Ever Oasis: release date, more details, concept-art, trailer, more

14 April 2017 Lite_Agent Ever Oasis, Grezzo, Koichi Ishii

Ever Oasis is one the games that was showcased during yesterday’s Nintendo Direct presentation. For those who missed the E3 2017 announcement, this is an action-RPG developed by Grezzo (The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D / Majora’s Mask 3D), and directed by the one and only Koichi Ichii (creator of the Mana series).

The game tells the story of a land that was ensnared in Chaos (a dark force that once threatened civilisations), a long time ago. An oasis was built in order to shelter the people from that menace, but to no avail: a powerful beast soon appeared from the skies and only left ruins in its path.

You get to play as a chosen Seedling, and a descendant of those ill-fated people. Your task is to a create an oasis, and make sure the people who inhabit the land can live a peaceful life. To do so, you have no other choice but to banish the Chaos once and for all.

As you can imagine, the desert is a really harsh place, made all the more dangerous by the menacing Chaos. Together with your companions, you have to set off on an adventure, and locate various dungeons located in that very desert. Inside, you will find various puzzles to solve, but also enemies to defeat.

But your trips into the desert are not all about dungeons: you also need to forage for valuable materials called Curios. Those can be used to craft other items, to be sold in shops, or you can give them to weary travellers. In doing so, you will help them accomplish their goals and fulfil their wishes, and they might even end up moving in and become your ally.

By collecting a currency known as dewadems, you can make the oasis grow with the help of the water spirit Esna. It’s a pretty well-rounded synergy: you open shops, stock them with wares, and this in turn encourage travellers to frequent your oasis more often, which helps it grow.

The companions mentioned above come from other tribes, and they all have a specific weapon and a unique skillset. You can switch between three characters at any time, which is useful when fighting enemies (as certain weapons are more effective against certain enemies), or when solving puzzles (since specific skills are required to solve some of them). Banishing the Chaos is too much for one lone person!

Here’s the trailer/video uploaded by Nintendo following the Nintendo Direct presentation (only available in Japan as of writing):

https://youtu.be/wKLJjk2hjlQ

Just after the Nintendo Direct presentation, Koichi Ishii (Director and Producer) posted a message on the Topics website in Japan, sharing some details about development (as part of a new series of blog post about the game).

In this first message, Koichi Ishii reveals that he traveled to Egypt about 10 years ago, and was fascinated by the landscapes he saw there. That’s how he came to feel the desire to make a fantasy game with an Egyptian setting.

Here’s some of the pictures he took during his trip to Egypt:

During his trip, he saw some old buildings, and came into contact with the culture of those regions, the lives of the people from that era. That convinced him that he needed to create something based on Egyptian mythology, from the point of view of those people who used to live in the desert. With those very thoughts in mind, he began working on what eventually became Ever Oasis.

Koichi Ishii explains that the protection of the Oasis is not a one-side affair: the smile of your teammates (with a deep personality) become your strength, and it’s together that you face the many trials ahead.