Evolution Worlds

"Come on! Let's go for it today!"
—Mag whenever you upload the game file.

Evolution Worlds is a Nintendo GameCube RPG created by Sting Entertainment. It was a compilation of Evolution: World of Sacred Device and Evolution 2: Far Off Promise, two previous Sega Dreamcast games, and merged the two together for the Gamecube release.

Mag Launcher is the current head of the family thanks to his father going missing three years ago. However, he learned about the news with the mysterious girl named Linear Cannon who carried the letter to him. In the letter, his father told him to take care of Linear no matter what happens to her. Following his father's words, Mag makes Linear part of his family and, together with Gre, they work hard day and day to pay off a huge debt to the Society while looking for the legendary Evolutia. Tagging with them in the long run are the Launchers' rival Chain Gun, and thrill-seeker, bounty hunter Pepper Box.

For the first part of the game, the Launcher duo do explorations with the other party members while Eugene from the 8th Empire becomes interested in some strange energy patterns coming from Pannam Town, speculating that Evolutia is hiding somewhere. And he's Obviously Evil with that face of his, so he's technically the Big Bad of the first part.

For the second part of the game, Mag's achievements are recognized by the head of the Society, prompting him to take more quests around the main HQ. On the way there, the train he's taking is robbed by Carcano, who becomes known to the Launcher trio. During their visit in Museville, the mysterious character Yurka, who seems to know Linear very well, speaks with her whenever she's alone by herself. To add more variety, they get assisted by Carcano later in the game.

The game is unique in that it's a combination of a regular RPG and a Roguelike, with randomly-generated dungeons, stairs and traps, but with a standard RPG battle system; you can level up skills in midbattle by spending TP on a wide range of movepools.

Tropes used in Evolution Worlds include:
  • Action Initiative: Run into an enemy from behind, the music sounds happy, and you get free turns to happily punch your enemies. Have an enemy run into YOU from behind, the music gets daunting, and you stand still while the enemy beats your head off your shoulders.
  • All in a Row: The party's leading member can be rotated with the three characters moving around, doing so gives some kind of bonus for exploration (Mag can destroy boxes and stone pillars, Chain can make the party run faster, etc). It gets a bit silly when you can make all of them jump on the very same spot.
  • Ambition Is Evil: Prof. Whitehead tends to be really nice towards Mag and the rest of the characters, but he's secretly trying to obtain ultimate wisdom all for himself.
    • Whitehead ends up feeling guilty for using Mag and for trying to finish his plan. He feels so guilty for helping Yurka achieve his goals that he offers to help Mag and co. as much as he can.
  • An Economy Is You: Where are people supposed to buy food in Pannam Town?
    • This is adverted for Museville, but then you'd say everyone eats three kinds of fruit and gets Drunk on Milk at the local bar.
  • Arbitrary Headcount Limit: 3 people max on your team, 4 max on enemy teams; however, most bosses come with only one enemy: the boss itself.
  • Authority Equals Asskicking: Carcano's men will follow his every word.
  • Badass: All the party members (except maybe Linear, sorry) are this.
  • Badass Beard: Carcano sports one.
  • Badass Grandpa/Badass Normal/Battle Butler: Gre is entirely capable of serving Mag at home and in the battlefield despite his age. He also fights without the use of a Cyframe and, unlike Linear, has no hidden powers.
  • Barbarian Tribe: There are enemies based on this.
  • Bare Your Midriff: Pepper.
  • Big Bad: For the first portion, Eugene. For the second portion, Yurka.
  • Big Creepy-Crawlies: Spiders are as big as their bodies.
    • And then there are huge robot spiders in the Very Definitely Final Dungeon that take up all the enemy side. Killing these hard-hitters net you lots of EXP.
  • Big Damn Heroes: Pepper pulls this out when saving Mag and Linear from the boss of Blaze Ruins. After that, she can be recruited for dungeon missions at the bar.
