Ok, so I think legally I have to mention that One Step From Eden takes inspiration from the Mega Man Battle Network series of games. I for one did not play those, so I was coming into this deck-building roguelike with an open mind. It may be brutally tough, but there is something that always drives you to have just one more go.
How to Download One Step From Eden
To download the game from Steam, click on the Download button at the end of this review.
The Game Review
If you want a deep story in your game, this is not going to offer you that. You pick a character (one to start with) they have a little bit of back story and you know you are trying to get to Eden, but that is it. I like the premise of the game and do wish that they fleshed the story out a bit more as I think it could have been very interesting.
Each character in the game has their own weapon and ability and it is up to you to decide the best way to go about using them with their deck, abilities, and so on. It is cool how the 9 different characters are already unique, but they still allow the player to customize them how they want.
The gameplay of One Step From Eden is what is either going to make this game very addictive for you or make you scream, turn it off and never play it again. This is all about the battles. You are working your way towards Eden via a series of battles against monsters and bosses. Occasionally you will get to decide where you go after a battle, but you are always trying to move forward.
The battles happen on a 4×4 grid, you have a blue one and the enemies have a red one. You can move anywhere on your grid and when the enemies attack, you usually get a split-second warning to get the heck out of the way. Some battles will have various squares impeded so you cannot use them.
The spells and abilities that you do are all done via cards and while there are over 200 cards in this game everything is random! So, you have to learn what each card does, figure out the best time to use it, and then pray that you get to use it during a battle. The randomness of this can be hard to take sometimes.
While you can build an epic deck at the end of the day, the more cards you have in it, the longer it can take to get a card that you need to use. You can also use your character’s ability and weapon as you battle. I found the best thing to do was really pay attention to the enemy patterns as this gives you the best chance of survival.
Boss battles are fun and you can either spare or destroy them, each one offers you a bonus. If you spare them, they will help you, if you destroy them you get to be more powerful! You will die over and over again in this game, but you learn a little as you do and you get that little bit better each time. I found myself always wanting to have one more run.
I love the art style of this game. The battles are done in high-quality pixel art and each round will have four different backgrounds such as grass and ice. The portraits and other game graphics are done in a cool, kind of anime style. The soundtrack is pretty rocking and it reminded me of the kind of thing you would have heard on the Dreamcast back in 2000.
I have to say that while I enjoyed One Step From Eden, this is 100 percent a game that is not for everyone. The difficulty is brutal, but that is what I kind of liked about it. Sure, the randomness of the cards can be frustrating, but I found that it added an element of excitement to each round.
