Evolve: PS4 Review

Evolve: PS4 Review

Platform: PS4
Released by 2K Studios

It's time to do the monster smash with Evolve, the latest from Turtle Rock and 2K Studios.

It's a team based game that sees you taking on a monster intent on marauding and causing chaos - but the twist is that you can be the fifth person in the game and take on the character of the monster as you stomp and kill your way to potential victory.

A clever take on the old hunters becoming the hunted game, Evolve is tremendously good fun to play with the spirit evoking the old Godzilla films in more ways than one. Starting off as the creature, you get to work your way up by hunting animals and eating them (thus kickstarting your evolution) and smashing and destroying buildings as part of the raison d'etre. But as ever, this kind of behaviour doesn't go unnoticed and soon you're facing a group of hunters of different classes (medics, assault, trapper and support) all hellbent on bringing you down.

The final showdowns are good fun to play with unpredictability and fraught anguish as you try desperately to get out of traps, wires and bombs all aimed at you. Success means a chance for your creature to go to the next level and grow into something even more deadly.

Which is all very well until it comes to the other side of the coin and you're facing off against a creature as part of a team. Then the rush to kill it before it evolves is something a little more critical as you work as a component of the multi-player to get it all together and to try and save the day.

But, herein lies some of the problem of Evolve - its multiplayer assets haven't worked as well for me as I'd have expected. There have been some frustrations getting to be part of games and even getting into the servers in the first place. When it's worked, Evolve has worked well, but there's been a little bit of a hit and miss process getting there and it's one that I'd have expected to have worked itself out by now (hence the reason for holding this review past release to give the game base a chance to grow)

Technically, visually and aurally, Evolve is evocative and in keeping with its genre. Its clever use of environment and sounds mean you feel like you're there and with the characters in the games evolving as time goes by, this feels like a rounded experience that's heading somewhere.

All in all, Evolve feels like the first evolution of something great; it's not quite there yet but with some nurturing and some patience, it could be a great game. It's just a shame that a few pieces here and there hold it back from scaling the heights of greatness that early reveals promised to make.

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