  • Black Market: Mag can eventually buy goods from Carcano's cronies once he gains their boss's respect (even though Carcano himself seemed to show respect to Mag before their fight).
  • Blow You Away: One of Carcano's attacks is literally called like this word by word. It blows enemies away.
  • But Thou Must!: There's no way to take Linear off the party to ask another member to join during ruins exploration unless she's kidnapped. Justified in that Mag promised his father to not leave Linear alone.
  • Can't Drop the Hero: Mag is the title character, therefore he must always be in the party and controllable, so you cannot get rid of him whatsoever... Not like you would want to.
  • Chaste Hero: Mag can't really understand the theme of love, not even when Nina seems infatuated about Gre.
  • The Chessmaster: Yurka is this, his only purpose for helping Whitehead being to open the path to the ancient civilization by controlling Mag and his party to search the keys hidden in the ruins.
  • Chick Magnet: A rumor in the Society explicity says that Carcano is popular among girls.
  • The Clan: Chain's family is a clan.
  • Combining Mecha: The Ulticannon needs both Yurka and Linear to work properly.
    • But then before you get the chance to fight it, Linear breaks out from the machine. However, Yurka, driven insane with jealousy, descends into madness, and the robot's loosely angelic-look turns into a gruesome devil-look, complete with a beating heart-like organ hanging to the right side.
  • Cool Helmet: Mag is always wearing his headgear wherever he goes... and whenever he goes to sleep. It doesn't really bother him at all.
  • Cool Loser: The Launcher Family is popular among other hunters in that they have an horrendous debt to pay to the Society, so Mag has to Work Off the Debt to keep his Big Fancy House. Luckily, the Gun Family adverted going through this by doing the opposite, but it's still kind of pathetic they now live in a bus.
  • Cool Shades: Pepper owns a good one.
  • Crazy Jealous Guy: After Linear is persuaded back into returning to Mag's side, Yurka, while still in the Ulticannon, starts to wonder why he's feeling jealous all of a sudden.
    • A very young kid behind Chain's bus home has the hots for Linear, but he doesn't like the idea that Mag scorts her everywhere she goes.
  • Critical Hit: Shown by the enemies having a different hurt animation.
  • Curb Stomp Battle: Upon fighting Carcano the first time, he'll go down without much trouble. However, he was letting his guard down to make time while his men were stealing appraisal items on the train. The next time Mag meets him face-to-face, he's tougher to beat.
  • Cute Mute: Linear starts out as this, somehow inverting the Heroic Mime status for Mag. By the second game or the second half of Evolution Worlds, she becomes the Shrinking Violet.
  • Damsel in Distress: This was obviously bound to happen to Linear judging Mag's father told him to keep her safe from everyone at all times. The second time this happens is subverted since she's convinced to leave Mag to keep him safe instead.
  • Dark-Skinned Blond: Yurka, with white hair thrown in for good measure.
  • Defeat Means Friendship: Yurka gets this treatment, but he dies. It's speculated that he will return one day to be friends with Linear and everyone.
  • Defend Command: On top of reducing damage, it increases the amount of SP restored.
  • Demoted to Extra: Poor Linear will never have a chance to fight the final boss on both parts.
  • Disappeared Dad: Mag's father, Asroc Launcher.
  • Disc One Final Dungeon: Eugene's Ship, arguably, since there are no enemies, but a Boss Rush with three bosses one after another (with breaks in-between all of them). It's entirely jarring if you didn't store many healing items and didn't do some Level Grinding beforehand. And yes, to add insult to the injury, it's a temporary Point of No Return till you save Linear.
  • Disc One Nuke: Averted. Mag's Hand Cyframe isn't as much of a disc nuke here due to the fact many enemies and bosses were cut out for the first portion of the game.
  • Dishing Out Dirt: Linear's Ocarina offensive spells practically has boulders fall on the enemies.
  • Distaff Counterpart: Even though it's not a bit too obvious at first glance, Linear is this to Yurka. And to add it up, they are the complete opposite of each other. Linear is a pretty shy girl who likes flowers and some people besides Mag while Yurka is really merciless and hates humans with a passion.
