Eldrem: Kingdoms — Deep Dive Strategy Guide

Overview: What Kind of Game Is Eldrem: Kingdoms?

Eldrem: Kingdoms is a third-person creature-collector action RPG from Eldrem Studios, a small independent team building around one clean twist: creatures do not fight beside you as autonomous pets, they lend you their power. Every spell you cast comes from the creature you currently have summoned. Summon an Ice Ursaleo for an ice shield, summon your dragon to fly, and pick your roster carefully because each species carries its own spell set.

The loop braids three genres. As a creature collector you hunt, tame, and breed fantastic beasts across the open world. As an action RPG you fight in real time, third person, channeling your summons' magic. And as a builder you raise a floating island home in the Crystal Sky Islands, from a tiny village to a mighty fortress, with creatures working as beasts of burden and hired NPCs running day-to-day operations.

The setting is a shattered world of floating islands reachable by dragonback. The studio's pitch line is that a dragon is not the most powerful being in Eldrem, but you will be. Development is public and unusually detailed: the team publishes exactly which systems are done, which are in progress, and what comes next. First release is planned as a solo PVE experience, with multiplayer features (PVP duels, co-op dungeons, guilds, creature trading) on the roadmap afterward.

Getting Started: Your First Hours (Planned Progression)

The game is in pre-alpha heading to a closed load test, so this section lays out the confirmed opening loop in the order you will meet it.

1. Tame your first creature before anything else. Every spell you cast comes from your summoned creature, so an empty roster means an empty skill bar. Early creatures are found in the open world; your first bond unlocks both combat and the stat bonuses that raise your character's power.
2. Learn the summon-swap rhythm. Need a shield? Summon the Ice Ursaleo. Need height? Summon the dragon. Fights reward picking the right spell set for the enemy, and switching summons mid-fight is the core skill the whole combat system is built on.
3. Feed and bond with your creatures. Keep them well fed and happy and they reward you with their full potential. A strong bond unlocks their powers, so bonding is not flavor text, it is a progression gate on the spell sets you can channel.
4. Claim your floating island early. Your island is home base, build plot, and creature pen in one. Getting the first structures up early means your breeding and raising infrastructure exists before your roster gets big enough to need it.
5. Breed for stat transfer, not just cuteness. Stat bonuses and skills transfer to the next generation through breeding. A planned pairing between your two strongest creatures beats capturing a dozen average ones.
6. Hire NPCs once you can afford them. Creature handlers keep your beasts fed, and the Warden manages your town's daily operations. They turn your island from a project into a system that runs while you are out hunting.

Beginner Mistakes to Avoid

Core Mechanics Deep Dive

Summon-Based Spell Casting

The combat identity lives here. You never cast spells as a person; you channel the creature you have summoned. Every species has its own set of spells, so your roster is literally your ability loadout, and the developer's examples are concrete: summon an Ice Ursaleo when you need an ice shield, summon your dragon when you want to fly. This makes team composition a real-time decision instead of a menu decision. Elemental combat and creature spell borrowing were in final implementation per the studio's latest public status, which suggests cross-species synergies will deepen this system further.

Hunt, Tame, and Breed

Creatures are discovered in the open world, tamed, and leveled to increase your character's power. The breeding system is the long game: stat bonuses and skills transfer to the next generation, so a lineage is a project with compounding returns. Bond strength gates how much of a creature's power you can channel, and feeding plus happiness upkeep determines whether a creature performs at full potential. The studio's own community joke, a legendary Thundersheep that ate the dragon instead of the other way around, hints at unexpected outcomes hiding in the creature pool.

Riding, Flight, and Open World Traversal

You ride creatures across the open plains, fight alongside them, or burn enemies from above. Flight is the traversal signature: the Crystal Sky Islands are scattered floating landmasses, and dragonback is how you link them. Expect the world to reward verticality, since islands you can see are islands you can eventually reach once your roster includes a flier.

Island Building and Automation

Your floating island scales from a tiny village to a mighty fortress, and building is tied into the creature systems rather than siloed. Creatures serve as beasts of burden and helpers assisting your builders. Dedicated structures assist breeding, improving, and raising your creature army. Hired NPCs automate upkeep: creature handlers keep everything fed, and the Warden runs the town's day-to-day operations. Raids are the counterpressure, with attackers seeking to destroy your town, so building is also defense planning.

