65: Eastward (with Chris Dominguez - A Novel Console)

Eastward (Pixpil) is a game that has a great elevator pitch- absolutely gorgeous pixel art, bopping music and gameplay/story that evoke The Legend of Zelda, Earthbound and Dragon Quest, but failed to live up to the heights of any of those games for me. Poor pacing and a baffling decision to have a silent protagonist dragged this game way down into the "this feels like homework" zone. And that's a shame, because a) we never want a game to feel like that, and b) this game won a patreon poll! I still love you, patrons!

Joining me on the podcast to discuss Eastward is Chris Dominguez, one of the two hosts of A Novel Console, a podcast dedicated to video games, books and food. As I told them on the show- if you're not up for video games, books and food, I don't know what to tell you. You can check out their show by following this link, and I was also on their show last week to talk about The Lord of the Rings and all of the other Tolkien adaptations.

TIMESTAMPS
Intros/Personal Histories/Opening Thoughts 1:16
Story Setup 11:12
Aesthetics 34:02
Gameplay 40:49
SPOILER WALL 1:07:42

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Cover art by Jack Allen- find him at https://www.instagram.com/jackallencaricatures/ and his other pages

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