Review of Evenicle 2
Subject | Evenicle 2 Evenicle 2 |
By | Helpfulness: 0 Vote: 8hexashadow13 on 2023-01-31 |
Review | tl;dr: A sequel that’s a stronger in some regards, weaker in others, but that for the most part maintains both the strengths and weaknesses of the original. Evenicle 2 as one would expect is the sequel to the first Evenicle. It’s largely the same concept, a turn based RPG eroge centered around a guy going on a journey to stop an evil organization and marrying loads of women along the way. In term of execution, I would say that it’s a mixed bag compared to the first, wherein it improved in some areas but also regressed in others. The plot itself I think is better in this game. As with the first game, there are a series of distinct chapters that are essentially their own sub stories but that build up the overarching story over time. However, I think the writing here did a much better job of world building from the onset and having each successive story continue building on the previous one, which resulted in an overarching narrative that flowed much better and was much more cohesive. As a result there were more plot threads that progressed at a pretty slow pace as compared to the first game, but I think that worked pretty well and built up the overarching narrative well. The game also had a conclusion that dealt with not only the overarching narrative in a satisfying manner, but felt like it provided a satisfying conclusion to all the chapter based sub stories as well in a way that made everything feel connected and important. The writing overall felt much more consistent and just in general like more thought was put into it. That’s mostly a good thing, but I suppose there are some negatives to it as well. The first game had major shifts in tone, wherein it was pretty lighthearted and happy go lucky for the most part, but it had a lot of shifts into being pretty dark and messed up. I wasn’t exactly much of a fan of these parts in the first game, so I don’t particularly miss them, but at the same time I did recognize their significance, and this game very much isn’t going for what the first game was at all. This game had a few shifts into being darker but they’re far less extreme than in the first game and thus just don’t have as much shock value. They’re also less of them, and thus they don’t contribute to the general tone and atmosphere, rather they just feel kind of out of place. As such, the game overall is much more happy go lucky, for better or worse. Also, while the writing is more consistent in this game, this results in it not being as crazy as in the first game. The first game had wild twists and inconsistencies that resulted in it being a lot rougher, but at the same time that resulted in it doing truly unexpected things and going in random directions which could be quite interesting and fun. This game is a lot more predictable and felt overall safer in regards to the themes and topics it touched on without doing anything particularly unique. So I would say that this game is an example of sacrificing originality and sticking to a more tried and true path for improved quality, once again for better or worse. I would also like to note that this game places a much larger emphasis on building the overall lore and plot of the Evenicle series. The first game just kind of threw in there was going to be more to the story at the end as a soft of cliffhanger. This game builds up lore and is constantly hinting at plot elements beyond the scope of the game throughout, with an ending that is much more explicit in conveying where the creators want to take the series going forward. As before, while the plot is important, this is a heavily character focused story with the emphasis being on the protagonist and his wives. This area too, is a mixed bag compared to the first. In terms of the protagonist, I think Alex is a much more interesting and amusing protagonist than Aster. In hindsight Aster was too simple, basically just being a standard shounen protagonist but a super perverted one. Alex is all that too, but he’s also a doctor and a fantastic cook. This is crucial because it gives him a broader set of motivations and just in general adds more spice to his dialogue and interactions which make him feel more like a solid character and not just a blank slate like Aster did. And it really can no be emphasized enough how much this enhances the comedy, resulting in a game that is overall has much more and high quality humor than the first game. In terms of the main heroines, I would have to give the edge to the first game because while the main heroines in this game are all pretty likable as well, none quite reach how awesome Kat in the first game was. However, this game does much better with the side heroines, wherein while they aren’t party members they have a much more significant impact on the plot and all continue to maintain a major presence throughout the main story which results in them overall having a much stronger impression and in general being more likable. I also felt that the first game was too front loaded on heroine’s character arcs and character development, but this game does a much better job by having it more spread out with a lot left to the character events. Thus, overall I’d say that I like the cast and how the writing dealt with the cast much better in this game. The gameplay is mostly the game as the first game, with some minor improvements but also minor detriments. The combat is somewhat better balanced compared to the first game, but incredibly similar and still just as repetitive. It’s a really typical turn based RPG system and though it can have depth, that never really shown up outside of bosses. The main difference is healing, wherein only Alex can use healing spells and they aren’t based on BP like all other skills, but rather MP. While each character gets one BP each turn in combat, MP can only be gained through resting in town or through finding food throughout the world. This gives the game a more dungeon crawler like feel that I enjoyed, though I suppose that’s somewhat subjective. The growth systems are somewhat stranger, in that while levelling is pretty typical with the now rare element that you can only level up in towns, equipment found in chests or looted from monsters will only ever be versions of equipment you’ve already purchased from shops, which is a bit strange but not that big of a deal. The world felt larger and more varied which resulted in it being more fun to explore, especially considering the game did a good job of encouraging it by putting treasure chests and healing spots all over. But at times it also felt too big, mainly due to how there were so many random encounters. The first game was overall much easier so skipping random battles wouldn’t be too much of an issue outside of a spike at the end, but this game has a much more steady difficulty curve which essentially requires you to be doing random battles at the rate it dishes them out. In combination, this results in it feeling like the game is definitely dragging on at times which diminishes the enjoyment of exploration and also somewhat weakens the pacing of the story. One of the major differences in this game as compared to the previous game is the Disease mechanic. Instead of a Wife Event bar, there’s a similar bar that goes up after each battle and when it reaches 100% a party member gains a random disease from a limited set of diseases that gets added to at the beginning of each chapter. These vary tremendously and while most are clear debuffs, some have positives and a few are event straight up buffs. These can be dealt with temporarily through the use of a healing spell, thus using the limited stock of MP, but will come back again after enough battles. To deal with a disease permanently, the player has to return to a town to analyze the disease, which then essentially gives a subquest to find a certain item. After finding that item, the disease can then be cured permanently, which then provides a Medical Record which are used to unlock Wife Events. I much prefer this system over the previous game. Each disease comes with it’s own cutscenes, which are often pretty funny. I also don’t really get the complaint about back tracking to find the items. In the first game, you either had to back track immediately every time your Wife Event bar reached 100% to do an event or you’d likely end up having to grind for Wife Events at the end. Here, the bar just starts from 0% again after a character gains a disease and multiple characters can get diseases, so you have more flexibility on when to deal with them in order to gain medical records. And actually getting the items is super easy due to getting teleport pretty early on. Thus, I would say I enjoyed this system and would prefer something like this to the one in the first game in the next title. As for other side content, there were side quests but just like in the first game they provided absolutely no rewards. Some provided a bit more background info story wise, but most didn’t even do that, nor were they all that amusing, and thus kind of felt like a waste of time. How hard would it be to provide something, even if it’s just XP or Gold? There are also super boss like enemies known as Megamonsters, but it’s kind of unclear when you’re supposed to fight them, as a lot are post game, but a bunch are also supposed to be fought before then, though not when you first encounter them when you’re going through the story. I did a couple, but decided it wasn’t worth it. The 3D graphics are still pretty low budget, but it is what it is I suppose. The art was high quality, even more so than the first game, but inconsistent in style. There were three distinct main styles, by which I mean used for character sprites and CGs. All three were high quality, but having them all intermixed was kind of weird. The character designs were fantastic with great variety and overall I felt they were better than the first game. The soundtrack I also felt was better than the first game, with more variety and a few tracks that really stood out. The OP and ED were both pretty solid in terms of songs and visuals. |
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