Evolve

With the right people on your side, Evolve can be a surprising blast. However, get lumped with utter idiots, or the shoddy AI, and it quickly becomes very, very frustrating. [Issue#254, p.66]

At launch, it feels neutered, and far too inconsistent to establish a lasting dominance on the multiplayer scene. [Apr 2015, p.110]

Evolve stands as a champion of forward-thinking game design that embraces risk and originality. For that alone, whether you end up enjoying it or not (but play with friends of a similar skill level and you surely will), Turtle Rock deserves respect.

Monstrous fun, tactical and ludicrously replayable online with the right crew. Single-player provides you with great practice, but wants for narrative and reliable team AI. [April 2015, p76]

It's a game so intricately different from what's come before that its tutorials are critical, so new that its own evolution in the coming months will be intriguing.

With its balanced class-based, teamwork orientated gameplay, great graphics and slick mechanics that keep you playing into the wee hours of the night, Evolve itches that competitive urge and feels a lot more evolved that your standard, run-of-the-mill shooter.

There's a good and very promising game here, full of intense online action. It just seems that Evolve needs more content in order to fully satisfy the player, content that will definitely come in the form of DLC.

Overall it is hard not to be impressed with what Turtle Rock have achieved here, as Evolve is truly unlike anything available at the moment. Its no-nonsense approach is a breath of fresh air, and while the steep learning curve may force some gamers out of the loop early, those who remain will help form the core experience of the game in the months to come - a version of natural selection if you will.

Evolve has rare highs hidden amongst tedious lows. When the title hits its stride, it is easy to see why it was designed in this way

Evolve offers an excellent mix of competitive and cooperative gameplay but it is buried behind a muddled progression system and lengthy matchmaking / loading times.

An excellent multiplayer game with a unique concept and jaw-dropping action. You'll need friends to play it with, though. And now that we're nitpicking: a single-player campaign would have been nice as well.

Evolve isn’t a bad game, per se, but the rage-inducing technical issues and design oversights, paired with a complete lack of heart-pumping “fight or flight” gameplay that the hype train and the Left 4 Dead series led me to expect have left me feeling unimaginably disappointed, cheated even, and I’m not even one of the countless people who had to pay more than $70 to find this out the hard way.

This is surely a game that'll only improve as its community stabilises, but right now it's hard to recommend unless you've got a group of willing friends.

There's not something major wrong with Evolve, but it suffers from similar faults as Left 4 Dead did. Basically it's a title with a strong focus on collaboration, but which fails to vary its concept enough to make it entertaining in the long run. Evolve will probably get better when the players becomes more familiar with the characters. Right now it has a ways to go.

The core gameplay is great, but everything surrounding it is problematic.

Each individual piece of the game has been crafted with the knowledge that, should the (imperfect) humans controlling the action play their part properly, the systems are in place to make every hunt look, sound, and feel hugely exciting.

As it stands, it's a game that could really benefit from some additional content if it's to evolve into the next must-have multiplayer shooter.

Evolve is a brilliant concept that, when matched with the right players, can be a lot of fun to partake in. The many unlocks and well-balanced characters build upon that at every step.

Evolve is a beautiful amalgam of a first person shooter meets third person that is set in a very engaging gaming universe.

Evolve is a game that walks a fine tightrope of success and failure with its setup. Luckily it manages to stay balanced and become a worthwhile purchase.

In the end, Evolve is a wonderful concept that boasts a surprising, appreciated amount of variety and strategy. Many may not anticipate the level of depth and practice required to really be proficient, which is why some shooter fans might feel a tad misled.

Evolve remains an ambitious, daringly original, and largely successful undertaking in four-versus-one play. It’s certainly worth a look for fans of cooperative, class-based games. And if you don’t mind its limiting quirks it could well become your go-to team play.

Evolve has nice graphics and atmosphere, but you may be bored because of long matchmaking times and some bugs. Nevertheless, it is quite fun to play with friends.

