Darwin's Rolling in His Grave! Let's play EVO: Search For Eden!

I think Mr. Leetspeak named them, not the programmers. Kinda like he named one of the others "Pants"

I've already got a big amphibian body in my current playthrough, so I wanna see what you'll do with the little guy.

It's not easy being green, but it's also the proper color for an amphibian.

As we all know, Dodong0 dislikes sm0ke, you're only just getting used to breathing now, so you don't need a handicap like THAT.

Small and green all the way.

Waaaaaaaaaaah!

I want more.

Hopefully an update tonight. Work, vacation-prepping, and prepping work for my vacation have been delaying me.

man, your username must be a bitch to type every time.

shivam is some lesser lifeform that has never heard of auto-complete or things like "remember me/keep me logged in" checkboxes. Thus, he is fit only for eating, and using his weak powers to fuel our own evolution.

Eh, typing it for a decade has it on speedy muscle memory. Every other key being a number makes for a simple rhythm, until the satisfying "t5" finale. That said...

Sorry for the delay between updates, folks. We took a wrong turn in the Time-Trans while trying to meet up with Gaia, our destined other.


Ahhhh!!! Wrong Enix interpretation of Gaia!!!


Phew! That's more like it. I'll take atmosphere-haired nude anime Gaia over disembodied stone nightmare head Gaia any eon.
I kid. IoG FTW!

We've come a long way in a short time, folks! 150 million years have passed, and in that time we consistently evolved into the dominant species of the seas, and then helped rebellious algae create an atmopshere we could breathe! Seeing that we would only continue to destroy everything before us, Gaia decided to give us an automatic pass on the next 150 million, and tossed us in a warp zone to a more interesting time period.

The next stage is the
age of Amphibians.
Amphibians, Ikustega
and Insects which
were the first to
arrive have already
lived on land.
There should be a lot
of large plants
growing there, but
something is wrong.



Something is impeding the fertility of our dear Gaia! We cannot abide this! "Early Creatures of Land" doesn't have the ring to it most of the other eras do. I guess they couldn't really pull off running with the "Amphibian Age" when this world has only one water stage. As such, most everyone just ends up refering to this as "the lizard chapter" or somesuch. Most of the references to actual creatures and events we experienced in chapter one were events from the Devonian Period of the Paleozoic Era, which is the time when life began to really move to land. Unfortunately, the Devonian Period didn't actually take place in the time period Chapter 1 was assigned. The dates we now receive for Chapter 2 place it mostly in the Permian Period, the end of the Paleozoic Era. This is the period most associated with Pangaea, making our entering it at the Coast of Pange semi-accurate.

Aside from the one water stage (which will be to our left), you can see we have a sparse setting for our first land chapter. Some arid greenery on the left, a rocky region to the right, and desert to the north. Truth be told, the Permian Period is thought to have had a gigantic desert in the northern hemisphere of inner Pangea. This chapter is a little more interesting than the last, but it's only slightly longer. As in the last chapter (and all), we begin atop the starting stage, and must leap into it before we are allowed any map-roaming.

The stage here is once again the Coast of Pange. Yes, we can return to our old kingdom! Or not, as you can see us stunned in agony as we slam face-first into the wall of plot. Actually, I'll note this now: In Chapter 1, we could leave almost any stage whenever we pleased, and it would simply count as not clearing it. In this chapter, once you enter stage left, the only way you're leaving is stage right. Makes each stage more of a commitment, I guess. Though, to be fair, most of this chapter's stages are so basic this isn't much of a chore.


Well, if we can't head back to the ocean, at least we can hop into the wading pool below. We enjoyed choking on air in chapter 1, maybe we an give drowning a try this time! Sadly, no, leaping in water simply causes your body to morph into a more aquatic mode. Let's us pull off our Kerokero? pseudonym better, I think. But enough playing around, time to get back to eating everything on Gaia's Green Earth (newly green). These hermit crabs, however, turn out to pretty much be like the plants of last chapter - an immobile health restore. There will be edible plants in this chapter as well, and many stranger things for us to munch on to heal as the game goes on. More importantly... What's that behind us? Just like in Chapter 1, our first stage gives us a yellow crystal! Let's hurry to devour it and see what wisdom it imparts!


