While I could find a game that so blatantly takes aspects from other games to be endearing in an odd way, Evoland just seems shallow in how directly it apes what I can only assume to have been some of the creator’s favorite games. Yeah, I’ve seen puddles that weren’t half as shallow as this game. Also, the buster sword is in the game, the main character can summon “Babamut”, the main antagonist is a demon lord named Zephyros, and a suspiciously familiar looking airship can be obtained from a man named Sid. She could only be a more clear analog for Aerith if she was killed by a silver haired antagonist and was later caressed in the main character’s arms. This second character happens to be a brunette mage girl who is clad in pink and red. Except whereas the gameplay of the Zelda -esque sections held strong, the combat here is severely underwhelming as the player can only control two characters, both of whom have only a few basic commands at their disposal, which fail to make the combat more interesting. While from Final Fantasy, the game borrows turn based combat that is placed on the overworld, right down to the way the menu designs and the active time battle system. Also, there’s a boss fight with a version of the main character, except they have red eyes and are enshrouded in blackness. Enemies are comparable to keese, octorocks, wizzrobes, and darknuts, and the core gameplay involves some light puzzle solving using bombs and arrows while traversing through areas that could easily be described as dungeons. The core gameplay is an overhead action game where the playable character is a sword wielding blonde boy clad in green clothing whose life is with three hearts. While the game would start off looking pretty bad with that, it would at least make the creators seem like more devoted fans of gaming history, rather than only expressing their interests in this narrow way. Or how the 16-bit era simply does not look that good.Įven the decision to have things begin by resembling a GameBoy game is questionable, as if the game was trying to mirror and represent the evolution of video game history, it should look closer to an Atari 2600 title or an early Ultima game. Or how the 3D mode sees few improvements over time and looks far more competent than early three dimensional endeavors. Such as how this game’s idea of an 8-bit homage involves using 256 colors while not abiding by a certain pallette, as NEs and Master Systems had to do. While its attempts and efforts to mimic certain eras can either feel inaccurate or just underdeveloped. The game lacks much understanding of the subtleties to the evolution of games as a medium, and feels fairly surface level with its more simplistic and streamlined execution. It is a very novel and interesting premise with a lot of potential that is not reached here. What begins as a silent tile-based GameBoy-esque overhead action game eventually gains colors, sound effect, music, and increasingly improved visuals all before reaching the third dimension for its second half.
Looking away from its history however, it would be easiest to describe Evoland as a Zelda and Final Fantasy flavored “homage” held together and made unique by how the game evolves technologically as things progress.
#Evoland switch review full#
Seeing the audience this short little flash game garnered, it was decided to expand the game in the form of a full retail product, simply called Evoland. It was a rather novel concept that managed to come in first place amongst 1400 other entries in the game jam, and amassed a sizable audience considering how obscure these sort of things tends to be. Now, I could just go a week without reviewing a game, but I’ve got a good record going for me, and the more I thought about it, I have enough to say about this game in particular to warrant a full review.Įvoland was originally developed as part of a game jam, as a title that showed the gradual technological evolution of games before turning into a very heavy homage of classic 2D Zelda titles. But I recently replayed it to provide a better reference for my Evoland II review, which is not done yet because I have been unable to clear Evoland II yet, on account of a scheduling error on my part. So, I was not intending on reviewing Evoland, mostly on account of having already reviewed it nearly 4 years ago.
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