    • Oh, and For the Evulz, Yurka takes a flower's life away right in front of Linear, who then gives life back to it and more flowers. This clearly cements how Linear is related to regeneration while Yurka is related to destruction.
  • Drop the Hammer: One of Mag's weapons for his Cyframe. No matter how big the enemy is, his trusty hammer squashes them with no problem.
  • Drunk on Milk: On a little note, Pepper comments how she and Nina of all people went to drink milk one night and the latter got so drunk that she started dancing the Macarena.
  • Dude, Where's My Respect?: The Launcher family (Mag included) is respected among other adventurers... but for the wrong reasons. The only people who respect them are Nina, who starts respecting Mag after he completes story missions without problems; Gre by default, and Prof. Whitehead. Carcano really warms up to Mag, giving him some well-deserved respect even before he's fought. Prof. Whitehead thinks very highly of Mag and appreciates the work he's done so far till the point they meet except he's really using him for his own selfish goals.
  • Easily Forgiven: Mag (somehow) convinces Whitehead from arresting Carcano despite all the trouble he's been causing to the Society for a long time ago with the idea that he'll repent for his actions soon.
  • Elemental Powers: Pepper's Cyframes all revolve around different elements.
  • Enemy Mine: Arguably, Carcano.
  • Enemy Summoner: The Lynx monster type can howl to call more of its friends to battle.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Carcano's lot refuses to kill people while on the job, but they only steal appraisal items.
  • Everything's Better with Dinosaurs: The final dungeon suddenly has a liking to having big dinosaurs roam the halls.
  • Expy: Tell me you weren't thinking about THAT Nina when you first meet Nina of the Society.
  • Face of a Thug: For some weird reason, both the item and equipment vendors in Museville are rocker dudes.
  • Family Rivalry: The Launchers have been long rivals with the Gun Clan.
  • Fingerless Gloves: Both Mag and Chain wear these.
  • For Massive Damage: Insecticide spray against insect based enemies.
  • For Science!: Whitehead's whole motivation to uncover the ancient civilization behind everyone's backs.
  • Frickin' Laser Beams: Pepper's weapon of choice.
  • Gentleman Thief: Carcano.
  • Global Airship: Mag's Sea Otter Seaplane can get him to anywhere in the first portion. It gets forgotten after the second portion comes in.
  • Goggles Do Nothing: Averted. Mag does put his goggles on when using his hand-based attacks.
  • Good Scars, Evil Scars: During his boss fight, you can see Yurka has one over his right eye.
  • Grappling Hook Pistol: This is one of Carcano's skills that he can use with his Cyframe. Outside of battles, he uses this to sneak into the Society Museum to steal artifacts.
    • Moreover, he uses this to enter the building after Linear is persuaded to leave Mag behind. Since Carcano revealed his secret, he won't be able to use it to plan surprise thefts anymore. But then again, he did say he was going to turn into a better person.
  • Hit Points
  • Humans Are Flawed: Yurka doesn't really like humans because of this reasoning since he and Linear are Evolutia. He comments on this when getting rid of Whitehead for his fascination with the ancient civilization.
  • I Have No Son: A kid selling fruits in Museville will go through this if Mag and the party don't buy anything from him.
  • Improbable Weapon User: Mag's Cyframe is essentially a Power Fist that can be upgraded to wield hammers, bowling balls and bug spray. Chain's Cyframe is a jet pack with a giant blade sticking out at the back. Linear uses a Frying Pan of Doom. Unequip Gre's and Linear's weapons, and they punch their enemies with their bare hands.
  • Inexplicable Treasure Chests: There's a large number of chests containing healing items, the same artifacts over and over, and an inexplicably large number of Cyframe parts that your friends can easily use.
  • Kid Hero: Mag. Chain somewhat is one.
  • Killer Yoyo: Yet another weapon for Mag's Cyframe.