"EVO tip."
Welcome to the world
of Amphibians!
If you evolve your
tail, you will
increase your jumping
ability and your HP.

Keeping it briefer than past informative yet edible jewels, this one simply informs us of the merits of enhancing our tails. Namely, reminding us that our ability to jump now has some worth in the game. There are in fact numerous places in the later game in which you will find your paths through a level inhibited if your jumping ability is lacking. But, hey, we're the supreme creature of the sea! Air is great for breathing and all, but why should I worry about swimming through the sky?

That wraps up all there is to this tiny stage, but returning to the world map shows a delightful new introduction of this chapter: multiple stages to choose from! As I know the top stage is a dead-end, I'm going to happily march to that route, because this would be a horribly short update if I teased by asking TT which way to go.


And our optional stage is the Empty Land. Well, it looks quite populated to my eyes, which are conditioned to viewing "a world covered by endless water." But, its just plants, such as these edible venus fly traps. We devour them all. Can't risk having to battle the plant kingdom as well! But, the stage is just an empty field otherwise, true to it's name. However, as we continue our promenade, we suddenly overhear voices from the heavens! Seems the game was sick of having us listen in on the plant gossip?

You hear someone
whispering in the air
above you.

Whisper A:
"Captain! The Green
Crystal has the power
to change your body
back to the way it
was before, doesn't
it?"

Whisper B:
"Ye-----s!"

Whisper A:
"But Captain, isn't
it wrong to operate
the process in
reverse? This
Crystal must be bad
for the Evolution
process."

Whisper B:
"Absolutely not!"

Whisper A:
"I will not take
responsibility for
anything that
happens."

Whisper B:
"-----It is still
good for the future of
this planet------"

And ahead, we find the game's last type of crystal. The mint-flavored green variety, which reverses evolution. Yeah, we can just think of it as age-reduction cream for our lovely Gaia's complexion. You know, sprinkle a few devolved creatures here and there so she has a younger look to her. What I want to know is what problem the "Captain" has.


How... how do you say that? Anyways, these mysterious figures will actually be hanging around for the whole game, and are our first exposure to the main plot, so get used to them. Meeting them will be for a later chapter, though.


After eating the green crystal, "Review of Evolution" is now on our in-stage menu. Huh, wasn't that only on the world map menu before? Well, the function here is different - it allows us to revert to any evolution which we have made a record of! And so, Pants is born again! However, as Pants was a crystal evolution, he has no land form, and stays as he was. We crawl upon the earth like a disgustingly slow snake, meaning that we have to jump non-stop if we want to make any sort of progress at all. Hmm... Maybe this wasn't such a good move... Should've made a record of our ultimate form... Ah! But wasn't the other stage we had the option of going to an aquatic stage? Huzzah!


Tee-hee, seeing our yellow fish body scoot about the world map on land amuses me. At any rate, our destination to the left is the Ocean of Pange. This will be our only water stage in this world, but we'll be sure to take advantage of it! Leaping back into the familiar embrace of the waves, we set forth to re-assert are superiority over the denizens of the deep. However, all we find are these silly lobe-finned creatures. Are these the masters of the deep that have arisen in our absence!? We set forth to devour!


But, we are still in the era of the game where nearly every stage has its own dialogue, and this one is no exception!

Coelafish:
"Um....
We are Coelafish.
It is very difficult
for us to evolve or
fight against other
creatures.
So, we stay as we
are."