Progression and Roadmap Reality

Per the studio's public development status: taming, combat, and summoning systems are being completed; elemental combat and spell borrowing are in final phases; player, NPC, and creature stats, skills, and progression are implemented; backend infrastructure for profiles, creature databases, and inventory exists; and three islands ship at first release. The next milestone is a close group of players testing client and server under load. The first stage is solo PVE, with multiplayer (PVP duels and battles, co-op dungeons and bosses, guilds with their own economy, creature sharing, trading, and borrowing) explicitly on the post-launch roadmap.

Advanced Strategies (What Masters Will Do Differently)

The Bloodline Project. Because breeding transfers stat bonuses and skills, the long-term power move is a planned lineage rather than a collection. Pair your two strongest specimens, raise the offspring past the parents, then breed the next generation from that peak. Two or three cycles of deliberate pairing outperform dozens of wild captures, and it compounds: every generation starts from a higher base.

Spell-Set Layering. Your summons define your spell loadout, so advanced play means carrying complementary spell sets rather than favorites. A durable summon with a shield spell covers the weakness of a glass-cannon damage summon. Design your active roster as three layers: survivability, damage, and mobility, and swap between them as the fight dictates.

Bond Before Breadth. Bond strength unlocks a creature's powers, and happiness governs whether it performs at full potential. Splitting attention across ten shallow bonds leaves you with ten half-powered spell sets. Max the bond and upkeep of three or four workhorses first; broaden the roster only when your island's handler automation can keep the larger stable fed.

Fortress as Force Multiplier. Raids punish the careless, but the same infrastructure that defends your town accelerates your creatures. Buildings that assist breeding and raising sit behind the same walls that repel attackers, so players who build defensively early get both safety and faster lineage progression from the same investment.

System Requirements and Platforms

Eldrem: Kingdoms targets Windows 10 on Steam with modest specs for a 3D open world: an Intel Core i3-6300T or equivalent, 8 GB of RAM, an NVIDIA GTX 1060, DirectX 11, and a broadband connection. A free Eldrem account is required and supports linking to your Steam account. Controller support is partial, so plan on mouse and keyboard for building interfaces. The in-app purchases flag on the store page confirms some form of optional monetization; pricing for the base game is not yet announced. Wishlist the page to catch the closed test invitations and the release date.

FAQ

Is Eldrem: Kingdoms like Palworld or Ark? It is the closest comparison point: taming, breeding, base building, and riding in a third-person open world. The distinct twist is summon-based casting, where your creature's spells are channeled through your character instead of creatures fighting autonomously.

When does it release? To be announced. The game is closing its pre-alpha stage, and the next public step is a closed test for a small group of players to stress client and server under load.

Is it multiplayer? At first release, no. The first stage is a solo PVE experience. PVP duels, large battles, co-op dungeons and bosses, guild economies, and creature trading are planned additions after launch.

How much will it cost? Not announced. The store page lists in-app purchases, so expect optional monetization on top of the base price; details are unpublished.

What is there to explore? Three islands at initial release, in a shattered world of floating sky islands. The studio's roadmap shows the Crystal Sky Islands setting expanding from there.

Can you fly? Yes, by summoning and riding your dragon. Flight is the core traversal mechanic linking the floating islands, and you can also fight from the air.

What are the system requirements? Minimum: Windows 10, Core i3-6300T, 8 GB RAM, GTX 1060, DirectX 11, broadband internet. A free Eldrem account that links to Steam is required.

Does it have controller support? Partial controller support. Building and management interfaces are designed around mouse and keyboard.

How does breeding work? Stat bonuses and skills transfer from parents to offspring. Pair strong creatures deliberately to compound stats across generations, and use island structures built to assist breeding and raising.

Do creatures level up? Yes. Collected creatures level up to increase your character's power, and a strong bond plus feeding and happiness upkeep unlocks their full potential.

Who should skip it? Players who want a finished, dated release they can buy today, or who dislike in-app purchase flags. The game is pre-alpha with no release date, so patience is part of the deal.

Final Verdict

Eldrem: Kingdoms earns a wishlist slot on the strength of its summon-casting twist: a creature collector where your roster is your spellbook. If you have bounced off Palworld's survival grind but love the taming layer, this is the one to watch. The development status is unusually concrete, the PVE-first roadmap is sane, and breeding plus island building give it the long-game structure that keeps collectors hooked. Skip it for now if you only play finished games; come back the day the closed test opens.

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Last reviewed by Game How To Editorial. We play each game, verify controls against official sources, and update guides when game mechanics change.