  • Lady Looks Like a Dude: How is anyone going to tell at first glance Chain is a girl? It helps that she's got a voice and female pronouns used on her.
  • Lethal Chef: Gre uses food to damage enemies and lower their stats/cause status effects.
  • Lethal Lava Land: Oddly subverted. Although Blaze Ruins sounds like a dungeon where fire is present (bomb traps are everywhere in all dungeons), it's just In Name Only.
    • Even weirder is the fact that the boss of said ruins is the non-fire elemental, Storm Bird.
  • Level Scaling: Averted. This is no longer an issue in the remake.
  • The Lost Woods: Forest Depths.
  • MacGuffin Girl: Linear.
  • Magical Flutist: Linear uses an ocarina to use magic on the party or the enemies.
  • Magical Girl: Linear by default, being the only party member who can use healing spells. Though this becomes even more apparent once she grows wings to save Mag from exploding with Eugene's ship.
  • Marshmallow Hell: This is what Pepper seemingly does to Mag to heal his HP. He seems happy about it though.
  • Meganekko: Nina of the Society.
  • Missing Mom: Mag's mother is never shown. Same with Chain.
  • Ms. Fanservice: Pepper. Half ripped jeans, curled blond hair, jacket ripped open showing a black bra, and her theme music which is saxophone music. Let's see here for more details.
  • Murder the Hypotenuse: If it weren't any obvious, Yurka tries to invoke this to keep Linear away from Mag. He even hurts him.
  • Mysterious Waif: Linear.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Mag's Crowning Moment of Awesome gets screwed over by a tank bullet exploding on him and Linear that he accidentally caused.
  • Nothing Up My Sleeve: Yurka's sleeves are so long they are a few inches away from touching the ground. He can, however, use magic with them.
  • Obviously Evil: You're this when you're asking the pretty shy Linear to become one of Eugene's maids while disregarding everything about Mag's exploits.
  • Off-Model: A rather weird thing happens to Mag's white jacket suddenly disappearing during animated cutscenes. By the next normal cutscene, it's back there on him. Why, the boxart on this page also suffers from this.
  • One Man Party: Mag is easily the strongest character. The other characters levels will appropriate to what level you are, but Mag always seems to have the edge in strength.
    • This gets subverted once Carcano joins the group, making him the second strongest character in physical attacks.
  • Only in It For the Money: If you do a mission with just Mag and Linear, your entire win bonus goes straight into your pocket. Unlike the last game, taking Gre along won't charge you here since he knows you're putting the money to good use. Chain, on the other hand, takes 30% of your bonus for herself, and Pepper takes 60%! The worst part, you never get this money back to you, so it's basically losing massive chunks of change for having people in your party! When you net 100,000 in the game (which is sizeable money) and then Pepper takes 60,000, that's a massive loss! The even worst part: bonuses are a one time thing, going back and beating the dungeon again means nothing, the money is gone.
  • Outlaw Town: Pine Village, Carcano's hideout, is just a big town over the water fully inhabited by thieves.
  • Overly-Long Fighting Animation: Magna Rave and Sledge Hammer.
  • Palette Swap: Most enemies in later dungeons go through this, but they do have different abilities to compensate.
  • Point Build System: You can gain TP in the game, which can be used to learn new skills.
  • Power Gives You Wings: Linear suddenly creates a phoenix-like form to fly away with Mag to save him from being killed.
    • Yurka pulls his long blue wings out when he's fought. And true to the trope, he really is a deadly boss.
  • Punny Name/Theme Naming: Most of the main cast are named after weapons. And Prof. Whitehead for his... white head.
  • Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Oh, come on! Eugene is HEAVILY invoking this trope whenever he makes that Slasher Smile when talking about Linear.
  • Recurring Traveller: The game practically calls Chain and Pepper from the shadows once the Launcher trio travels to Museville so the party doesn't have to keep Gre for the third slot.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: Yurka.
