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Evan's Remains

Evan's Remains is certainly an interesting combination of genres and while at times the puzzles feel like they are just there to break the story apart, it all comes together with excellent artwork and a memorable narrative.
Evan's Remains Game Cover
79%Game Brain Score
story, music
grinding, replayability
83% User Score Based on 924 reviews
Critic Score 74%Based on 18 reviews

Platforms

Nintendo SwitchPlaystation 5Playstation 4XboxiPhoneWindowsPlayStationXbox Series X|SPCMac OSPhoneXbox OneiPadMobile Platform
Evan's Remains Game Cover

About

Evan's Remains is a single player casual platformer game with mystery, thriller and anime themes. It was developed by maitan69 and was released on June 11, 2020. It received mostly positive reviews from critics and positive reviews from players.

A mystery adventure that merges puzzles with visual novel elements.

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83%
Audience ScoreBased on 924 reviews
story445 positive mentions
grinding8 negative mentions

  • Beautiful pixel art graphics with fluid animation and detailed environments
  • Engaging and emotional story with multiple plot twists and thought-provoking themes
  • Simple, elegant, and satisfying puzzle platforming gameplay with a skip option
  • Heavy on dialogue and story, leading to pacing issues with frequent long cutscenes interrupting gameplay
  • Story becomes convoluted and divisive for some players, with an ending that may feel unsatisfying or confusing
  • Lack of gameplay depth and variety; puzzles are relatively easy and repetitive, and the game is short
  • story
    1,250 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Evan's Remains is a story-driven puzzle platformer praised for its engaging, emotionally impactful narrative filled with intriguing mysteries and unexpected twists. While the story captivates many players and is often highlighted as the game's strongest element, it is also described as convoluted, overly long, and occasionally frustrating due to its complex plot and heavy dialogue. The puzzles serve mainly as breaks between story segments and are generally easy and skippable, reinforcing the game’s identity as a narrative-focused experience rather than a traditional challenging platformer.

    • “Relatively simple puzzles, but a surprisingly touching story.”
    • “I want to keep this spoiler free, but the story genuinely had me hooked and tearing up by the end.”
    • “Right off the bat with my review, I found myself heavily invested in this game's storyline just on the basis of the refreshing storyline, plot, and character dynamics, despite how convoluted it gets later on in the game.”
    • “The story is dreadful, the twists are unearned and bad, and the entire mood of the last bit of the game feels resentful that humans genuinely feel emotion at the ending of To The Moon specifically.”
    • “The mystery that the story builds up falls completely flat in the end, when a bunch of plot twists come out of nowhere, invalidating a bunch of the plot and leaving plot holes galore.”
    • “A++ for storytelling ability from the developer on this one, that ending will stick with me for a while. It subtly becomes much darker as more of the story is revealed until the game goes into straight “wtf” land with a plot-twist so evil that my jaw dropped to the floor.”
  • music
    208 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The music in the game is widely praised for its beautiful, calming, and atmospheric qualities, complementing the pixel art and story effectively. While a few users noted minor technical issues and occasional repetitiveness, overall the soundtrack enhances the immersive experience and is considered a standout feature, with many enjoying and even purchasing it separately.

    • “The music is fantastic and available as a standalone soundtrack for only a dollar.”
    • “Most games repeat the soundtrack over and over again but the depth of the Evans Remains soundtrack is fantastic.”
    • “The soundtrack matches the mood beautifully — airy, thoughtful, never overbearing.”
    • “However, during some of the puzzle sections, the repetitive music became distracting and added unnecessary tension.”
    • “The music tends to get a bit monotonous as it constantly loops with periods of silence before it loops the same track again.”
    • “Visuals are pretty, music is a bit boring, and writing is odd at times.”
  • graphics
    206 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's graphics are widely praised for their charming and beautifully executed pixel art style, featuring vibrant colors, smooth animations, and thoughtfully designed environments that create a calming, immersive atmosphere. Character portraits and cutscene visuals receive mixed feedback, with some noting a mismatch in style, but overall the art complements the gameplay and story effectively. The aesthetics, combined with a fitting soundtrack, significantly enhance the player experience, making the visuals a standout aspect of the game.

