This exercise in the beauty of asymmetrical gameplay really comes into its own when you take into account the environmental foes that both sides have to deal with. Wildlife comes in many forms throughout the maps of Evolve. Slow and dimwitted Crowbill Sloths wander lazily through the flora, which itself is capable of chewing upon a Hunter’s face, while packs of Trapjaws bring down their prey in the shadow of lumbering Nomads. All of these creatures pose a threat to Hunters in the same way as they offer a boon to Monsters.
Let’s say, for example, you start a game of Evolve as the Kraken. From the very beginning, your goal is to feed on as much fauna as possible to evolve into a stronger version of yourself and replenish your armor value. This armor can be depleted by fighting either wildlife or players and is replenished by eating whatever you’ve killed. To stop fights going on forever though, your health as a Kraken (or indeed any Monster) cannot be rebuilt. This gives the Hunters a fighting chance should you be adept at running away. It might sound a tad harsh on the Monster but it’s actually an incredibly fair system and adds to the constant need to progress which Evolve fosters in your heart.
Other factors like the methods a Monster has for it to sneak around unnoticed twinned with minor assistance offered to Hunters in the form of scattering birds or tracks create a constant air of dread for both parties. The same can also be said for things like the buffs gained from wildlife which can help both groups spear onward to success. There’s plenty here to applaud in design but there’s one aspect of it which really makes the moment to moment gameplay worth experiencing.
The player is given a toolbox with plenty of applications, rather than a single set of spanners which only turns one or two nuts.
Savvy Hunters will find that sound is their best friend, while others will take heed from the beautiful lighting effects of Evolve to spot what their quarry is doing and where it is. A Wraith’s ability to instantly zip across the field of play and explode sounds like a simple damaging attack, but can be put to good use as an additional escape tool or a way to attract Hunters into your clutches. It’s not necessarily a game where you fight other people in a skill-based melee of combat. Evolve is a sandbox for players to test their wits against one another to see who will come out top of the food chain.
Speaking of chains, progressing through Evolve‘s leveling system is a little hit and miss. You could play for upwards of 10 hours and never unlock a handful of the Hunters. If you choose to exclusively play as the Goliath when given the option to be a Monster, you will never even see the option to play as a Wraith since it’s only unlocked in the Kraken’s progression tree. This is because Evolve takes the route less traveled by giving you so many reward paths to go down that you’ll easily lose track.
You can hit level 14 within 10 or so hours of play, and by now you’ve unlocked a bunch of new perks to play with and a couple of shiny profile art pieces. Your leveling as a specific Hunter class or Monster type is itself a whole new kettle of fish. This isn’t a huge problem when looking from the outside in. Turn the tables though and it’s incredibly hard to keep track of how you’re actually doing without keeping your eyes locked on the screen after a 15 minute monster mash in which you got eaten about the face four times while your Assault buddy was walking into a wall.
Actually, no, that’s a rare sight.
You see, Evolve‘s maps are beautiful, but not in their visual extravagance because they all seem to use the same color palette and have as much graphical differentiation between them as the individual cookies in any packet. They are designed using some sort of witchcraft which, when paired up with the subtle markers given to Hunters, does a fine job of funneling the team into the same place without the need for heavy constraints. Of course you will come across that one utter dingus who thinks he can take on anything with his Laser Cutter but luckily, at least for the majority of the time, the maps of Evolve push people in the right direction at the right time.
As fun as the standard Hunt mode is, it does become a little boring after a few hours of constantly fighting the same sort of battle; however, with Evolve‘s Evacuation mode there’s a glimmer of sunshine on the horizon of an otherwise dark day. This mode tasks both sides with a romp through five different battles towards a final end scenario which plays out as a sort of tower defense. In this section of the game there are three additional game types which serve to brighten up Evolve, with Rescue being a personal favorite, along with a power struggle which grants benefits to both teams through the Evacuation campaign.