  • The Reveal: Linear? Yeah, she's the Evolutia. Nobody could find the legendary Cyframe since everyone thought it was a relic or a machine, but not a sentient human(?) being. Eugene manages to find this out by using a hi-tech radar.
    • And then there's the fact Yurka is also an Evolutia.
  • The Rival: Chain the first five minutes of the game. After that, it doesn't really sound like she's being a rival at all if she demands Mag to take her to dungeons all the time.
    • This is her reason for following him all the way to Museville.
  • Roguelike: Elements of this are in dungeons, though the battles are turn-based.
  • Run, Don't Walk
  • Shipper on Deck: Chain's dad literally admits Linear is better off with Mag than her own daughter. It helps (or not) that he really doesn't like Chain.
  • Slasher Smile: Eugene does this whenever thinking about doing dirty stuff to Linear or whenever he slowly descends into insanity.
  • Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The Crypt Maze is an Underground Level that introduces slippery floor. Thankfully, the ice floor is not made of Frictionless Ice.
  • Smug Snake: Prince Eugene.
  • Succession Crisis: The Gun Clan has been known for having male heirs as the ones turned into adventurers. But then they came to a full stop with Chain. To remedy this issue, the clan had no choice but to give Chain special education so that she could continue their legacy.
    • ...Which is extremely weird considering how her father treats her as The Unfavorite behind her back.
  • Surfer Dude: The Cyframe mechanist in Museville looks like this.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: No, Carcano isn't going to help Mag and the others get into the Society Museum to rescue Linear. It just happened.
  • Tank Goodness: Mag and Linear run away from an army made entirely of this.
    • And then Mag and his rescue party face one as a boss while trying to get to Linear.
      • Weirdly enough, both Forest Depths and Crypt Maze have tank-like bosses that're not related to the dungeon element-wise, the latter does employ an ice attack though, but that's it.
  • Tech Points: The characters all have a wide movepool to which they can unlock by gathering TP in battles. Since Linear and Gre don't have the same benefits to upgrade/change their weapons like the other Cyframe users of the party, they instead have more areas they can choose from the beginning.
    • In the second part, there's a dungeon specifically made so that the party gains more TP than EXP from the enemies in there.
  • This Is a Drill: Carcano's Cyframe other skill.
  • Thriving Ghost Town: There's only about 10 NPC's in both Pannam Town and Museville, and the majority are useless. Except for the shop owner, upgrade shop, missions and appraisal, everyone else does nothing whatsoever except talk about totally irrelevant things or mention stuff you already know.
  • Time Skip: Six months after the events of the first game, to be specific.
  • Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Mag and Linear are this trope, with Linear being One Head Taller than Mag.
  • Top Down View: One of the two available camera angles.
  • Tsundere: Chain, Type A. This is even mocked at the beginning of the game when she begins making fun of Mag until Mag embarrasses her with the word cute, at which point she tries to defend herself, but just takes off flustered.
  • Underground Level: Crypt Maze and Carcano's Thieves' Trap.
  • The Unfavorite: Chain's dad really doesn't like her. He even implores Mag to take her to his missions just so that she's not around the house.
  • Unwitting Pawn: Mag to Prof. Whitehead, who is himself the Unwitting Pawn of Yurka.
  • The War Sequence: A really over-the-top cutscene happens when Mag and Linear run away from Eugene's tank army. What's really shocking is that Mag's Power Fist actually manages to fend them off with an earthquake... except a tank falls back in a hole while firing a bullet up to the air that screws his moment by falling on both of them.
  • White-Haired Pretty Boy: Yurka.
  • White Mage: Linear, has tons of magic attacks and only two are attack.
  • Work Off the Debt: Both Mag and Chain were left with a huge debt after their parents disappeared. Chain paid it off by selling her house, while Mag is playing this trope.
    • By the end of the second half, it turns out the Society didn't actually pay for the lodging in the Museville Hotel, so the hotel owners added 30,000 to the Society's bill, adding it all up.
  • You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: With no need to find the keys with the unconditional help of Mag's actions, Yurka disposes of Whitehead.
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