    • “The pixel art of the game in motion is among some of the best I've seen from an indie game, achieving both incredible aesthetics while remaining clean and readable for gameplay.”
    • “Evan's Remains captivates with stunning graphics, a superb soundtrack, and a compelling story.”
    • “The incredible 16-bit style graphics are fun and easy to fall in love with.”
    • “A choice was made to use obsolete, decades old retro pixel 'art' as a substitute for contemporary PC graphics.”
    • “There's no options to change the resolution for the game or customise the graphics settings.”
    • “-cut-scene graphics- while the colourful pixel art is used for the side-scrolling puzzle solving, every cut scene features some of the worst anime style head-art for the dialogue that you have seen in a long time, like Sailor Moon would be ashamed at how bad it is.”
  • gameplay
    206 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Evan's Remains offers simple yet enjoyable puzzle-platformer gameplay with progressively introduced mechanics that keep puzzles approachable and satisfying, though some find them repetitive and lacking depth. The gameplay is brief and serves primarily as a narrative vehicle, with a heavy emphasis on storytelling that may disrupt pacing for those seeking more extensive or varied puzzle challenges. Overall, the gameplay is clear and user-friendly but often secondary to the game's story-driven experience.

    • “Evan's Remains is a narrative-driven puzzle platformer that delicately balances cerebral gameplay with a slow-burn mystery.”
    • “The gameplay segments are interspersed between narrative chapters, consisting of carefully crafted platforming puzzles. Each new mechanic is introduced gradually, allowing players to internalize its function before layering additional complexity on top.”
    • “Really nice puzzle mechanic - gets non-trivial quickly, and has mechanics that stack in interesting ways, but never too frustrating.”
    • “Contrary to what the other reviews of this game state, I feel as though the gameplay aspect was quite repetitive even with introduced mechanics and personally on its own didn't keep me invested.”
    • “The puzzles got a little boring towards the end being that they just repeated the same mechanics for almost all of the puzzles and didn't add anything new.”
    • “The gameplay when you do get to it is extremely basic and doesn't feel very fulfilling due to how little variety there is to the types of puzzles you play.”
  • emotional
    117 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    "Evan's Remains" delivers a deeply emotional and touching narrative that resonates strongly with players, often evoking tears and heartfelt reactions through its character development and thematic depth. While praised for its sincere storytelling and atmospheric presentation, some reviewers felt the ending and plot twists complicated or undercut the emotional impact. Overall, it offers a meaningful, emotionally rich experience especially suited for those who value narrative-driven games alongside simple puzzle gameplay.

    • “This methodical pacing demands patience but rewards attentive players with emotional nuance and thematic resonance.”
    • “For players who appreciate cerebral puzzles paired with emotionally grounded storytelling, it offers a compact yet memorable journey into themes of brilliance, regret, and the search for understanding.”
    • “The story was... outstanding, special, heartfelt, moving, touching, meticulous, full of unexpected turns, and with an astounding conclusion.”
  • atmosphere
    30 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its intimate, reflective, and carefully crafted mood, blending mysterious and melancholic tones with beautiful pixel art and soothing, atmospheric music. This combination creates a relaxing, immersive environment that complements the story and puzzles without overshadowing them. While not all players connected with the narrative, the overall ambiance stands out as a major strength, enhancing the emotional and thematic depth of the experience.

    • “The result is an experience that feels intimate, reflective, and carefully constructed, prioritizing atmosphere and thematic depth over spectacle.”
    • “My joint second favourite thing about the game so far is the story and the sound / music within the game; anyone who plays the demo or the full game will immediately see (hear) how good the sound design is within the game. It brings atmosphere to you so you can experience what's going on whilst playing.”
    • “It helps transform sunny beaches and sleepy coves into more melancholy explorations and at times creates a truly surreal atmosphere that plays well with the narrative.”
    • “The second one comes after the credits, and should be completely avoided to prevent the atmosphere of the ending from being ruined - seriously, you can simply turn the game off when the credits roll, I strongly advise doing so.”
    • “But in the end none of that ever gets resolved, and you realize all of them are just "icing" created to add atmosphere to an otherwise meh story.”
    • “Puzzles are just right - not too taxing to be frustrating, and take you out of the atmosphere the game creates, but not too simple they feel patronizing.”
  • character development
    12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game features strong and emotionally engaging character development, praised for its well-written story and meaningful conversations that resonate with players. While a few moments of character delivery felt slightly clunky, the overall design and narrative depth received high acclaim. The combination of compelling characters, storytelling, and visual design makes it a standout experience for fans of story-rich games.

