Ever Oasis

Ever Oasis takes the best out of Monster Hunter and Animal Crossing and combines them to make something even better!

Its addictive main gameplay loop, fun combat, amazing (and truly different) sense of style, and kindhearted nature make it feel like nothing else; though it reminds us of Rune Factory 4, Animal Crossing, Tri Force Heroes, and Final Fantasy Explorers in turn, this really is its own experience, and one we’d recommend to any action-RPG aficionado.

Ever Oasis proves that the six year old handheld still has the potential to pump out some great content, while also being one of Koishi Ishii’s best works.

A truly superb experience. It’s filled with so many things to do, but in a way that feels anything but forced and overwhelmed. Instead, everything works together in harmony to make a truly deep and engaging game that's easy to recommend to anyone.

Ever Oasis is a masterfully crafted piece of gaming software that manages to introduce a lot of original town management elements into an action RPG without feeling overwhelming or too hard to understand even for younger audiences, all while offering a solid experience gameplay-wise, as well as visually and audibly.

Ever Oasis is a perfect blend of management simulator and action-RPG. Despite being on a handheld, this deep RPG's stylish presentation and many gameplay systems come together in a way that few games do.

It’s no easy task, but Ever Oasis has managed to make me care as much about preserving my town as I do about saving the world. Despite the few odd design choices, there’s a wonderful blend of adventure and town-building where every task you tackle finds multiple ways to reward you.

Ever Oasis is a refreshing action-RPG with a surprising amount of gameplay depth and variety. By stitching together swatches of different gameplay genres and inspirations, Grezzo has crafted an impressive title with an engaging world and satisfying gameplay loop. Its music and graphics are cute, but its gameplay is refined. After finishing off this adventure, I cannot wait to see what Grezzo’s next step will be!

Party and inventory management are fussy, but this action RPG is a real treat for parched 3DS owners. [Aug 2017, p.77]

Unimposing mix of building-simulation and action-JRPG which surprises with great fights and plenty of content.

Ever Oasis offers a surprising amount of content in a fun, accessible game. Challenging yet forgiving battle mechanics mean that beginners can hack and slash away, while masters can focus on strategy and speed running. A diverse cast of characters with numerous abilities encourages playing with diverse parties, and the warp system enables lots exploration, creating replayability while making long slogs across maps a thing of the past. Easy to pick up, hard to put down, and overflowing with features, Ever Oasis really is a diamond in the desert.

In the torrid desert of the AAA industry, Ever Oasis stands out as the rejuvenating refuge so desperately needed.

Whether in combat or solving puzzles, as well as in management of your oasis, Ever Oasis does a nice job of being accessible yet avoids being shallow. This is not a tough game to learn the mechanics nor is it hard to make steady progress, hour after hour, and that’s a good thing. It provides a charming atmosphere and a pleasant presentation that’s fun to get into and hard to leave. If you’re in the market for that, GREEZO’s Ever Oasis makes a strong case for itself.

There are issues with the game, but honestly, I think Ever Oasis is a blast. Building up my little spot of heaven, running errands for the residents, and venturing out into the great sandy plains outside my garden gate provide equal thrills. The longer I play, the more I enjoy it and that is far more uncommon than it should be. If this game is to be the first of a new franchise, it’s a damn good starting point.

In Ever Oasis you’re trying to make your oasis grow, and as you do, so does your strength, and your relationships. It’s a straight-forward, simple action RPG that takes some inspirations from Harvest Moon and The Legend of Zelda, but none of those are a bad thing. Ever Oasis feels distinct and unique enough to be its own, strong title – if you haven’t abandoned your 3DS for the Switch yet, Ever Oasis is yet another great 3DS game.

Ever Oasis is a game that is very well designed, dynamic and interesting. A special title that brings yet another great adventure to 3DS.

Ever Oasis has a charming, varied, and colourful world to explore with many characters who join you on your journey to safeguard your newfound home once and for all. If you're a fan of action-packed adventures, you can't go wrong with this adorable pocket-sized tale.

Ever Oasis is a competent blend of simulation and action RPG that revels in its celebration of nature's bounty.

For a game that looked like another cute little timewaster, Koichi Ishii has outdone himself.

Ever Oasis is an interesting game with several different gameplay elements. You can build your own oasis but you can also go on an adventure. There is a lot to explore and there are a lot of different characters to do so with.

It’s not quite the sum of its many parts, the combat in particular begins to feel like a chore, but otherwise Ever Oasis is a real diamond in the rough late in the life of the Nintendo 3DS.

Quotation forthcoming.

Ever Oasis marks the return of the ActRaiser and Dark Cloud formula, with the management of a thriving community and monsters to slash by the dozen. The overall gameplay is pretty simple and not too challenging, but it still has its charm, and it's portable.

Ever Oasis starts slow, then picks up the momentum and delivers a brilliant adventure full of colorful characters and fun dungeons. Might be a lil' wonky at times but as a first step in a new franchise Ever Oasis is more than we could have hoped for.

In Ever Oasis, melding a city-builder with a hack and slash adventure has never looked more adorable. While visually and narratively enticing, the Animal Crossing meets Zelda concept is never fully satisfying, instead giving brief joy to specific types of players, and begging for a sequel to bring every genre together perfectly.

By mixing proven Action-RPG recipes with inspired puzzles and a slice of good-hearted life simulation, Ever Oasis already makes a refreshing cocktail. But there is more to discover under the sand of the desert than it seems, since the powerful stream of cooperation injected through the game's strata adds depth to this captivating adventure. Despite the inexplicable lack of multiplayer, such journey can be seen as a humanistic, ecological allegory from Koichi Ishii, and surely a benevolent experience, something rather rare these days.

