When does Before the Echo get good?

Give it 2 hours. In the first 2 hours 1 in 2 reviews are negative (47%); after 10h it's 1 in 30 (3%). 82% of owners got the first achievement.

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IndieRPG

Before the Echo

Oct 20, 2011 Steam: Very Positive

Give it 2 hours

Gets good by 2h almost every game dips in hours 2–3

Started playing 82% of owners

Steam reviews 86% positive of 1,457

What the data shows

In the first 2 hours 1 in 2 reviews are negative (47%); after 10h it's 1 in 30 (3%).
82% of owners got the first achievement.

When it gets good

Share of positive reviews by how many hours the reviewer had played when writing the review.

before it gets good opening up fully opened up

Based on all 1,472 Steam reviews in every language. Median playtime in a sample of 290 reviews: 13.9h for positive, 3h for negative. Almost every game is rated lower in the first 2–3 hours: that window includes refunds and quick first impressions. What matters is how deep the dip is and how fast the game recovers.

Where players quit

Share of players who started the game and reached each story milestone. 100% is the most common achievement (82.1% of owners), so people who bought the game and never launched it don't count.

Story milestones aren't labeled yet; all achievements are listed below.

All achievements (21)

On Your Way Successfully defeat your first enemy. 100%
Precision Complete a battle without failing a spell. 91%
Yet, I Love The Holidays Defeat the Holiday Whompa. 75%
Triple Fortune Obtain all three droppable items from any single enemy. 69%
Manafont Recover over 150 mana in a single battle, and win. 38%
P's And Queue's Queue up five spells in a row. 23%
Another Castle Get her back. 22%
Perfect Run While learning a spell, achieve 100% accuracy for the entire song. 20%
Meant For Each Other Beat the game on any difficulty. 15%
Quarter Quell Successfully complete a synthesis at 25% odds of success or lower. 14%
Element 77 Synthesize Iridium. 14%
Presents Are Accounted For Obtain every droppable item in the game at least once. 14%
Buzzer Beater Defeat an enemy with less than one second remaining on the clock. 12%
Yo Dawg Trigger Boost a Trigger Boost. 11%
Time Despair Defeat an enemy within eleven seconds. 11%
A Little Too Into It Synthesize every recipe in the game. 11%
Lies Within Lies See the hidden ending. 11%
Ail For What Cures Ya Defeat an enemy using only poison spells. 10%
Arclit Defeat an enemy on the seventh floor using only Arclight. 8.9%
Iris Discover the name of she who controls fate. 8.2%
Erudite Learn all spells. 7.9%

Steam page Updated: 2026-10-20.