Evoland takes you through the history of the (J)RPG

Ludum Dare 24 winner Evoland's central theme took you through an evolving game world that started as an 8-bit monochromatic Zelda like dungeon crawler, and ended as a flash game styled Zelda like dungeon crawler. Admittedly it wasn't sweeping in its scope, but what can you expect from a game made in 48 hours. Now Evoland is set to be revisited and expanded with a far more dramatic evolutionary path.

It seems to focus more on the Japanese side of RPG development, but it's still a neat concept, and that final shot of a fully 3D village suggests a beautiful conclusion to the humble sprite-based adventure. The original version had plenty of tongue-in-cheek digs at RPG tropes, and, according to the game's description, it seems this update plans to do the same:

"Inspired by cult series like Zelda and Final Fantasy, Evoland will take you from monochrome to full 3D graphics and from active time battles to real time boss fights, all with plenty of humor, and references to many classic games."

Evoland is due for release in "Q1 2013" (or, in Earth time, between now and March). There's a Greenlight listing here , and you can play the original game here .

Thanks, IndieGames .

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.