LogFAQs > #951234539

Evoland 2 (PC)

Probably my underdog game of the year.

A long time ago I played the first game on my phone. It was this tiny ambitious gamejam-esque concept where you started out with gameboy legend of zelda, evolving mechanics and graphics until eventually finished with FF7-style gameplay, all the while riddled with references and fun pokes at the various game genres it goes through with. I knew that the dev was working on a sequel at the time but I never knew it was going to be this epic and ambitious.

Not only is the sequel a full-fledged open-world JRPG that takes beats mainly from Chrono Trigger and Link to the Past. It has made its main mission to jampack every game genre known to man in a single game. There's a beatemup, a platformer, a stealth section, a shmup, guitar hero, professor layton-y puzzling, pac-man, pong, and the list goes on. I fucking lost it when an FF8/9-esque collectible card minigame was unlocked! There has got to be a world record for most game genres in a single game because this thing is just crazy. Not to mention, that the game is chock-full of references from various pop culture media such as Game of Thrones, Tinder, One Piece, Borderlands, etc the list is endless. I think I even spotted a 20th Century Boys reference in there and some obscure ones like Gianna Sisters.

I kick myself now for allowing this game to sit on my desktop for close to a year. I blame the really slow start and pacing, and the by-the-numbers plot that I wasn't really too interested in. I was wrong though; the plot is VERY interesting (but still slow). Initially assumed to be tacked on just to showcase game genres and make references, the game actually follows a more serious tone with dark implications that in the end doesn't really get resolved, which is the entire point of a time loop. There is no beginning and end. Everything that happens affects something. The Future leads into the Past in-game which then leads to the Present and kickstarts everything I find this interesting because in a meta-sense you're also repeating the loop by playing the game again.. And what's really nice is this implication was never spoonfed to you. I love games that let you figure it out on your own and the discussion threads on this has been brimming with talk.

I also love that the narrative stays close to you and your friends. Throughout your journey a couple of time events get tossed around and a couple of people are named, but these very typical JRPG characters are never encountered again if at all and are never deemed significant despite early appearances. There is a clear sense of a balancing act between lampooning and telling a good story, which I feel no other game does. Like, if its a parody it will go out of its way to make references and not take itself seriously. This game risked being serious and succeeded at not becoming an edgy excuse altogether.

That said, the game isn't without its flaws. It was clearly made with variance and variability in mind so, being a jack of all game genre trades and a master of none, there is some visible clunkiness and lack of polish to it. On 2-3 occasions I would get stuck to a wall and would require a restart (fortunately checkpoints are aplenty here). Boss fights, though very interesting and span game genres, are ridiculous at times (but thank god difficulty is easily changed in options). Movement and combat isn't entirely satisfying as its so generic at this point. The evolution aspect was great but after that novelty, sticking to that style of game the whole game with uninspired dungeons with no gimmick is stale at times. The music is also full of short tracks. You will find yourself muting the game at times for how annoying it eventually becomes looping after a minute or so. Its best feature may not also be your favorite feature. Like, would you stop and play 7 rounds of Bejeweled in the middle of your JRPG? They're ridiculously hard and challenging btw. I barely survived the Shmup section myself and one of the collectibles is locked behind it even so good luck getting gud.

For all my complaints though, I can't really blame the 10-man team who worked on this. And to my surprise, I found out that the lead dev Nicolas Cannasse actually created the Haxe programming language (of which Evoland is made from)! I can't help but think that the dude was probably flexing and showing the capabilities of his language by making all those game genres. I would check out his post-mortem on the game itself as its very interesting if you're into that kinda thing.

https://haxe.org/videos/conferences/wwx-2015/the-tech-behind-evoland-2-by-nicolas-cannasse.html

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It's not so cliche anymore when it's happening to you.