I’m usually not a big fan of comparing video games to one another. However, when I saw Everhood I was instantly reminded of one of the best indie titles of the decade, visually as well as because of the quirky nature of this game. Take one look at the game’s art direction and you’ll know I’m talking about Toby Fox’s Undertale. This instant connection my brain made doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing, as long as Everhood is more than just a game that looks like Undertale. Luckily, it definitely is.

Upon playing the game, I was glad that I didn’t write it off as a copy of one of my favorite games of all time. The psychedelic trip through the dreamscape that is Everhood was, in all honesty, quite the delight. Though it is not without its own flaws either.

In Everhood, you play as the character referred to as “Red”, a wooden doll in the search of his stolen arms. That is quite an interesting premise to begin with. Almost instantly, Red starts his journey and begins wandering through this quirky yet eerie world while encountering all sorts of odd characters, each with their own charm. Some of them are more unique than others, but overall it is a very interesting cast of creatures.

A lot of these characters function as the game’s enemies. While Everhood calls itself an RPG, the combat encounters in this game reminded me more of a game like Guitar Hero than it did any other game with a roleplaying focus. The encounters here are all their own stage of a rhythm game, most of them with a unique gimmick.

Calling these encounters “fights” would be a bit misleading because that’s not really what you do. Since Red lost his arms, he doesn’t really have any means of fighting back, so all he does is dodge or jump over the oncoming music notes in the form of a couple of variations of crescent shapes on a grid. One fight has you up against an ATM while trying to withdraw money to get into a club. Another one makes you go on a drug-induced trip with a bunch of mushrooms in a forest.

The encounters themselves are quite difficult. Getting hit by one of the “notes” makes you lose a certain amount of health depending on your difficulty setting. On the higher settings, it can take no more than two hits and you’re out. You then have to either start the encounter all over or restart from a checkpoint. There is no way of manually healing yourself during a fight either. The way it works is that once you’ve lost health, if you don’t get hit for a couple of seconds, it starts filling up again. I think that is a good way of handling things. Adding healing items or abilities into the mix would’ve made the already very hectic encounters even more chaotic.

Changing the difficulty after death (or just in general) doesn’t change the fight itself. The notes stay the same, but they deal less damage to Red. Even on easier difficulties, it’s still not an easy task. However, it is somewhat more forgiving than the harder difficulties that are recommended by the developers. I would’ve personally liked a more distinct difference between the different difficulties available in the game, to make it that much more accessible.

The game isn’t just one encounter after another, however. There are good amounts of story bits between each musical fight, as well as some fun minigames that are occasionally thrown into the mix. One example is a racing game which is almost as fun as the usual encounters, albeit really hard to beat. Or maybe I’m just not very good at racing. Either way, these minigames are a lot of fun and add a welcome variety.

One of my favorite aspects of Everhood is definitely the soundtrack. Each of the almost 100 tracks is unique and there is not a single bad one among them. This is definitely a positive parallel to Undertale because both games’ soundtracks are incredible and definitely worth listening to when you’re not going to play the games. The tracks during the encounters are definitely the most memorable, which makes sense, given you can get stuck on an encounter for quite some time. After all, you wouldn’t want to get bored after hearing it just a couple of times.

Overall, Everhood was a very enjoyable experience that took me about six to seven hours to finish. That being said, the game does seem to have different endings depending on the choices you make on your journey. A certain amount of replayability definitely exists for those that want to see every nook and cranny of the game. Despite being somewhat short, it’s definitely worth its price.

A Nintendo Switch review copy of the game was provided by Foreign Gnomes for this review.

Phenixx Gaming is everywhere you are. Follow us on Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.

Also, if you’d like to join the Phenixx Gaming team, check out our recruitment article for details on working with us.

Phenixx Gaming is proud to be a Humble Partner! Purchases made through our affiliate links support our writers and charity!

Everhood

$14,99 USD

9

Score

9.0/10

Pros

• Amazing soundtrack
• Unique encounters
• Multiple Endings

Cons

• Harsh difficulty