I think that might have been some pathetic form of begging for their lives! However, it identified these fellows as the Coelacanth, which I think is pretty well known these days as a prehistoric fish long thought extinct. It was also believed to be the missing link between fish and tetrapods until 1938. We had the option of getting their "Hands & Feet" fins in the last chapter, but skipped over them, which it is now clear we were right to. These guys seems pathetic! They just slowly drift about, seeming to be totally ignorrant of the rules of the world our jellyfish instructor informed us of! He said we must evolve! He said the strong would devour the weak! Curiously, you take 3 points of collision damage with these guys, but only 2 from their jaws. But, you'll be taking more of the former, as these guys seem to target your backside, meaning that more than any enemy prior (I believe), they strive to sit atop you. Fortunately, we have quite a large health reservoir for dealing with them!


Hrm... or, maybe not... Yes, the green crystals, too, provide only a temporary change in evolution. Don't stress my wasting it, though. We'll have no reason to want to be an aquatic creature for the rest of this chapter, and we'll have another green crystal by the time any real desire for past evolution presents itself. Amusingly, since I was in my land form when I used the crystal, we get to ever so briefly be our land form underwater. Since we were dashing when the green crystal's power failed us, we actually get to "run" through the water a few steps before mysterious time flux capacitance trades in our legs for fins. This was a delightful surprise for me.


Unfortunately, we no longer have the health to trade blows with these guys. Especially when we no longer have the speed to efficiently disentangle our noble form from their lowly vessels. Lastly, these guys only give 4 EVO.P each. These guys are absolutely worthless to spend any iota of time on at all. As they won't attack you unless you attack them first, there's truthfully no reason for you to do anything but swim across the stage without event. I suppose this stage can be thought of as a lesson that it is not always worth attacking everything. But I still wanna'... At any rate, the sea has become a slum in our absence. Let's get back to dominating the land. That's where the real money's at!

We're upgrading to Super Stagenauts, now with adjectives! Finally, our first land adversary, in the form of the timid Ichthyostega. Unacceptable, as they emerged in the late Devonian, which we left behind when we hopped in the Time-Trans. They know their number is up, and flee from us as soon as we approach! Bwa-ha-ha, I hope their tasty cartoon meats are as nutritious as that of the last chapter's token scaredy creature!


Get too close, or actually land a hit, and suddenly they brandish an onslaught of tongues! RUN AWAY!!!! However, we have an ace up our sleeve! One detail I'd completely forgotten about this game is that in classic platformer tradition, enemies will take damage from your jumping on them. This is probably our ideal form of attack for these guys, since they have no anti-air tactics. It's especially fun to find a line of them and bounce from one to the other. However! You can only bounce on each enemy once per jump. Should you try to bounce on any enemy a second time before touching the gorund, you'll simply take collision damage, as seen in the last screen above. Hopping around on things can be quite fun, having the pleasant side effect of us amassing a decent bit of EVO.P from these critters before we even realize it. (They give 10 EVO.P each, but I lucked out on 2 super meats).


Yet another new aspect of the game presents itself! Henceforth, the game will regularly cycle between day and night, because, as any scientist can tell you, the spread of oxygen allowed the passage of time to take place! The main aspect of the game's day/night system is that many creatures change their behavior depending upon the time of day. For instance, the timid Ikustega decided to take a nap, snoring adorably disgusting little snot bubbles, that just make us want to eat them all up! So we do. Unfortunately, our jaws are still too weak to take these guys out in one chomp, and they remain awake and as panicked as usual once we've had a taste. Happily, unlike the terrorfish from last chapter, alerting one does not alert the rest, and the injured fellow will rush right past his sleeping friends, leaving them as bait to get us off his trail.


As dawn approaches, and we happily lick our lips from our late night snack, a new challenger appears! What the heck is this thing!? It swims through the skies! How dare it look down on us from up there! We'll give it such a thrashing! Or, we would if we could get up there! Our undeveloped tail leaves us earthbound, and even using one of the local lizards as a springboard fails to earn us the air we need to pluck our first insect encounter from the sky. Dragonflies of this period were in the Order Odonata, which was the dominant aerial predator of these times. These ones just fly back and forth, pretty much just being scenery for us in our current state.