Supplemented by a beautiful score and packed with sidequests and replayability, Ever Oasis proves a sorely-needed bit of refreshment for 3DS owners waiting for a title they can get lost in.

Ever Oasis is basically a Harvest Moon-esque game with semi-open world roaming and Zelda-like dungeons. It’s nice, aesthetically and thematically, with lovely solid chibi style characters and some wonderfully twee music that I just can’t stop humming. It falls down somewhat with the adventuring, what with the AI issues and slightly simplistic combat, but the town management side of things can really get its hooks into you. There’s a serious buzz to be had whenever your Oasis gets a big transformation. This is a game that wants to make you smile, and it will do just that; just don’t expect a champagne supernova.

Ever Oasis marks the first fully original title from developer Grezzo in some time, and it is exciting to see what the studio is capable of when given the opportunity to create something totally new. The final product is a unique RPG experience that doesn’t have a lot of character, but is able to deliver a consistently compelling adventure. I never got the sense that the world was alive, but I enjoyed exploring, fighting monsters, watching my town grow, and making sure my residents were happy.

A really lovely video game with a balanced genre combination. Although not reaching the level of the greatest games of Nintendo 3DS, the new adventure from Koichi Ishii is a remarkable and varied adventure game.

While the gameplay might be repetitive and clunky at times, the game encourages players to return, and the town building aspects are quite addicting.

Entertaining mixture of desert exploration and basic builder, that would have benefitted from a coop-mode.

Ever Oasis is a fun action RPG that successfully combines mechanics from Animal Crossing and Zelda. It's loads of fun to go through all the dungeons and it is a great way to spend your summer vacation.

Ever Oasis is not the most difficult game this summer, but it definitely offers a good buildup that makes it hard to put the game down. Very charming.

A charming game with lacking elements that prevent it from keeping up with the current competition.

An interesting combination between action-RPG and social management. It has the Nintendo accessibility power, but also the magic of Koichi Ichii. The result is interesting, but far from being perfect, due to a plain story and an inconsistent gameplay.

Ever Oasis is a little dreaming adventure, perfectly suited for players of all ages and experience. Its being so user-friendly and easy to approach, unfortunately, comes at the expense of depth with respect to every in-game system.

Although Ever Oasis is a beautiful and well-designed action-RPG that feels extremely simple and has nothing new for the genre fans.

Many times while playing Ever Oasis I wanted to improve my settlement, which is an addictive pastime. Tracking down all the recruitable characters is a task that must be pursued into the post-game period, and I'd like to continue doing so. The game isn't all about building up the oasis though, and the combat engine isn't enough on its own to entice players. This is still a charming title though, and worth investigation by the many players who haven't attempted it yet.

An interesting combination between an RPG and a management game. Artistically very valuable, the gameplay reveals a repetition that in the long run makes the adventure a bit boring.

Ever Oasis' tight blend of mechanics and activities are bound to keep you coming back for more well after completing it, if only to see what else you can do to develop your desert sanctuary. While the game's story isn't particularly moving, the consistent gratification of its incisive design makes it a satisfying adventure. Ever Oasis takes time to grow, but the return is well worth the wait.

It does something different from other RPGs currently on the device through its action-styled gameplay and town-growing focus, and the end result is a unique and enjoyable romp.

Light and breezy, Ever Oasis makes for a pleasant little snack while waiting for the next wave of 3DS RPGs. Some of its core concepts could have been taken further, but it's still a well-executed RPG from a long-standing veteran of the genre.

Ever Oasis is a decent game for a younger audience to get into, but it doesn’t do a lot that’s completely new. It blends the adventuring with town management nicely and is a well made game, but at the same time there’s nothing that really thrilled me while playing it. It’s a shame really, as there’s nothing necessarily wrong with Ever Oasis, there’s just nothing particularly special either.

Ever Oasis may not live up to the most ambitious thresholds but that doesn't mean that it's not a fun game. Its amazing art design, feeling of progression and fun combat will easily make this a long-lasting and will mire players in its lore and details for a very long time. In the large and varied 3DS catalogue, this is yet another very welcome title.

It's hard to fault a game for being mediocre, but Ever Oasis never reaches the potential for ideas it brings to the table. If you're looking for a game that doesn't ask much of you, then Ever Oasis might be just the right speed. I ended up playing it to wind down in the evenings because the gameplay became so routine. Otherwise, you may end up getting impatient and moving on to something else in no time quick.

Good, but may leave you thirsty for more. [Issue#190, p.82]

While parts of Ever Oasis are fun to play and satisfying when you solve a challenging puzzle in a dungeon, as a whole the game feels like it doesn't quite do enough in either aspect in dungeon crawling or town management. I can see the appeal that this might have for fans of these types of games but personally, I think it would have benefited to be one or the other, fully fleshed out.

There's a real earnestness to Ever Oasis's tale, as Ishii and team meditate on our relationship with nature and the value of coming together to build a better, more hopeful world. It's unfortunate that the actual substance of the game doesn't trouble itself to embody that reaching ambition, content to stay resting comfortably at the wellspring of other, better games' ideas. [Sept 2017, p.114]

Ever Oasis is a decently enjoyable game, especially if you go into it aware that it requires some patience. It's just unfortunate that for all its various ideas, each of them needs work in one way or another. Still, Ever Oasis proves that there's plenty of appeal to harvest from its mixture of genres. Hopefully another game or even a sequel can more fully capitalize on such potential.

A charming and often inventive mix of Animal Crossing and Zelda, that lacks depth but not ambition.

With little actual challenge to speak of, Ever Oasis doesn't have much going for it. There aren't any tricky enemies to ward off, and the town-building simulation is shallow. It's the combination of several other genres whose best games are far, far, far more worth playing than this one. In its attempt to crib from the best, Ever Oasis never establishes its own identity.