    • “Great game, with an interesting story and character development - kept me intrigued all the way through, the ending is very touching and got me emotional.”
    • “The story and character development in this game is perfect.”
    • “It had a lot of character development, was written so well, and even made me get very emotional at the end.”
    • “There are a few aspects of character development that get delivered a bit clunkily through dialogue, but it didn't trouble me too much.”
    • “There were some stand-out moments, mainly in the conversations focused on character development rather than plot advancement; and some of the topics the story delves into will certainly resonate with many players.”
  • grinding
    10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Grinding in the game is minimal to moderate, with no grindy achievements and the option to skip puzzles if desired. However, some players find certain achievements tedious to obtain due to time-consuming language changes and dialogue-heavy sections. Overall, the grinding aspect is manageable and not overly burdensome.

    • “A lot of grinding.”
    • “You'll need a second life for grinding.”
    • “Getting 100% achievements is tedious (wait 15 minutes, change your game's language, go back at a random spot) but easy.”
  • replayability
    7 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's replayability is limited due to its linear, story-based nature, offering little variation across playthroughs. However, players who enjoy the puzzles or have nostalgic attachment may revisit it occasionally, and the ability to revisit specific scenes enhances its appeal. Overall, replay value is low but still appreciated by dedicated fans.

    • “While there isn't much replayability per se (nothing changes from each playthrough), I have the option to go back and enjoy specific pieces without interruption.”
    • “Definitely something I look forward to with replayability.”
    • “Replayable but would only do so when nostalgia hits me.”
    • “Replay value is obviously low (it being a story based game) unless you enjoy it for the puzzles.”
    • “This game is mainly a linear story based visual novel, and that can be a drawback that outside of speedrunning there is no replayability.”
    • “While there isn't much replayability, per se (nothing changes from each playthrough), I have the option to go back and enjoy specific pieces without having to be interrupted.”
  • stability
    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game generally runs smoothly but has some stability issues, including glitches in certain music tracks and bugs in the post-credit section. Despite these problems, the overall experience remains enjoyable and worth playing.

    • “The post-credit section is also buggy.”
    • “There are issues with the soundtrack that the developer should fix, like the track 'sleep' having glitches and the track 'lost' having very audible clipping and distortion after the 2:00 mark.”
  • humor
    3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The humor in the game is mixed, with some puzzles featuring light, enjoyable comedy, but attempts at self-aware or meta-jokes, particularly in cutscenes and endings, are seen as poorly executed and detract from the overall experience.

    • “The puzzles are funny and can be solved easily.”
    • “Hilariously, one of the cutscenes acknowledges that the difficulty curve of these puzzles is all over the place, as if acknowledging the game's flaws without actually addressing them makes it all better.”
  • optimization
    3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Optimization is mixed, with flawless performance reported on the Steam Deck except for a minor bug, but some users experience poor performance overall. The game runs quickly but lacks polish in optimization, which affects the experience for some players.

    • “Flawless performance on Steam Deck (excluding one bug related to the Easter egg achievement 'Aurelio'; discussions on fixing this are available in relevant guides).”
    • “Because the content of the game is so wordless, the performance of the game is also very poor.”
    • “The optimization is not the best; I passed the entire game in less than 30 minutes.”
  • monetization
    3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The monetization of Evan's Remains is criticized as a cash grab, with the game feeling like a low-effort mobile app port on Steam. Users feel it's misleading and lacks genuine value, similar to deceptive advertising that fails to deliver on its promises.

    • “Evan's Remains is a mobile app that's been dumped on Steam as a cash grab.”
    • “Gamemaker Studio is often used to make retro pixel shovelware and cash grabs.”
    • “It's like watching water park ads on TV with a giant castle and huge water tunnel, then coming to the park just to realize the castle is a cardboard prop for pictures, and the water tunnel is still under construction.”
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3h Median play time
3h Average play time
3-4h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 6 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

Evan's Remains is a casual platformer game with mystery, thriller and anime themes.

Evan's Remains is available on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, iPhone and others.

On average players spend around 3 hours playing Evan's Remains.

Evan's Remains was released on June 11, 2020.

Evan's Remains was developed by maitan69.

Evan's Remains has received mostly positive reviews from players and mostly positive reviews from critics. Most players liked Evan's Remains for its story but disliked it for its grinding.

Evan's Remains is a single player game.

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