Eastward

Short version of the review:

-eccellentgrafic and artistic direction

-lovable and well written characters

-good level design

-great music

-confusing plotline

9- overall.


Long version of the review ahead.


Grafic:

easly still one of the best if not the best pixel art in the market, even after 3 years from the release of the game.

the colours are ALWAYS vibrant, there are a lot of details in EVERY location of the game and the design of the places you visit is ALWAYS phenomenal.

the character have all expressive designes and there are a lot of unique sprites you can see during the development of the plot.

the only (picky) complaint i have is that there are no diagonal sprites for characters, which can lead to some mechaninc poses in game,

but again its a very small and picky problem i have.

10/10


Characters:

the characters are just so lovable and well written.

the character design is great and the writing for them easly holds up.

there is not single character who doesnt have at least 2 layer to their personality and

the games goes as far as giving even more characterization to people you will see once or twice in the game:

the costruction company leader and the 2 brothers were a pain in the ass to have to deal with but at the end you appriciate how much the boss cares about the 2 dumbasses.

at first glance you see Lee as an arrogant mafia boss but then you will recognize how much he does love his city,

malva at first glance can be seen as the light headed princess of the city and just by progressing you get to know her anxiety and struggle given by having her responsability.

those were just a few examples.

the only exception is solomon who has a very confusing and kinda childinsh arc.

8.5


Music:

nothing much to say really, give it a try yourselves,

the cooking giggle is contagious tho, be aware.

9


level design:

even if the dungeons and places you visit are all beautifull, the challenges you have to face and the enigmas are not that hard at all.

the only instances were i would die is were i got stuck in the miasma.

the levels are very creative tho, there is always some new mechanincs you have to come around and some new weapons you can exploit, which are all a lot of fun to use except for the flamethrower.

one of the main complain i have with the level design is the lack of significant non compulsory areas that rewards you significatly.

yeah there are some but they usually are preatty short and they reward you with salt or gear parts.

the game is kinda linear in this sense unfortunatly.

8


Combat:

not excellent but not bad by any means.

i personally played with mouse and keyboard and i had fun.

the enemies are all well designed and have specific counters.

weapons are all fun to use and they all have a proper niche (except the flamethrower as i said).

there are some issues tho:

the way to switch bombs and weapon is very clonky,

there is the possibilty that i didnt fin the key in order to do it but i was honestly quite a pain.

you have to press esc and stop time in order to select the weapon you want, which takes a way the adrenaline of tbe fight.

sam is also pretty useless aswell, there are very few creatures worth blocking and i found way easier to brute-force your way out with john.

as i said, not excellent but not bad

7.5


plot and pacing:
(major spoilers ahead)

the plot is by far the weakest point of the game.

the beginning and setup is incredible and the visually stunning as always.

you really want to know whats this lab you find in the middle of the forest , whats the "harvest", whats the miasma and why was it created.

who is mother? why is the miasma destroying the world? whats eastward?

unfortunatly everyone of those question will get vaguely answered.

for the amount of "useless" dialogue this game has, there is no excuse to have a plot so vague and confusing.

from solomo's quiz we learn that the miasma is was invented to destroy umanity so they cound build a better species, which is very clichè and brought up at 80% of the game completed.

the finale brings more questions than answers and it ends up even contradicting itself in some points.

the pacing was great tho,

it changed from chilled and relaxed to frenetic and anxious multiple times and it never leaves you bored.

the only major issue I have is the monkeywood arc;

i cant express how stupid this arc was, easly the lowest point of the game.

it litterally comes from nowhere and breaks up a very misteryous and full of stake situation we had going on, with isabel nowhere to be found and uncertain of the state of malva.

the level design was also very borign and it being solomon's hideout was so random.

6


even tough the final grade i gave doesnt mathematically add up to the scores i gave in each section i still stand my ground.

i wanted to give this game some extra points because it defently deserves it.

i didnt play this game for the plot in the first place and i had a lot of fun+ the pixel art was too good.

