Zool has been announced as the April Evercade Highlight of the Month, making it the second title to be highlighted by the program, after it made its debut on Evercade last month with Midnight Resistance.
Last month, we reported that the Evercade Highlight of the Month program was replacing the Evercade Game of the Month, the difference between the two being that the Evercade Highlight of the Month showcases titles from previous Evercade cartridge releases, whereas Evercade Game of the Month previewed new indie retro games coming to Evercade.
Gremlin’s 16-bit platformer Zool has now been released as the Evercade Highlight of the Month for April 2025. Zool was previously released on Evercade on the Gremlin Collection 1 cartridge.
Zool made his debut in the gaming world on the Commodore Amiga in 1992, when he was touted as the Amiga’s answer to Sonic, due to both games being speedy platform games, and while Zool isn’t without its charm, it clearly can’t keep pace with Sega’s little blue fella!
Zool was billed as “Ninja of the Nth Dimension,” and due to his appearance, it’s often assumed that Zool is a ninja ant, but this was never intended to be the case, as Blaze Entertainment point out on their Evercade blog, stating that, “behind the ninja mask, he is a green-skinned, gremlin-like creature — which, of course, is simply a reference to developer Gremlin.” So that’s one Zool myth dispelled! The version of Zool that appears on Evercade is the Mega Drive/Genesis version, despite the game being best-known as an Amiga game.
We’re not sure why Zool was even released on the Mega Drive/Genesis, because, let’s be honest, why have Zool when you can have Sonic?
We think we’ve established that Zool is no match for Sonic, but it’s still well worth playing, and Evercade VS, Evercade EXP and Evercade Alpha owners can currently play Zool for free, as the Evercade Highlight of the Month for April. To get access to Zool, owners of compatible Evercade models simply need to update to the latest system software, and will remain playable until the system software is updated again.