Evolve is a bold move from Turtle Rock. It's a game that requires time and patience to be fully mastered, and a fair number of matches won't be satisfying for reasons that completely elude the player's will or skill. On the other hand, if you really dedicate yourself to mastering the mechanics, and especially if you have a team of friends to cooperate with, the experience will be absolutely unique. Shame for the lack of starting content, which will require further cash to enrich the lasting appeal.

Evolve is a good game or a bad game, depending on what you are searching for. There's a lot of potential, partially unexpressed because of the necessity of playing with friends (avoid the strangers!) and the absence of loot and crafting. Give it more than a chance, especially if you have previously played L4D.

Evolve may not be as fleshed out as other multiplayer shooters, but it’s still one of those rare games that chases after something different and actually succeeds.

Evolve is a complex PC game marketed as a console triple A hit. Not everyone will like it, but it's a fresh take on an old concept nonetheless.

Evolve revolves around a very limited concept, but it does stretch the concept as far as it can go. The asymmetrical 4-versus-1 gameplay stays interesting because the well-balanced level system. The adrenaline that comes with hunting and being hunted makes Evolve a thrill ride.

Evolve has a hint of greatness, but a lack of content at launch and a jarring amount of premium launch and planned DLC hold it back. What we have here is an evolution of the Left 4 Dead formula, not a revolution.

Genuinely designed and offering something so different from what can be played on the market, this game is the current meaning of addiction and replayability. There was a pre-Evolve, and without any doubt, there will be a post-Evolve.

Evolve should have been great. It isn't. Worse still is that its core idea feels as if it has been undermined by over-complication and, more disappointingly, the worst practices of modern publishing.

No actual campaign and focus on four players and one monster feels fresh only for a while. Currently, the constant repetition simply becomes boring, and interesting content fills only a couple of evenings.

Evolve is a nice but limited multiplayer shooter. Playing the monster is epic and if you manage communication with your team well, hunting is a blast too. But, the limited content and the repetitive gameplay prevent this game from being a monster hit.

The highs in Evolve are really high, it’s a beautifully polished game that offers a really cool unique multiplayer experience. Unfortunately those highs are completely dependent on the people you play with, making it hard to recommend to solo players.

While it shows moments of brilliance when played with the right group, Evolve simply can't consistently promise that level of experience. Play with good friends or play as the monster - but anything else will leave you feeling irritated and unsatisfied.

It’s rare for a big multiplayer game like Evolve to feel so considered and intelligent.

Evolve's matchups offer a lot of replayability and competitive thrills, and I can see myself returning to it consistently in the following months – even if those play sessions do inevitably end with me lusting for more to do in the world.

There’s an ambitious and wonderfully tense multiplayer game hidden somewhere deep inside of Evolve, and on the rare occasions you can coax it out with perfectly balanced teams and a little luck, you’ll understand exactly what Turtle Rock was aiming for. More often than not, however, you’ll find yourself stuck in another dull and lengthy traipse through the jungle with an unsatisfying and lopsided payoff, made all the worse by a lack of substance or long-term appeal.

The addictive class-based rewards, lengthy compendium of achievements, and the overall adrenaline of capturing and killing a trophy monster makes for a compelling game.

Admittedly, it can be hit and miss when paired up with AI players through matchmaking, but as with so many games, it can be pure gold when played with friends.

If you are looking for a new shooter that is like nothing else on the market right now, it’s definitely worth giving Evolve a shot.

Evolve offers a unique experience. Warning: you will forget Call of Duty and Destiny. This is a title you will play month after month after month.

By locking away the other two monster classes at the beginning, Evolve needlessly gates off completely different styles of play that new players will want to experiment with immediately, if only to get a feel for competition. Even in the case of the hunters, the slow leveling and unlocking of new skills, perks, and characters feels needlessly complex in what could have been a simpler and more approachable game.

Evolve is, in the ideal environment, enjoyable, a game that offers a really interesting experience. However, that environment is hard to attain and weighs down a risky idea, where we miss more content in the form of game modes and where solo mode is, in short, unnecessary.