9-


scemo chi legge

a very original yet refreshing take on 90's classic jrpg's. Major Made in Abyss or any other fantastically imaginative insane dark animes.

h

Game has been enjoyable, its a good chill game

I really REALLY wanted to like this game, I've been planning on getting it for over a year, but I just couldn't enjoy it no matter how much I tried. It feels like it takes all the wrong lessons from the SNES era of video games, combining admittedly fresh and exciting new ideas with some of the most tired and boring tropes. Most painful is the insistence on a silent protagonist in a game and narrative that just doesn't support that choice, your main action seems to be ignoring and refusing to talk to a curious and eager child which feels like actual neglect in the worst way if you think about it too much. Maybe I'm over reactive to this but it made me so uncomfortable and bored. I couldn't get invested at all.

Incredible world design and art. Cute story full of mystery and discovery. Combat is not too challenging. The logic puzzles are fun and engaging, especially once you unlock the ability to control both characters at the same time.

Every inch of this game was touched by an artist. I often leave glowing reviews of games I only every play for an hour or two. Just long enough to know it's a good game. Very rarely do I actually play-play a game. This is one of those games. It's just too good to not finish. The characters are awesome, the art and backgrounds and monsters are awesome...this is the kind of game that actually makes me want to dig out the sketch book and draw out of sheer love.

If I woke up next week to a knock on my door, and I opened it and some really serious japanese guys in black suits asked me what the best dev team to remake Secret of Mana or an equally epic RPG legend from my childhood, I would select the team that made this game. It really really is flawless.

You know a game is good when finishing it leaves you questioning your entire existence. It really does touch your heartstrings, in a good and bad way. It was immersive, fascinating, creative, and everything I could possibly ask for in a game. I was so unwilling to part with the game I bought the DLC as well, I hope I can see more games like this in the future! <3

Love the game, everything about it. The style, the story, the characters, everything. Definitely play if you haven't already and I can't wait to start my next play through to get the rest of the achievements. Super fun and story rich post apocalyptic family story with tons of hack and slash killing monsters and figuring out puzzles to continue in the story.

Great art, dialog, characters and story. What more could you ask for?

This game is a masterclass in poor design. There are so many moments late in the game - some of the timed puzzles, the Izzy fight, that are tedious and unlike anything that came before. Really stupid late game, left such a sour taste in my mouth. Would not recommend anyone waste time on this.

Overall a beautiful game.
Beautiful art, lovable characters, nice music, and well built.
The story is written really well, even thought Chapter 6 feels a bit out of place, like it was written to make the game just a tiny bit longer.
However, I think that - if the game is played as it is structured (ie: taking a break before starting new chapters) - this won't be very much noticeable, if at all.
Another thing is achievement tracking, especially for those that revolve around doing all of a certain thing, like discovering recipes, obtaining ingredients, and so on.
Those may become unobtainable in game, and it can become frustrating when trying to find the last few chests you forgot (but you really didn't).
This is the biggest issue I had.
Other than that, I loved the game and I think you'll love it too.

The most beautiful game ever made.

nice art style, good music, fun gameplay, intriguing story and works great on steam deck

yeah.

story's kind of flat and weird tbh didn't really feel immersed in it at all

I love this game :(

its a fun game. the pixel art is really nice and all the places look real cool. the game is pretty easy over all but it tends to ramble when it come to dialogue tho.

good

It has a Cowboy Bebop reference

Of all the games I ever played on Steam, this by far one the best.

one of the most beautiful games i ever played.

This one is a good example of how to create a powerful, story-driven and friendly (some times with challenges) game.
Different places, new friends, persons with their hopes and desires, antagonists from technical-based universe, circle of life all around this world and many more significant parts of what we can call "tough adventure" you'll find in "Eastward".
Besides the story, situations and dialogs here are a lot of pure gameplay:

- Walking in a dungeons to fight enemies and collect artifacts;
- Solve puzzles of different categories: platforming, time-based ("run for your life" for example), searching correct path and more;
- A set of mini-games not hard to deal with, not hardcore. My personal respect goes to developers for this one!
- Game constructed with a smart-switching consept in mind. I mean type of gemaplay switches every time you get tired of the current. A lot of dialogs? Here is a dungeon to explore. Tied of dungeon? Let's move to next plot cutscenes. Next need to replenish supplies with cooking mini-game. I think you get the point.

