EUROPA
Edge UK|May 2023
This Ghibli-inspired adventure looks positively dreamy
EUROPA

Don’t let all the sunshine and blue skies fool you: Europa is a game made in the dark. Helder Pinto has been working on it since 2017, alongside his day job as an art lead at Blizzard. This is, somewhat unbelievably, the product of his spare time, a side project that started life as some environmental doodling after Overwatch shipped. “I basically made this game between 11pm and 3am, over the last few years,” he says. And there’s something of those midnight hours about Europa itself. The surprisingly lush watercolour landscapes of Jupiter's terraformed moon have a dreamlike quality, especially as you fly and glide across their surface as Zee. This chunky little android might be the last boy alive - but that just lends an air of serenity to his adventure, which has the air of a Lofi Beats To Study To mix on YouTube.

This story is from the May 2023 edition of Edge UK.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.

This story is from the May 2023 edition of Edge UK.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.

MORE STORIES FROM EDGE UKView All
Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles
Edge UK

Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles

Anyone familiar with the concept of kitbashing is already halfway to understanding what Tomas Sala’s open-world builder is all about.

time-read
4 mins  |
June 2024
Children Of The Sun
Edge UK

Children Of The Sun

René Rother’s acrid revenge thriller – an action game with its limbs broken and forcibly rearranged into the shape of a spatial puzzler – is at once a bonafide original and an unlikely throwback. Cast your eyes right and you wouldn’t blink if we told you this was a forgotten Grasshopper Manufacture game from the early PS3 era (we won’t be at all surprised if this finds a spot on Suda51’s end-of-year list).

time-read
4 mins  |
June 2024
Post Script
Edge UK

Post Script

What does Rise Of The Ronin say for PS5 exclusivity?

time-read
3 mins  |
June 2024
Rise Of The Ronin
Edge UK

Rise Of The Ronin

Falling in battle simply switches control to the next person up, and then quick revive fixes everything

time-read
4 mins  |
June 2024
Post Script
Edge UK

Post Script

The pawn and the pandemic

time-read
4 mins  |
June 2024
Dragon's Dogma 2
Edge UK

Dragon's Dogma 2

The road from Vernworth to Bakbattahl is scenic but arduous. Ignore the dawdling mobs of goblins, and duck beneath the chanting harpies that circle on the currents overhead, and even moving at a hurried clip it is impossible for a party of four to complete the journey by nightfall.

time-read
6 mins  |
June 2024
BLUE MANCHU
Edge UK

BLUE MANCHU

How enforced early retirement eventually led Jonathan Chey back to System Shock

time-read
7 mins  |
June 2024
THE MAKING 0F.... AMERICAN ARCADIA
Edge UK

THE MAKING 0F.... AMERICAN ARCADIA

How a contrast of perspectives added extra layers to a side-scrolling platform game

time-read
8 mins  |
June 2024
COMING IN TO LAND
Edge UK

COMING IN TO LAND

The creator of Spelunky, plus a super-group of indie developers, have spent the best part of a decade making 50 games. Has the journey been worth it?

time-read
10+ mins  |
June 2024
VOID SOLS
Edge UK

VOID SOLS

This abstract indie Soulslike has some bright ideas

time-read
2 mins  |
June 2024