Edge of Eternity is a turn-based RPG developed by Midgar Studios and published by Dear Villagers. The world of Edge of Eternity is beautiful and it has a lot of great ideas, but it's let down by a disjointed story, unappealing characters, and an overall lack of polish.
Edge of Eternity involves a war between a fantasy world and sci-fi invaders. The continent is being attacked by an invading alien army, which unleashes a horrific plague, known as the Corrosion, upon the people of Heryon. The Corrosion slowly transforms the infected into techno-organic monsters. Edge of Eternity follows a soldier named Daryon, who deserts from the front lines after his squad is decimated. He returns home after receiving a letter from his sister, Selene, as their mother has been inflicted with the Corrosion. Fortunately, Selene is a powerful priestess, and she believes she has discovered a way to cure the disease, but it involves traveling through some of the most dangerous areas in the land.
The fantasy realm of Heryon is gorgeous and exploration evokes a feeling of playing Xenoblade Chronicles with an even more impressive world. The environment is filled with alien structures and magical crystals that jut from the ground, with the cities that dot the landscape feeling suitably massive and lived-in. The same cannot be said for the character models, which are on par with ones in Dragon Age: Origins. This is also the case for monsters, which feel like they could have been cribbed from any number of other games. The world of Edge of Eternity is gorgeous, but there is a disconnect when seeing its doll-like inhabitants roaming its surface.
One of the best aspects of Edge of Eternity is its combat system. Battles take place on honeycomb-style grids, with players able to move their characters in six different directions. The battles are turn-based, and actions have a casting time before they can be used. As the game progresses, the player will gain access to attacks that can move their character across the board, as well as push & pull enemies into position. The combat system is deep, and some battlefields have artifacts on spaces that can be activated for stat boosts or used as siege weapons. The game also attempts some large-scale battles, where the player has to defend against waves of enemies. This is a great idea in concept, but it's hamstrung by needing to wait for each individual monster to take their actions, which can lead to a lot of sitting around.
Character progression is tied to leveling up their weapons and attaching crystals to them, which unlocks abilities and stat bonuses. Each weapon has its own board which unlocks as the player levels it up with use, in a manner that's similar to the Sphere Grid system from Final Fantasy X. Edge of Eternity has a lot of accessibility options, especially when it comes to gameplay difficulty, so players of different skill levels will find it easy to tailor the combat to their liking. Even die-hard RPG fans will face tough battles under Normal difficulty, but the depth in the combat system is enough to keep players coming back for more.
The thing that lets Edge of Eternity down is its story and characters. The game tries to tell an epic tale, but it sometimes feels as if big chunks of the story are missing. The story moves at a breakneck pace without stopping to explain important concepts, or brushes over important revelations in order to get to the next scene. There's so much going on in terms of the overall story that a lot of elements aren't fully realized, between its invading alien army, church conspiracies, a plague that creates monsters, and the different factions vying for power. Edge of Eternity would have benefitted from trimming its scope.
The playable characters are also unlikeable, which makes it hard to want to continue playing as them. It's fine for characters to start out as angsty, indifferent, selfish, or conniving, but they can and should grow over the course of a well-realized story. The party in Edge of Eternity are nasty and unappealing throughout the entire story, and they don't come close to earning any of the emotional payoffs at the end of the game. All of this isn't helped by a lack of polish when it comes to character animations. There are some scenes where characters just teleport into different positions between shots, making the game feel like an anime parody at times, with people flash-stepping around the room.
Edge of Eternity is an ambitious game, but it doesn't quite live up to its scope. The game feels like a homage to the classic Final Fantasy games of old, but its enchanting world is let down by the lackluster events happening on its surface. The combat system and character customization are well-done, but they don't matter if there isn't a good reason to keep moving forward. While JRPG fans will likely find enough to like that its worth giving Edge of Eternity a shot, other players should seek more engaging options within the same genre.
Edge of Eternity leaves Early Access on PC today, June 8, 2021. The game will be coming to PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S in Q4 2021. Screen Rant was provided with a digital code for the PC version of the game for the purposes of this review.