I experienced this game entirely on PC. However, there is also a VR version which I am unable to play. This is unfortunate because I strongly believe the VR version is intended way to play, so my own experience felt hindered. I can give the game’s narrative credit. I was intrigued by the curse of the lake and the hopefulness of Mora and genuinely wanted to see how things would end up. There could have been more player agency for how the events unfold, but I’ll get into that later. However, outside of narrative, there really isn’t enough here. The puzzles are too simple to solve and exploring takes more time than its worth. The narrative alone is not enough for me to recommend picking this one up.
I think it’s important to mention the VR version though. I’ve played a handful of them in the past and still have a headset somewhere. When it comes to VR games, my standards are a bit lower because it’s more so about the experience. A VR game could be short, simple and lacking polish and I might still enjoy it because I was “there”—if that makes any sense. Admittedly, the last time I played a VR game was years ago. My Oculus Rift headset has been phased out by Meta Quest. VR games could and most likely have improved over the years. Regardless, this is all to say that despite the PC version of this game being lacking, I’m willing to give it some credit. I would recommend picking up the VR version rather than the PC version if you are interested in playing.
Two Siblings, A Cursed Lake, and the Drowned One
The story takes place in a small Italian village that has sunken beneath the water from a cursed lake. Players play as an unnamed protagonist, almost like a spectral viewer of the story. A mysterious voice in the form of shifting lights guides players through the depths and teaches them how to swim. The voice also tells players about echoes—portals of memories that allow the player to travel back in time. These portals require an item (or three) to activate. The item(s) required display above the portal and players need to do some light exploring in order to find it.
Thankfully, the game makes this much easier in two ways. Pink fish guide the player toward objectives, pointing them to the next portal or the items they need. The game highlights these items brightly, making them easy to spot. That clarity helps because the player can pick up a huge number of items. Probably about 90% of items you can pick up have no use and there really isn’t anything to do with them either. For example, you can pick up every single strand of seaweed. Why? Who knows. In the PC version, there isn’t a way to turn the hand and inspect the items either. For the giggles, swimming around awkwardly carrying seaweed, a random object in a strange way, or a fish can be enjoyable.
Anyways. Once you have the required item, you can take it to the portal and interact with it. There’s a small inventory you can store items in, but honestly, you never really need it. The distance from item to portal is never far. Even if the portal requires more items, it only takes a few seconds to just place the item in the portal before finding the next one. When you activate the portal, you step inside and experience a brief flashback from the past. These moments carry most of the narrative and introduce the two siblings along with the rest of the cast.
The narrative follows the story of two main characters—the siblings Dario and Mora. Dario, the older brother, is a troubled teen. He’s run into trouble with their father and stirred conflict with others in the village. Lately he’s been having dreams as if something, or someone, was beckoning him to the lake. The villagers claim the lake is cursed by the Drowned One—a woman lost to time, her name and story erased. They keep their distance and warn their children not to go near the water. Those who fall in vanish without a trace.
Of course, kids will be kids. Dario and his two friends, Angelo and Lucia, are hanging out beside the lake when Maro, Dario’s younger sister, comes along. Maro is a supportive child who takes on a dare from local bullies to find the Drowned One’s locket. Despite the warnings from Lucia, Maro spots the locket hanging at the end of a dock and carefully makes her way towards it. The dock is unstable and Maro almost falls into the lake when a board falls beneath her. When the three spot Maro in danger, they rush over to try and save her. Dario inches towards her, pulls her up and the two start heading off the dock. Suddenly, the locket glows and half of the dock collapses beneath them, causing Dario to fall into the lake. He does not resurface.
This moment sparks the rest of the narrative. The kids try to get help for Dario but nobody believes them or even wants to come. Even the parents don’t believe Maro as they believe Dario has already left town. You can find highlighted objects at various locations that help tell the story outside of the portal flashbacks. This is where we learn more about Dario as a character, such as the poor relationship he has with his father or with the village.
Eventually, Maro ends up seeing the player and believes we are a ghost or spirit. She speaks to the player directly and though we are not able to speak ourselves, we can respond with yes or no. It’s a fun little way to give the player some agency when it comes to the narrative, but how we respond overall does not affect the story. The only changes that occur are bits of dialogue (and a steam achievement or two). The story does not change otherwise. There are two endings available, but which one you experience comes down to a final decision at the end.