This seems like about the time for an evolution, but since we've gone so long without an update, let's go ahead and try to tackle one more stage. This one is the land of "bull" Ikustega. Just looks like the last stage with a green palette swap for the loser lizards. Although, once we get close to these ones, they seem to run towards us rather than away, which makes them even more pathetic than the last - OW!


RUN AWAY!!!! Don't look into their terrible eyes of fury!!! This definitely calls for evolution time! On that note, you'll notice "Hands & Feet" isn't available this chapter, but "Back of the head" is. we received no description of this option from the yellow crystal, but that's because the abilities received from evolving that part of the body vary considerably with each selection.



You'll notice we have a few more options this time around, and that the number of choices we have are not limited to a single screen. Don't worry, though. The options pushed off-screen here don't really matter for us. Just the unselectable "Decrease body size" and "Remove" dorsal fin. More interestingly, you can see that we have multiple "final" evolutions in several cases, presenting alternatives depending upon what sort of stats you want to go for. Sadly, there's no way of knowing what stats each evolution provides until you've invested in it. So, what'll it be, folks? But before you decide, I must ask you...


Could you bear to part with this adorable face?

Yes. Yes you could. Ugly frog face.

Wow, this is really turning out to be a great read!

I say we need some ass-kicking power. Grow that jaw! Grow it!

I'd go for Ikustega's jaws. They may alter your adorable face, but the attack boost will help you grind up an EVO-P buffet from those stupidly cute Ichtyostega. You'll have your own thorny spring tail in no time!

Also, you gotta get the Wooper upgrade for the back of your head. After Pokémon Gold/Silver and Dragon Quest IX, I think not going wooper is punishable by biscuit punching. =P

dual horns!!!

Fierce Jaws, Jumping Dorsal Fin, Thorny Spring Tail, Morimar, Armor Body, and Dual Horns in that order. I like bite then mobility- a great way to get by early on.

Those dragonflies are mocking us.
"Look at that silly amphibian try and reach us", they say.
We should teach them a lesson.
Tails improve jumping.
Evolve a kangaroo tail.

This made me laugh out loud. You gotta watch out for that Will jerk.

Because I am an unusually merciful LP reader, I suggest some getting some tail to improve your mobility.

You always recommend getting some tail!

I'm not seeing the problem here...

It's an upward spiral. Getting more tail improves your mobility, improving your mobility allows you to get more tail, etc. It's a win-win!

Get horny!

This is such a fun LP.

Go for the tail! Eat those bats!

Tail!

Duodenum!

No Duodenums until chapter 3, friend. You'll have to keep relying on MGS2 for your fix. Pervert.

Get yourself a decent set of jaws. This stage of the game is probably my least favorite because you start off so slow and weak with few decent enemies to farm for EVO points. Upping your jaw damage so you can one-shot the ikustegas helps immensely.

The fully-evolved amphibian is an incredible monstrous hellbeast, screw cuteness.

Thats why we all love em... Cuteness in this game is nothing compared to destructive force >=D

Just announcing that I am back from vacation times, and updates will therefore by resuming. Should be up tomorrow, methinks.

That Percyphibian is kind of cute.

Yeah, I was hoping Percyphibian would look... kinda' stupid. But it did not go as planned. Yay?

Oh, yeah, I was trying to post music, wasn't I?
Amphibian's Land
I hate this song so much!


And so, this time TT votes Tail > Jaw. I'll resist making a dirty joke.
This yields the following improvements:
* Hit Points +3 (20 > 23)
* Strength +2 (01 > 03)
* Jumping +2 (01 > 03)

Honestly, on every play through I've ever done, my pattern for the first two chapters has been to get the first jaws, then the first tail, maybe first dorsal fine, then just play with that, slowly grinding for the final evolution of everything.


