Evoland shows how action-adventure games have matured, without the boring history lesson

When I spotted Evoland, which Bordeaux, France-based studio Shiro Games is billing as “short story of adventure video games evolution,” two thoughts crossed my mind. First, it looked like an equally clever but more gorgeous version of Silicon Studio’s 3D Dot Game Heroes, a pixel-heavy throwback to the 8-bit era with modern sensibilities. Then I wondered how the developer was planning to encapsulate the entire history of a genre in one title.