yeah and your final form is an orb, all things return to orb
took this long for the references to SPORE
look, having an understanding of the circular rhythm of life causes one to want to make a video game about it.
the prologue chapter of the game I was designing in HS was called “survival” (based on this song) and used mosquito symbolotry.
Orbviously.
And the tone should stay more in line with the fish chapter’s darker moods, until you reach human when it suddenly becomes Metal Slug and then the end when it’s just 2D Rez.
There should be a dedicated poop button.
Why not just become 3D suddenly for the final chapter? Make the player sick but soothe them with synesthesia & Mixed media.
SEPARATE BUTTONS FOR:
Ooh, how about 2d sprites in a 3D environment a la Dragon Quest VII/Xenogears? With a music visualizer playing on the skybox? And in the orb form, the poop button makes you invert and poop yourself out?
…so when do we get started?
So, I made a decision and I’m not sure it’s a good one. I entered chapter 4 as a bird, and when I was asked whether I wanted to become a mammal, I said no and remained a bird. I wanted to see if the game would let me get away with this and the answer is that I entered chapter 5 as a bird.
Being a bird has lead to some weird stuff. I agreed with the bird-king, so he took me to the moon and in the future we become the inspiration behind the Nazca lines.
I also flew up in a level in chapter 5 that you wouldn’t be able to get to if you were a mammal (I assume), and when I got to the sky I overheard the two aliens running the evolution experiment. They apologized for introducing the crystal and then they took me to mars for a while. They were very chill dinosaur aliens.
But, by remaining a bird, I think I might have ruined most of the game for myself. I don’t have any incentive to fight stuff because I can’t evolve any more (except in lateral directions), and running away is a much better survival tactic, so I’m finding myself flying over most of the stages. Even cramped places like the monkey cave or the bird castle were easier if I just flew away.
On the bright side, being a bird has also trivialized the later bosses so far. None of them have a good answer for you being up high, and it’s very easy to either evade them or lock them into a pattern where they jump at you over and over while you bite them.
Yeah, I highly recommend doing a backup save in chapter 3 so you can try the different routes into the next chapter.
I got to the Bolbox (I think that’s the name) boss fight and might just stop playing. A boss fight that is seven boss fights is the worst thing this game could have shown me.
FYI, you don’t have to be a bird to do this.
Also, you’re at the final boss, and you should have tons of points to heal up by lengthening/shortening your neck on the cheap. The only really bad phase is the fish. The cockroach can be a challenge too, but the rest are easy to stun lock.
Oh yeah, I figured, it’s just not a decision I would have made if I weren’t a bird.
Unfortunately, I do not have a lot of points around. I haven’t been fighting much and I recently switched from a bird jaw to a dinosaur jaw to do more damage. I might go and grind for some healing points. I tried save stating through it and eventually locked myself into a death (fighting the fish lol).
The fish is definitely the worst, you’re right, but I’m having a lot of trouble with the amphibian and the jellyfish too. The amphibian because it won’t stop shooting its projectile (if I can get it in the corner and keep up the timing, I can stunlock it until the snail bops me) making it very difficult to get in and deal damage cleanly. The jellyfish just has extremely good neutral.
After much grinding and save stating and healing with evo points, I found myself at the final phase with about 20 HP and no heals left. I kept dying and didn’t want to repeat the whole process, so I did something I’ve never done before and went and looked up some Game Genie codes so I could just cheat my way through the rest.
I feel like I need to sit with this game for a bit. When it’s funny and weird it’s really cool, but a lot of it isn’t like that. A lot of it is just a platformer that isn’t very good.
I am right at the end of E.V.O, and I am even more convinced now that this is a better game in concept than execution. I like it a lot, but not necessarily because of how it plays. In fact, playing it kind of blows at times, haha. I think I kind of hate it? There is just something so frustrating about the hit boxes, the lack of invicibility frames and how enemies can stun lock your ass in weird ways. Bosses keep killing me without me even having time to react – the yeti parents were especially fucked up in that way.
But that’s mostly things I’ve already said I guess. It is wonky as all hell, yet endearing in it’s own quirky ways. It’s pretty funny too sometimes. I don’t know if I would’ve had the patience to get this far if I didn’t have save states though. This one is tough.
Let’s just say it could’ve used some more polish. Anyway, lets see how I fair against the final few challenges. Hopefully I won’t get screwed.
Famous last words.
Yeah, this is definitely a game more ambitious than it is successful, but there’s still something I find fascinating about it.
I did like the little false endings along the way, but there really should have been multiple endings based on your form at the end. That was definitely a miss.
I’m not kidding about thinking this would be fantastic as an Indie game if someone with a talent for gameplay took a crack at these concepts. They could evolve it into something special, like a giant bird with dinosaur teeth, or a mermaid.
It’s absolutely fascinating, no doubt about it. I did like the fake endings along the way too, but like you say it feels like there should’ve been more to it. It’s cute. I mentioned before that E.V.O would benefit from another iteration, or someone else finishing up the concept. So an indie take on it would absolutely be welcome.
There was PC98 predecessor, might check that out.
Exactly!
I’m so glad I could share this confounding experience with others!
After sleeping on it and washing away the frustration of that final boss, I think this is where I land too. It’s got very cool stuff that is worth seeing, but boy playing it sure does suck. We’ve evoked game ratings, and I think for me this is a quintessential 6/10. It’s got that 7/10 goodness, but you’ve gotta warn them that it’s got a little more roughness to it than your usual 7/10. Although I will also say this this particular kind of “hard wall” difficulty is the thing I have the most difficult time appreciating in games.
Glad I revised my opinion of it from when I was much younger. Still thinking about The Shinka Ron. We’ve got a lot of September left.
The concept of E.V.O. outshines any sort of execution. It’s a hell of an idea that practically anyone could just nab and make the coolest game out of, but apart from Will Wright no one seems to have stepped up to the challenge. And so E.V.O. remains the proof of concept for better or worse.
I will say though, despite me using save states to make going back to bosses less time consuming, I think dying is pretty lenient in this game. It doesn’t put you back to the title screen like many other games did at the time. Losing half your experience points is perhaps harsh in one sense, but it does give you plenty of room to fuck up without having to reload a save from the title screen over and over again. I suppose that’s the rpg roots showing.
Except for those times they put a boss at the end of a maze, so the runback is miserable
