Evan's Remains Critic Reviews

Evan’s Remains is a beautiful, cleverly designed experience with themes that stretch far beyond its premise of a girl on a mission in uncharted territory. Spending time with it made me ponder the nature of gameplay and of how storytelling is used in games in a way few others have.

Evan's Remains is one of the little surprises of the year. A beautiful game in every way, with great puzzle design which, at the end of the day, leaves us with a memorable experience due to the story and its characters. I can only recommend it.

A beautiful and breathtaking puzzle platformer full of heart, charm and quality level design. A game everyone should have on their radar.

Evan's Remains is an example of a very atmospheric story that makes great use of pixel graphics, music, and puzzles for maximum immersion. And although the project is completed in three hours – it is clearly worth it, although the ending may not please everyone because of its final plot twist.

I can’t over-emphasise how pretty it all is. The backgrounds are wonderful, the meticulously detailed character animations on par with the best I’ve seen. That the vast majority of this game, including not just the art and writing but also its fabulous music, is all by one guy, is astounding.

It's a shame to take great graphics and an interesting premise and ultimately squander them, but that doesn't mean Evan's Remains is absolutely horrible. Given a bit of tweaking it could have been great. As it stands, it's an iniquity you can finish in a couple of hours if you're great at puzzles. Just don't expect to get too engrossed.

While the overly convoluted plot devolves into a straight visual novel near the end, until then you’ll be drawn in by the intuitive gameplay, vibrant side-scrolling world and the intriguing mystery that make Evan’s Remains such a satisfying puzzle platformer.

A fancy title must always be attached to a fancy game. Evan's Remains has a certain quality of intrigue to it that is evident from first glance. Gorgeous pixel detail, an isolated environment, and a keen focus on human psychology and heart. Suffering from some issues with landing the endpoint and gameplay prowess, it will inevitably be a selective title for many, notably those with the mindset that story always goes before gameplay. But for those looking for a thought-provoking, immersive game that costs less than a standard theater ticket, the search for Evan is definitely filling in those aspects.

Evan's Remains is fine — at least initially. The mix of visual novel-like cut scenes and platform puzzling is a good combo, and those who aren't too keen on the platforming part can take solace in the fact that they can skip those portions without penalty. However, the predictable nature of the tale lessens the story's impact, and the small number of puzzles doesn't provide much for action-oriented players to chew on. It is a short experience that seems appropriately priced ($7) for what you're getting, but this title won't stick with you after the credits roll.

The scarcity of the game’s puzzles is frustrating, because, slight repetition aside, every one of those puzzles is cleverly designed.