So, no drawbacks or flaws you will ask? Wrong. Have one. Time to pass the game. 8 chaptes and about 30 -50 hours to complete, like full-time RPG? That is obviously too much. 6 chapters and 30 hours is good balance to satisfy the taste of advanture for the combination of genres used in "Eastward".
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Verdict: 8.5 strong & powerful frying pans from 10 possible. One from the couple of best indie games I've played last 2 years. Recommended!

The visuals are so pretty and it gives massive earthbound vibes, a super pretty game.

Amazing art and storyline

+Cute, colorful pixel graphics
+unique slice-of-life of an adventure

-generic gameplay; Linear levels with incredibly easy puzzles and combat. There is no aspect of the gameplay that makes Eastward unique.
-Boring, unstructured story; most of the characters feel very insignificant and the most of the events in Eastward's adventure seem meaningful in the grand scheme of the story. Much character dialogue makes no sense or is completly irrelevant.
-repetitive soundtrack; some of the songs are pretty good, but others are annoying to listen too and get reused too often.

I played the game a while before the DLC was released, so I can't say anything about the newer content, but as for gameplay:

While I enjoyed the game's wacky, light-hearted adventure (which reminded me of a Studio Ghibli movie) as well as the lovely pixel graphics and some of part of the game's catchy vaporwave/ chiptune-filled soundtrack, the game felt monotonous to play and the story was uninteresting for most of my playthrough. Could be a lot better than this.

Game is bugged. Can't proceed past first area with electric bugs. Maybe some folk can but mine didn't work, and i'm not the only one apparently. Waiting on a refund though its unlikely as Steam have already said say I've owned the game for too long (played it the first time yesterday).

I forgot my own rules when dealing with steam. Try a game and if its crap or bugged to unplayable in the first 10 minutes uninstall and refund. don't even try to bug fix it.

EDIT

I requested a refund and was denied it as i had bought the game too long ago. So despite not trying the game until yesterday (14th Oct24) Steam staff decided i should not have a refund.

So £13 got me 17 minutes of gameplay! Good value!

I then looked up the forum for help, if i'm stuck with the game surely there's a fix for it? Steam surely would not sell a game that has bugs making it unplayable.

Turns out like a lot of games of steam it has a lot of bugs however what i noticed is that after a certain time there is little to no input from the devs regarding bug fixes. Seems after the game got released on Switch they sort of abandoned this version.

But i digress. I continued my search on the discussion pages for anyone else with the bug and the only mention is a thread from a month back from somebody with the exact game breaking bug.

They posted it in the regular discussion board and bug an feedback and have had no reply except from me.

So despite steam staff directing me to forums for help its obvious there will be none.

So that leaves one recourse. Re-install the game and try to play it again up to that part. See if it bugs out this time or not. This will add more time to my time that is still under 2 hours (17 minutes).

I'll update this again when i try it again. Whenever that will be. Don't have the heart to do it at the moment. Not even sure if i wanna continue purchasing from steam. Its been a disappointing experience.

Bought the game day one, OST and DLC, full price.
Have to say the obvious, great pixel art, music - style in general. BUT the painful part is the gameplay it self. Like yeah, look at all of those environments, people and enemies, but don't mind the flat story. There is a lot of filler dialogue, sometimes games do it for the lore dump into your brain, but it felt like many empty sentences. Story feels painfully quantity over quality.
God f***ing damn it, I understand John is silent protagonist, but I wanted at least him to scream sometimes. Say something, Add something. just don't stand here.

Ending thoughts:
This is a repeat of Owlboy: twinstick adventure, amazing artstyle and music, but the story felt flat.
Soundtrack was sometimes mismatched to the mood or just too energetic or too... sharp in intense moments. I think if some tracks were toned down it would fit more.
I'm gonna pull myself up to replay it one day, maybe even before the end of 2025 and if I will be wrong I will update the review in terms of replay value.