Personally, I wish the ending wasn’t based on one decision but instead was a culmination of the responses made throughout. I don’t need the narrative to have massive changes depending on your responses. The events can unfold as they would because afterall, these are flashbacks of the past. However it would be nice if they had…well, any impact at all. You can straight up tell Mora that you won’t help her and yet she still speaks to you as if you said you would. There was one instance where I responded “no” to not knowing why I was there but then Mora said that I responded yes to this question later on. It was a let down in the narrative and unfortunately takes away from the replayability factor. It doesn’t seem worth the time to play the game over and choose the other option just to have slightly different dialogue.
Despite this, the narrative did have me invested and kept my attention throughout. I wanted to see how things would end up and I was not expecting the end moments. Yes, I would have appreciated more meaningful player agency, but I can at least acknowledge that the game includes it to some degree. I can certainly give the game some credit when it comes to story telling and narrative. A strong narrative matters here because the game spends most of its runtime on story. My playthrough took about two hours, and I spent nearly all of that time experiencing the narrative.
The Time Spent Between Echoes
Gameplay is entirely a walking simulator except you’re swimming instead of walking. This is something that’s probably slightly more enjoyable in VR as you actually need to do the motions of swimming. Though the world is technically open, there isn’t much to explore. Most of the experience involves moving from portal to portal, watching flashbacks, and interacting with Mora. A small handful of puzzles do exist to make gameplay more interesting, but these puzzles are way too simple. For example, the first puzzle you encounter is putting together a bust. There are three pieces in the same area and you simply need to put them down in the correct order. That is it.
In fact, I’d say that most if not all of the puzzles play out in the same style. You find the correct item nearby, place it down where it needs to go and move on. There was one puzzle that did not follow this, but it actually bugged out. A large object and four different weights needed to be balanced on a scale. Seems simple enough but when I put a weight on the scale, took it off, and then tried to put it back on again, I was no longer able to pick up the weight. This sort of soft-locked me as I was not able to complete the puzzle. So, I went back to the main menu and reloaded. After I did this, the weights disappeared and the portal activated, even though it was only the second of the three required items.
(Another bug occurred at the very end but this was more humorous. The character models t-posed on me to assert dominance.)
Puzzles are a common way for narrative based walking simulators to break up the monotony of going from point A to B. I don’t need the puzzles to be complex enough to stall the experience, but these puzzles feel far too simple. They might be slightly more enjoyable in VR, yet even then, the game could have pushed them further. The gameplay avoids feeling monotonous or boring since the overall length is fairly short, but the lack of interesting puzzles still feels like a hugely missed opportunity.
Last but certainly not least, if you read through some of the steam reviews, many of them praise the visuals. I’d like to do the same as the visuals are rather nice. The somewhat gloomy and dark atmosphere of the sunken village lines up well with the general mystery and somewhat negative overtones of the narrative. Characters are not actual people but instead brightly different colored lights in the shape of them. The consistent bright pink highlights, whether it be the guiding fish or items, stand out against the dark backdrop. Swimming to the surface to see a beautiful visual of land was a nice touch and I’m glad there wasn’t some invisible wall blocking the way. Now the visuals alone aren’t enough to justify exploring every corner and crevice, but I do think they deserve some credit.
An Echo Better Experienced Rather Than Played
Overall, I think Echoes of Mora is an okay game but probably not one I’d recommend playing on PC. The game’s narrative and visuals are positives, but they don’t do enough for the PC version to be recommendable. There could have been more to the player agency and to the puzzles to improve the experience. Without these improvements, its two to three hours of a walking simulator narrative that doesn’t lead to a particularly memorable or enjoyable experience.
However, I think the VR version is definitely the intended way to play and the game becomes more recommendable. I think the walking simulator nature and the simple puzzles would be slightly more enjoyable in VR. Having to perform the movements of swimming or physically reaching out to grab items or point at the choices allows you to immerse yourself more into the experience. Admittedly, I am more lenient when it comes to VR games and only have a limited experience in them, so my opinions may not hold any water. However, if you are interested in playing Echoes of Mora, I’d strongly suggest the VR version over the PC one.
Thank you for reading and happy swimming!
