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Eversion (PC)
Released December 29, 2008 by Zaratustra Productions
Genre: Platformer, horror (sorta)

If you believe everything the Internet tells you, as statistics posted on the Internet indicate that about 107% of Americans do and "There are other countries?"% of people from other countries do, it's pretty likely that you know Eversion inside and out without ever having played a second of it, and you probably have been led to believe that it's the best, most Lovecraftian, most terrifying-despite-looking-like-it-was-made-for-children game out there, particularly in the platforming genre.

Well, not quite, but you're on the right track, I guess.

Facts about Eversion: Eversion is a horror-ish platformer for the PC released in late 2008 made by a fella named Guilherme S. Tows (according to the Steam application) for a company named Zaratustra Productions (according to Zaratustra's web site). It's a fun game sure to give you hours of enjoyment, at least going one way. The game was inspired by a quotation, at least, by Lovecraft, which, I guess, is more than most folks know of the man's work, which probably extends no farther than throwing the word "Cthulhu" around as a name describing a particular class of squid-faced horror (think "Mindflayer appearance, Godzilla stature"). In that respect, I have to give the creators credit. It makes a game that's actually pretty cool to watch and read about, and not because it becomes surprisingly gory for something with such a cutesy outward appearance. It is actually a legitimately cool concept! Once. It's kind of like how "Persona 4.5" would probably be ever-lovin' terrible. Not to make predictions about the new updated rerelease of that game.

Basically, the game plays like an old-timey eight-bit platformer. You play a flower-like creature in a cheery, colorful world and you have to collect gems and save a princess. At times, though, your progress will be impeded. To get ahead, you'll have to "evert" (or "everse," according to the incorrect original version) to a different layer. Doing this will modify what you can and can't go through, how you interact with blocks, and what can hurt you. The game uses two world numbers, then, to tell which of the eight layers you're on and what level you are in.

The dual level number in action. Left is before everting, right is after.

Soon enough, though, things start to get... weird. Which is quite appropriate, because "to evert" means to turn something inside-out. The cheerful world was just a lie and eventually you can see strings holding up the clouds, the hills growing hellish mouths, etc. Basically, unsettling things rather than outright horror. Though, I've played a fair few horror games, so maybe I'm just numb to shit like that. At least the scares aren't cheap, mostly. You get a few new traps over time, too, like giant hands that make Sonic Screwdriver noises and walls of shoddy, monochrome special effects.

I don't even want to know what's going on here.

At the end, you, the flowery protagonist, save the princess. Except not. In every ending, you fail, in some way, to save the princess. Yeah, that's it. It's not that hopeless, though.

Now, to the more subjective parts:

Storyline Development: Miniscule

This is the story: You're a flower. You have a princess to save. The world gets creepier and creepier as you go. The spoilers could fit in that much space. You aren't playing this for it's gripping, Pulitzer Prize-ready storyline.

Gameplay: Very solid

The controls are simple but effective: arrow keys move you and let you jump, space bar everts. Very easy, and the controls are basically more than responsive enough that, if something goes awry in your character's movement, it's probably your fault. I do have a few errors with hit detection in some cases; for instance, at the end-of-level flag, it is possible to jump over it entirely and not clear a level until you go back and actually touch it. Usually, this is not a problem, but in the "wall of black stuff level" which I screencapped above, and a similar level later, you can get killed if you're slow enough. This is possibly not a legitimate error, but it is still very irritating. It can also be hard to get through thin gaps in floors and ceilings, often slowing down your progress, as in the second "wall o' shit" level. It's artificial difficulty, really.

Music and sound: Excruciatingly acceptable!

Make no mistake: I don't really like most 8-bit music, and I certainly will not give bonus points to someone for making an 8-bit tune when something that doesn't sound like Mr. Game and Watch threw up a game of NetHack on a Game Boy Pocket would not only have been quite possible to make, but would have sounded better. Thankfully, though, at least in the Steam version, Eversion's music, composed by Matthew Steele and Miroslav Malesevic, includes some legitimate instrumentation in between its beeps and boops. I can't fault the music for usually at least trying to create a disturbing atmosphere. As for the sound effects, they're not too bad, but aren't very memorable. The sounds associated with the hands are a bit worthy of mention, though -- they're a bit on the unsettling side the first time, but later just become comical.

Graphics: I'll give them these

Though the Steam version boasts enhanced graphics with, in my opinion, way better backgrounds, it changes the effect the old graphics had of a cutesy, 8-bit, 2D platformer with horrifying secrets. The newer foreground graphics are alright, but a lot of them just feel like someone chucked them together with MS paint and added a little shading later. You could do worse, especially for something that looks unambitious, but it just doesn't feel the same. Also, the wall traps and the blood explosions are monochrome and use very intense colors, too -- they look extremely out of place with everything else. But it looks decent, for a game of its type.

Difficulty curve: Decently fair

While the game is pretty tough sometimes, it's generally very fair and increases its difficulty at a perfectly reasonable rate, particularly if you just take your brain out of the dusty old box you keep it in when you're not using it. The last level, though, can be balls hard, and the level before it requires a good bit of memorizing. So, it can be a pain in the ass sometimes, but it's nothing you can't handle, probably.

But how is it as a member of its genre?

As far as platforming games go, Eversion is a fun, relatively rewarding experience that doesn't bring anything new to the table, and probably wouldn't if it even could, but at least tries to put a unique spin on the old, venerable genre. A nice thing about this game is that the two "fixed scrolling" segments in this game really aren't, and considering how slowly they move, that's definitely very good. It would be nice to see that in other platformers, but since it's strictly horizontal in this case, I guess it's doubtful that that'll happen in the new Yoshi's Island anytime soon. So, that's out of the way, but what about the horror aspects? The game doesn't live up very well to the Lovecraftian horror hype to the extent that I'd prefer, but it can't be helped. The game does have it as an atmospheric element, but that pretty much seems to be all, unless that ending is supposed to remind of e.g. the film Dagon (hopefully this doesn't spoil anything, but I don't think most of my reader base has seen Dagon). The blood explosions that I mentioned earlier are so excessive and miscolored that it is perhaps a parody on the overuse of such blood-and-bleeding tropes in horror. The game doesn't remain scary for long after the first play, sadly, and the game does have a sequence of massively cheap shock scares in the start-of-level screens toward the end of the game. It's a cheap trick and it wouldn't endear me to the genre if this was my first horror themed game.

The verdict?

Steam/HD version: 3.5/5
Non-HD version: 3/5

I haven't had a chance to play the other games from the competition that spawned Eversion, like the white chamber, but they are on my list. I'll get to those later. As it stands, though, Eversion is a relatively solid title for an indie game that, to be frank, didn't live up to its intent. I can understand way too well why this is so beloved by folks on the internet, the same folks who love Persona 4 to death and read only Medaka Box.

Buy it on Steam! It's only $5.
For reference, my crappy Steam recommendation.