It is not really revolutionary to say that mobile games are playing very differently from PC games and consoles. They are guided by a different design philosophy - a philosophy that favors clarity to subtlety, charming characterization of graphic excellence and entertains the player by telling a fully realized story. There is nothing wrong with that, but it makes it evident when a mobile game is focused on another platform. Another Eden: The Cat Beyond Time and Space is obviously a mobile game, not just because the first thing you need to do after the download is to accept a long list of terms and conditions. It's incredibly heavy on cinematics and dialogs, leaving the surprisingly complex combat system in the cold, and the rhythm and themes of history can be inconsistent. I can see the seeds of a big jrpg buried here, but the mobile format holds the game.

Another Eden begins with a prologue detailing events that occurred 16 years ago, when a blue skin bet, called only "beast", met a little abandoned girl in the woods. After a surprisingly playful encounter, the beast realizes that the baby has great power. He disappears when he hears another human approach, but not before having expressed the desire to see her again one day. The human approaching is revealed to be an old man, who takes the baby and his elder brother, who was hiding nearby, at home with him. Then, the player is immediately placed in the skin of Aldo, a young guard from the village living in the Kingdom of Miglance, who - in the true tradition of the JRPG - slept dangerously late.

Not surprisingly, Aldo and his sister feinne are the children of the opening. Everything seems peaceful until Aldo follows a cat in a hole in space-time and finds himself in the gallery of dreams and receives an intensive course on the gacha mechanisms of the game. When he comes back, it's To discover that feinne was kidnapped by the beast now adult, being called the king of the animals now. After 16 years to endure the discrimination and the pure and simple violence of the humans, the king of the animals brought together the remaining animals under his banner and prepares to completely exterminate humanity. For that, he needs the power of feinne.

After a BOSS fight impossible to win, Aldo learns that Feinne was taken to the King of the Beast Castle... just in time to be catapulted 800 years in the future. There, he finds himself stuck in the floating city of Elzion, at a time when humanity is at war with their synthetic creations and where the soil became uninhabitable. Shortly after his involvement in the fight, the entire city disappears in the light while a new sorry future is born, forcing Aldo to travel again in space-time in the hope of saving every1. The following is, well, an adventure beyond space and time.

Aldo is a rather endearing protagonist, although there is nothing particularly special about it. It is a relaxed guy who cares deeply from his sister, is usually quite kind and has quite hilarious shocked expressions. However, the focus on travel manigans and secondary quests strips its character's arc of most of its emergency, which means that the trauma of the opening of the game does not really seem to have affected it. You can say that this game has been designed and written as a series rather than a single story contained. The rhythm is irregular and elongated, the focus is much more placed on dialogue and cinematics only on real gameplay, and it lacks a lot of decisions and mini-games that add from the depth to JRPG on console. Despite cute graphics and simple gameplay, Another Eden addresses complex themes such as discrimination, sorrow and war costs. I would not consider it as an exceptional example of RPG's heavy narration, but it succeeds in interesting you, and it's probably enough.

Graphics at the 2D control diagram that is too simplistic, it is clear that Another Eden has been designed to be played with your finger. Sometimes this clumsily translates by the mouse and the keyboard. You walk with the keyboard but use the mouse to explore and interact with things. There is a constant stream of icons, contextual windows and sound effects intended to transmit information via a much smaller screen. If you are already comfortable with emulation, it will not be a problem, but it can be surprising at first sight, especially since some tutorial screens always assume touch controls. The music is beautiful but a little without inspiration and I can not call the graphics of the game more than decent. The backgrounds can be very beautiful, however, and portraits of anime style characters are quite beautiful. In addition, there are a lot of cats in the game and I appreciate it.

If you are familiar with the JRPG, especially mobile JRPGs, then you know the mechanisms of Another Eden. Standard character classes, many secondary quests, turnbones per turn, random meetings, new skills that are unlocked over time, success that unlock premium currencies - there is nothing particularly new here. Different characters use different weapons and have different types of attacks more or less effective on different types of enemies.

The non-competition mechanism is another force, unlocked in chapter 10, which is triggered by a counter that fills up as the team inflicts damage. When enabled, it allows the group to use its skills for a short time without burning MP. You can accumulate impressive quantities of combined damage before the counter is empty.

Overall, Another Eden: The Cat Beyond Time and Space is nothing revolutionary, but for what it is, it's pretty good.