And, turns out I could probably forego the jaws in the early parts of this chapter. The ram is a tad more awkward to use, but it allows me to dispatch these fellows just as quickly once I get the pattern down. In addition to their primary lunging bite attack, these bull "ikustega" can also pounce upon me, as I was doing to their timid brethren earlier. I could counter suit, but, as the
jump still only does 1 damage, it just leaves me open for a counter-attack, as their damage animation ends before I hit the ground.



For whatever reason, these guys started to look kinda' cute to me as I was murdering them (I may have problems), so I made some quick little GIFs for your viewing pleasure.


And, oh, look, it's our little Odonata friend! At last! We can pluck this usurper from the skies! Though apparently, getting close enoguh to bite it without taking collision damage is a bit tricky... Like any airborne thing in E.V.O, upon taking damage, it falls straight to the gorund in a cartoony fashion.


Hey, wait, come ba~~~ck!!! Unfortunately, we're cursing our frog mouth now, as we cannot ram while jumping, and catching the little suckers again once we've landed one blow on them can be a bit tricky. Perfectly possible, just a tad annoying at times. The Bull Ikustega give 15 EVO.P a pop, while the Odonata gives 30. Bu, again, killing 2 of them is quicker and simpler than going for the aerial foe, though this would probably be otherwise with better jaws. But, this is boring, eh? Let's move on to our next prey. Hopefully, Land of lethargic Ikustega.


"Get off mah lawn!"
I doubt the elder is elder than I.
Land of Amphibians is kind of... redundant at this point?
Oh, hey, look, this chapter's first creature to make it into more than one level.


But this level does have an original creature, and I really wish they'd named this land after it, because I have no idea what the heck the thing is. Solving the many fishy mysteries wasn't too difficult, as the records of prehistoric fish are quite limited. However, the Permian Period is much better documented, and I really don't have the time or patience to dig through every recorded genus trying to find the one this thing might possibly be a reference to. Whatever it is, I'm pretty sure it's head crest was meant for aquatic purposes, and not the ramming that is so unpleasantly demonstrated on me here. However, we can one-shot these guys with a ram attack as well, and they drop the 30 EVO.P that Odonata dropped, so when night falls, and they begin to slumber, we skulk through the fields devouring them ruthlessly. Thankfully, I believe this is the last of the levels in this world that consist of nothing more than "walk upon the flat ground to the right until the level ends."


we now enter what appears to be a series of descending ledges on the world map. In reality, unfortunately, it's just this tiny little perch for- BWA HAHA HA! LOOK AT THAT FAT LIZARD AMPHIBIAN! "Boss" Ikustega!? You gotta' be kidding me!

I congratulate you
on passing through the
protected land. But
this is the final
area.

(Wow, short chapter...)

I am the stongest
of the Ikustega
family. I am....
Debustega.

*flips through web pages* (Debu? Dibuh... Dibthyo? I think they made it up.Maybe Hynerpeton, which is the only thing in Order Ichthyostegalia that isn't also in genus Ichthyostegidae? It is close to double the size of the regular ones. But, I'm just grasping.)


Indeed.

Did you laugh at me?
(Quite heavily.)
Do you think my body
looks funny?
I know you are
laughing at me.
You make me very
angry!
I am going to
defeat you!

Ha! That's a laugh! Do you think I've forgotten the wisdom of my jellyfish sensei!?


I'll make a meal of you in no time, fatty!


Boss Battle
Wow, he can jump pretty high...
At least I'm safely under this ledge, and-
OW, CHEATER!
So, he does about a third of my health in one jump... That's no biggie! The jump is pretty slow, I should be able to avoid being crushed under his blubbery body. I'll just head away from the ledges, and...


Sweet Gaia, he vomited on me, and it did 50% of my health, twice, guaranteeing instant death. These vomit blobs leave behind puddles when they land, and standing atop them will continuously do they same damage as the basic attack to you. If you're hit by the ball, it's pretty much guaranteed you'll take at least one hit from the puddle as well, meaning they are instakills in our current state. JELLYFISH! YOU LIED! *sob*