Don’t let John’s grizzly, rough exterior and lack of words fool you. The relationship that John and Sam have isn’t your typical father-daughter dynamic. Along the way, they meet a colourful cast of characters including Jasper the one-man show, William the merchant and his robot companion Daniel, Solomon the mysterious entity, rocket scientist Princess Alva and her guardian knight Isabel, and many more. One day, an apparition doppelgänger of Sam allures her to go against the Mayor’s orders and break the surface, causing herself and John to be exiled. Ruled by a mayor with an iron fist, Potcrock Isle indoctrinates its citizens, especially the children, to never travel to the surface, warning that it is filled with nothing but danger, death, and haunted by an entity known as the Miasma.īeing the energetic troublemaker, Sam claims that she has been to the outside world before, where the skies are baby blue, and the lands are lush green.
The origins of Sam are unknown, as she was found in an experiment tank deep underground by John. The journey begins at Potcrock Isle, a subterranean society where John and Sam live, sheltered from the outside world. “Sam, being the energetic troublemaker that she is, claims that she has been to the outside world before.” Perhaps a subtle tribute to the renowned Chinese novel, Journey to the West, where a Buddhist monk sets out on a pilgrimage to the West, Eastward stars silent protagonist, John, and his adoptive daughter, Sam, in a post-apocalyptic world as they embark on an adventure to the East.
Eastward john full#
It not only cleverly utilises 90s-era Ghibli-style animation and beautifully hand-crafted pixel art to create a world full of life but also weaves in a gorgeously composed 8-bit soundtrack to bring even more colour to an already vibrant universe. Pixpil’s debut title is an indie action-adventure role-playing game that pays homage to Zelda and Earthbound, the retro classics we played under the sheets as children after the lights went out.
Developed by Pixpil, a small team of three based in Shanghai, and published by Chucklefish, Eastward has finally opened its doors to a world waiting to be explored. This all changed in 2018 when a little game called Eastward was announced, showcasing a scintillating trailer filled with blooming colours, a bombastic cast of characters, and, to my surprise, many traces of my heritage. Most Asian games I encountered were Japanese-themed games oversaturated with samurais and katanas and made by Western developers, or games by Eastern developers influenced by the West, depicting medieval knights and castles. Growing up, I rarely came across games that put my Chinese culture in the limelight by an Asian development team.
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