Took me back to the old CRT monitor gaming days

Level design is creative

Sound design is memorable

I liked until chapter 3, Then I turned out kinda boring, and the story was not as interesting. The last chapter was soooo hard to finish with those "loops"

Good pixel art tho, and the characters are pretty charming, and that intro was a 10/10.


I kinda recommend it but not.

First of all, the game looks amazing. The artwork is just top notch, and it provides a lot of nostalgia without losing it's own identity.

As for the story, it's alright. It's not the deepest plot out there, but the characters are fun. The only issue I have with it is that the game is very eager to throw cutscenes at you. Which doesn't really work when the actual gameplay isn't that deep either.

Eastward's gameplay is alright. You start out with a basic weapon and get a few more while progressing. And the game lets you switch between Jon and Sam on for combat and puzzle purposes, which is a neat mechanic. Combat itself is fairly simple, and doesn't really change besides getting a few ranged weapons at your disposal.

Overall, Eastward is a good game. One that is elevated due to its visual charm. With decent gameplay, and occasional pacing issues.

its one of the best game ı played but between the saves it really long

This game changed my life

I loved this one. incredible charm and a deep story. it's hard not to like the charisma of it all. it was originally billed as an earthbound-type game but it's really only similar in quirks and humor. gameplay is more zelda action adventure.

I really liked the game but the end felt a too long (the theatre train part and the end). I would prefer it to be a bit shorter.
But it's still worth it! (and beautifull)

Eastward is one of those games that keeps you guessing. Every corner you turn there's a surprise. And the plots of the story, wow, just amazing. Would recommend 10/10

Gorgeous pixelart and charming music. The plot kinda gets off the rails later in the game but still a worthwhile play

It finally got a little challenging at the end! The linear gameplay, confusing story, and repetitive tropes "The bad guy is in a mecha suit!" till the very end took a lot away from some of the really good parts (the cooking for health points, the art, the really cute relationships).

I bought it because i liked the art ,i knew it's not a greate game from start, and i wasn't wrong! i don't recommend it at full price.

I can't recommend this game enough! This is a definitive must play to anyone who loves a engaging adventure with incredible characters and so much beautiful places, so different and uniques. The gameplay has the perfect balance of challenge and the way you engage with a variety of gimmicks is very fun.
There wasn't any character that wasn't great, it's impossible not to feel a strong attachment to them throughout the adventure, specially Sam, Alva and Daniel are incredible characters that always put a smile on my face. And the way the narrative progresses giving you little hints of what is happening just to create more curiosity and make you want to understand everything... I simply loved every aspect of this game.

Eastward is an action RPG that reminds me of games of the genre from the SNES days, in good ways and bad. The story and dialogue is a little simplistic. Overall it's very linear; there's no going back as the story progresses. There's a little game-within-the-game side quest that I didn't have the patience to bother with, and it's not necessary to the story at all, just for completionists. There's a cooking system for you to create healing and buffing items, but it's not explained very well. Even when you know recipes, it doesn't tell you what kind of effects it will have, so you're pretty much just cooking at random most of the time. The weapon and gear upgrades require parts that can only be found in treasure chests, which is annoying if you don't find everything.

That said, it's still a decent game. The two characters you control have their own individual abilities that get unlocked as the story progresses. In many parts of the game you have to solve puzzles by splitting up and using their powers separately. There's one kind of annoying stealth section in the game, and one escape segment. I found the boss battles to be engaging and even somewhat challenging in places, as it wasn't always obvious what you had to do. The pixel graphics are nostalgic, the music is pretty good. If you're in the mood for a throwback action RPG, and you have the time, it's worth a play.

Delightful art and music but gameplay and dialogue are just kind of boring

I love this Game, this game make me fall in love with gaming again... I want this kind of experience, today AAA games, have forgoten their meaning, games want to sell, but i want an aventure, i want meaning and i got that from eastward, this game make My heart biger

Art is slay. Story-line is slay. Music is slay. Characters is slay. John is my favorite househusband. There's a variety of diff skills and things you can do. Beautiful. 10/10

Could not give a rats ass what people say about the pacing, I loved this game to its core. Loved all the wacky dialogue from all the characters you meet. Oldman dad and daughter stories will always be peak.

