The first Echo Generation was announced in a Introducing ID@Xbox Back in 2020, I remember reading how Vanessa Chia, writer, producer, and co-founder of Cococumber, wanted the game to be a reflection of the childhood many players grew up in, with the nostalgia of the time being a theme with that small-town vibe that was prevalent in the media of the time, such as stranger thingsGhostbusters: Beyond or The Goonies. As for gameplay, given the familiar feel of RPG mechanics with a lack of mechanical bloat, it would be a mistake not to feel nostalgic for games like Paper Mario or Super Mario RPG.
It was no surprise that Echo Generation continues this nostalgia-filled journey with Echo Generation 2, giving the player a feeling of relaxed familiarity, as if they were watching a Saturday morning cartoon with a bowl of cereal. What did surprise me, however, was how invested I would become in the characters and world the Cococumber team would create.
To start, you follow the game through the perspectives of two characters: Sister M and Jack, two completely different characters, who share the same story without knowing it. From the beginning, you can choose where you want to start, which is a nice addition if you think you’ll prefer one over the other, although I find it hard to decide. As with some games with multiple playable characters that feel like a repetition of each other, the stories are distinct and in some ways, tonally different, while still maintaining the same vibe, if that makes sense.
Sister M begins her story by escaping the research facility that she and the other children grew up in and experimented with. Where are all your friends and who is ‘El Comandante’?
Jack’s story begins with him and his family spending a weekend at a cabin when there is an explosion at Jack’s workplace, a local scientific facility. Jack then has to get his family home to safety before he’s called back to work to help save the day.
Is it the same installation? You’ll have to play the game yourself, but I played the first 3 chapters for this preview and also had the option to play two others, each chapter with a completely new character: Annata Z, a zombie who wakes up with no memories other than the fact that she misses her daughter, and Nolivia, a bounty hunter from the future.
The game’s art style follows the first: a retro 3D pixel art spectacle for your eyes, and each screen you enter is as beautiful as the last. Within Jack’s chapter, the game begins with a shot of a sunset across a lake, but the one I keep coming back to is the guest bedroom.
With the way the light shines through the window on either side of the bed, cleaning the room allows the greens and reds around the room to stand out, adding a greater level of 3D space to the already 3D pixel art. I don’t think I can think of a screen I walked into that I thought was a disappointment.
The game’s gameplay is a simple, nostalgic version of a turn-based RPG battle system, where good guys and bad guys politely take turns trying to defeat the other, one move at a time.
However, the difference this time is the redesigned battle system, which works with a card collecting system, where throughout the world, shiny collectible cards will be hidden for the player to find, each of which will give you a new attack, defense or support card to add to your arsenal. Each one belongs to a certain type of card, whether diamond, spades or hearts. Each enemy will have a stance bar on top of their health; Using cards with matching symbols will eradicate their stance bar, causing your subsequent attacks to deal more damage.
One choice Cococumber made to distinguish the two stories was to cast Sister M as a solo character fighting to escape the oppression of her lords, and Jack as the typical father who teams up with his babies to fight with knives and axes. It’s a great way to keep the player engaged with your game while changing your tactics from allowing one or two attacks per turn to 3-6.
Echo Generations 2 is short and sweet, with a completion time of around 9 hours if you want to see everything the game has to offer, giving you a great little game to pick up and play before tackling your next gigantic RPG, or if you want a trip down memory lane and play a game that looks like it could have been a console from your childhood.
Echo Generations 2 is now available in Xbox Series| S, Xbox on PC, Xbox One, Steam and compatible portable devices. The game is also part of your Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass Subscription support and features for Xbox cloud gaming and the Xbox Play Anywhere program, making it the perfect game to play whenever you have 5 minutes, wherever you are.
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