When you’re the kind of person who judges a e-book by its cowl, you’d have skipped One other Eden and possibly tutted at it throughout your first look. That may be a fairly massive mistake to make.
As a result of whereas One other Eden may look identical to one other free to play gacha JRPG, it truly bears far more resemblance to the classics of the SNES period, simply with a couple of extra fashionable trimmings.
That is smart when you think about the sheer expertise that’s labored on it. You’ve received Chrono Set off’s Masato Kato and Yasunori Mitsuda on the story and music – the latter of which is joined by Luminous Arc 2’s Shunsuke Tsuchiya – and the artwork is all created by Binchotan’s Takahito Exa.
And it actually exhibits. One other Eden simply oozes high quality. Dialogue isn’t cringe-worthingly unhealthy, despite the fact that it’s a complete cliché (which isn’t actually a criticism when levied at a JRPG), the artwork is completely gorgeous, and the music is like JRPG consolation meals.
Throughout our first play by means of, we felt like we have been replaying a traditional somewhat than diving right into a model new sport, and that’s each a optimistic and detrimental of One other Eden relying on the facet of the fence you sit on.
One other Eden Feels Extra Like a Lovingly Crafted Remake of a Basic JRPG Than a Model New Sport
You play as Aldo, a fairly commonplace JRPG sword-wielding hero who’s beginning his new job as guardsman of a small, idyllic village. His worrywart sister Feinne expresses concern, and he continually reminds her that nothing ever occurs within the village anyway.
With out going into spoiler territory, Aldo is confirmed flawed, and units out on an journey together with his sister Feinne to save lots of the human race from extinction. The demon king, the first antagonist, desires to wipe them off the face of the earth.
Cue a time-hopping journey all through historical historical past, the current, and the distant future, as Aldo and Feinne battle monsters, greet new get together members, and discover a beautiful world.
Whereas there’s nothing significantly new in One other Eden, fashionable trimmings have been wrapped delicately round ageing techniques in a fashion that makes the sport really feel extra like a lovingly-crafted remaster than a model new expertise.
The battle system, for instance, is your stand turn-based JRPG fare. Nevertheless, there’s a great deal of high quality of life enhancements, like tapping and holding your character’s portraits to pick out a ability, a helpful repeat button that permits you to queue up that very same ability to your subsequent flip, and the flexibility to hurry up fight. That’s a godsend whereas combating by means of trash mobs to achieve a dungeon’s boss.
Whereas it Performs Like a Premium JRPG for the Most Half, One other Eden Does Function Gacha Mechanics
Gathering new get together members borrows from gacha mechanics, which is the place One other Eden will seemingly make most of its cash. Very like within the regular free to play rubbish, you’ll spend premium forex summoning heroes – every of which have a star score. It’s right here, and that can put individuals off, however we haven’t actually had to make use of it to date. It appears you will get by means of the sport with out utilizing it.
World exploration additionally manages to really feel fashionable whereas sticking to the identical primary method. You discover all kinds of side-scrolling areas, however you’ll be able to transfer up and down paths at set factors, which makes the world really feel rather a lot bigger than it will do in any other case.
There’s additionally a beautiful 3D impact that makes the world appear to be one massive animated pop-up e-book. Your entire world, characters, and enemies have been lovingly hand-drawn, but the animations to convey them to life are some true digital wizardry.
Total, we’re tremendous impressed with One other Eden. It manages to skirt the road between traditional and fashionable with absolute ease and the result’s a sport that feels recent but comfy – like a pair of outdated, clear pyjamas.
It’s a disgrace that this isn’t a premium expertise, fully with out gacha mechanics, however we will’t actually complain provided that that facet of the sport has been fully non-obligatory to date. When you like JRPGs, undoubtedly give this one a strive.