In a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment during today’s Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase, you may have caught a glimpse at a cute-looking RPG called Another Eden Begins. Coming to Switch 2 and Switch 1 this summer, it features time travel, turn-based combat, ten different endings, and New Game+.
What if we also told you that the creator was none other than Masato Kato, one of the writers of acclaimed ’90s Squaresoft RPGs Chrono Trigger and Xenogears, as well as the director of Chrono Cross? And that the game’s music is composed by Yasunori Mitsuda, who also worked on all three of those games? The pieces are starting to fall into place now.
Yep, while it may have been a footnote during the Direct, this sounds like a big one for classic RPG fans. Plus, while it’s not immediately clear from the trailer, this is almost-definitely a reworking of Kato’s free-to-play mobile RPG Another Eden: The Cat Beyond Time and Space, which came out in 2017 and is still ongoing.
Images: Wright Flyer Studios
Fans online seem to think so, highlighting that Begins appears to only cover the first “arc” of the mobile game, while highlighting some of the differences, including a few character redesigns.
Taking place across multiple timelines, Aldo’s younger sister is kidnapped by the Beast King. Forced to pursue them, the young hero finds himself falling through spacetime, where he awakens 800 years in the future.
As Aldo, you’ll gather 18 different companions, including an android, a feisty hunter, and a noble frog samurai. Look, you’re thinking it, not us (Okay, maybe us too) to help traverse the timelines and save the world. Blend in some strategic turn-based combat and you have a JRPG that feels ripped right out of the SNES and PSOne era.
Images: Wright Flyer Studios
So, this seems to be following the Octopath Traveler 0 formula of reworking a mobile favourite to remove the gacha elements and make it fit on home consoles. We’ll have to wait for more details, but for now, this looks promising.
Are you looking forward to Another Eden Begins? Let us know in the comments.