John <3

I was really disappointed with this game. The art style and sprites are truly beautiful but the untested feeling game systems and what feels like unpolished combat just made the game not that fun to play and harder to come back to every time I stopped playing. Additionally the world building and story left a lot to be desire. It felt like the creators just kept on adding elements to the game without actually creating probable reason and cohesion for them to all be there. Things aren't explained and the silent protagonist ends up hurting the experience more than anything. Basically nothing is ever explained or well explained and the epilogue was very disappointing and elaboration nothing that happened throughout the game. I do have to say I thought the Boss fights were really interestingly designed and I enjoyed them, although they rarely had visual cues so I felt like I was flailing around wasting resources occasionally because the game didn't show enough to teach you how to battle a boss. The enemies also got boring with time and reused with different sprites later on in the game. While it looks really good and the visuals are very well polished I cannot in good consciousness recommend this game, I would refund it if I could have or simply have never bought it in the first place, I was left disappointing and feeling like I had wasted my time by the end.

I wish Steam could give a neutral rating because this game is really a mixed bag.
I'll try to be fair and give both the negative and positive. The main problem is a big one, but afterwards I'll show what I did like.

Main problem
---------------
Everything is held back by a horrendous pacing issue. Someone needs to keep the narrative designer in check because the man is a maniac. They've added the functionality to fast forward through conversations/cut scenes and at a certain point I made the conscious decision to keep that button pressed during 90% of the dialogue. I'm sad to say that even though I skipped all of that dialogue, I was still perfectly able to follow the story. If I were to distill the pacing into a Gen Z sentence, it would be a resounding "Bro's yapping".

The absurdity was raised to another level when, in the penultimate chapter of the story, I was still asked to play mailman and deliver letters to 3 random people in town.

When I'm asked in a game where it feels like the length has been stretched artificially, to repeat certain tasks over and over again...well, it feels like a slap in the face.

The absolute audacity to force me to do errands after I've been skipping 20min of dialogue. It shows a total lack of respect regarding my time.

So...why did I finish it?
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The artwork is absolutely exceptional. I've never seen pixel art as atmospheric and beautiful as in this game. Level; character and boss design were next-level. Even though the combat lacked diversity and I found it overall to be easy, I enjoyed solving the puzzles and I applaud the creativity shown during the 'dungeons' in the final chapters. It's just a shame that only 10% of players will experience it...

In the end I found the story to be pretty ok, but it's held back by the pacing. Without the fast forward button, I would've never had the patience to finish this. The way they explain things in the end, could've been resolved better. They really had to trim the fat and I hope they'll learn from this mistake for their next game. That's why I still recommend this game. Because the talent in artistry and game design is clearly visible here and I want them to get enough funds to learn from this and make an exceptional game next.

Wow...

I've sunk 13 hours into this creation. What do I say?

I've thought a lot about how I would phrase this, and here goes...

It’s clear to me that the creators of this game had a story to tell, but not so much a game to create. When there is gameplay, it's quite fun, and the music is amazing. But this game is 70% story and dialogue. The last six hours of my gameplay felt like a fight against my attention span, with a constant internal argument as I tried my best to just finish the game. I made it to Chapter 6 and finally couldn't continue. I just wanted to get back to the main story and finish the game, but there are endless scripts and side missions forced into the experience.

I simply couldn’t do it anymore. It became mind-numbing, and I started hating every second.

If you're someone who loves a lot of dialogue and wants a wacky animated movie that you get to play occasionally, this is the adventure for you. As for me, I'm just exhausted.

I love this game the pixal-art the characters the game play but I'm conflicted about the story it's harsher than what I was anticipating but overall i'll go with a thumbs up

Great RPG, give it a shot. Cute with dark undertones and interesting gameplay