MMOs and what they mean for its players and how they vibrantly connect people, places, things, etc. is all fertile ground to explore. But I don't think employing its conventions for the sheer sake of, what I feel is just having them for tribute, while having nothing really emotional on offer throughout a painful exchange of 'well, grinding is core to feeling that time and investment yes?', is good. Partner quips and npc dialogue that rudimentarily remark on things-that-people-do-in-mmos is not enough connecting tissue to simulate that there is LIFE here. I would sincerely trade away the game's rather functional and alright combat, and solid zelda-like puzzle design, for something much worse if it meant that there was sincere emotional depth to its personality, history and real internet-like connection between factions and people here, etc etc. Like there's almost something unnerving about playing through an 'mmo' with this much polish. I'm not saying it needs to be more realistic but it feels so ultimately constructed and lacking in every punch put within the first handful of hours. Even your avatar is simply emotive early-on, in a situation I feel would at least incite so much more vulnerability (there's not even, like, real awkwardness or emotional unevenness between any of its cast so far. You think vr mmo players are going to communicate this perfect?). Idk, not every mmo reconstruction needs to be DOTHACK, but gosh does this wish it was dothack

This Game was amazing. The combat was simplistic yet it felt great to learn the move set to pull mad combos on groups of enemies. The whole art style of the game was just beautiful especially later on in the game with Giga's Garden and Sapphire Ridge looking so damn good as well as the sprites being really well made. Hell the story was so simple on the surface level and yet it was also fantastic with

many themes that it manages to tell very well. Even the weakest parts of the game, which I would say are the dungeons, still hold up pretty well on there own which features a good mix of combat and puzzle solving. I can't wait to do my NG+ run

I really wanted to enjoy this game. I’ve heard a lot of great things about it from friends as well as content creators I really admire, and the fact that it took major inspiration from Zelda made me very interested. After about 16 hours, I came to realize that the game just isn’t for me, and I’m bummed about it. I had to really force myself to play through a large chunk of that 16 hours as well.

My biggest problem with CrossCode is its level progression system. In most games I play, I despise doing sidequests that require a lot of chores or busywork, such as collecting a certain amount of materials or defeating a certain amount of enemies, and only ever really do them if it’s convenient for me. CrossCode requires you to do a lot of these very types of sidequests in order to be properly leveled for the main campaign. The game will let you know that you’re underleveled as you enter an area, or encounter enemies that are a higher level than you. I was surprised at how frequently I happened to be underleveled, as well as how many sidequests I needed to complete in order to reach the recommended level for an area or boss. I tried to go along with the game’s expectations and did a lot of these very sidequests, but this made my experience with the first half of the game a huge bore, and from what I’ve been told, it doesn’t really get any better.

The puzzles are also not my cup of tea either. They generally consist of just pushing and pulling blocks in a room, or shooting your VRP shots at different angles to ricochet and hit specific targets. By the halfway point of the game, I was already sick to death of both types of these puzzles.

There’s a lot about the game that I did enjoy. Its presentation is fantastic, with beautiful pixel art and outstanding music. I also really enjoyed the combat, even though it felt like I didn’t really progress far enough through the game to get a deep grasp of it. These are the elements of the game that really kept me going and made me want to stick with it. As for the story, I don’t think I made it far enough to be able to comment much on it. So far, from what I’ve experienced, the characters are charming enough, but I can tell I’ve barely scratched the surface of the plot, even though I’m apparently halfway through the game.

I don’t know if I’ll ever come back to CrossCode, but I’m shelving it for now at least. I really feel like I’ve been forcing myself to play it up until this point, and it’s leading me to resent the game a little, which I really don’t want to do. I really, really wanted to like this game. It’s clear that a lot of passion was put into it, but so much of the game up until this point has consisted of extremely boring busywork that’s left me immensely unsatisfied.

Crosscode is a ridiculously ambitious title. I genuinely don't understand why it isn't more often praised as one of the best indie games of all time. The story has it all (interesting plot, clever twists, fun characters) The gameplay has it all (complex combat mechanics, build variety, great bosses, challening and diverse puzzles) and the game is HUGE for an affordable price. In a way, it's just as impressive as hollow knight, if not more, and that is my favorite game of all time.
The dlc makes it even bigger and better too!

One of the best game i've played in years. Definitely in the conversation for one of the greatest indie games ever made alongside the likes of hk, undertale, cuphead, celeste, etc.
For people who like action rpgs and puzzles this game is one of a kind masterpiece. For people who dont uhh there's definitely a decent barrier to entry. Although there are assist options so everyone can finish this, u can also look up puzzle solutions. But it's understandable that it's not for everyone.
It's arguable that the quests, puzzles, and this game in general shouldve been shorter, i agree. Half of their dungeon ideas probably should be for postgame optional stuff. Still a 5/5 for me though.

Finished the base game with ~80% of the trophies (planning to get all of them post-game when i buy the dlc)

CrossCode has an excellent foundation for its gameplay, but is plagued by issues both big and small that prevent the game from ever taking full advantage of its strengths.

The combat is, at its core, both simple in terms of its basic functions while still delivering a very satisfying experience when pitched against the right enemies. Many of the boss fights are a genuine 10/10 in my book (almost all of them revolving around just the basic combat mechanics) but these only make up a small portion of the total game. Most of your time will be spent on the game's weaker aspects.

Navigation throughout the world is frustrated by the game's terrible depth perception, unnecessarily large size, and deliberately unhelpful map (which intentionally obscures information to force more interaction with the game's awful platforming). But just blazing through the world to get straight to the bosses is a terrible strategy because of how heavily the game relies on stats (derived from character level and equipment) rather than player skill alone, meaning even an excellent player will have to engage with a good deal of non-required content lest they wish to get bogged down in fights against enemies that can kill in one hit while barely receiving any damage in return. And once the exploration is dealt with and you're ready to take on the next boss with all your newfound gear, the temples leading up to them drag on for so long that it physically exhausted me to do them in one sitting.

Broadly speaking, while CrossCode has an excellent foundation and many isolated moments where it reaches 10/10 territory, there is some awful stuff in between those points that make the overall experience a very rough one at times. It feels like the game could have been cut down significantly and come out better as a result, but the game's systems just aren't built in a way where skipping the non-essential content is a viable path forward. CrossCode's flaws are too deeply embedded within the game for avoiding them to be a realistic option.

While I still enjoyed my time with the game overall and I'd still recommend it to most people, I can't bring myself to ignore the game's many flaws either. CrossCode can be a rough experience at times, but its still one worth getting through for the fantastic things it achieves along the way.

Definitely not for me. Played for over 3 hours and there just wasn't really anything here to justify continuing. The intro was decent, fighting mechanics are okay, pixel art looks nice, music is great, the world does feel pretty alive, but that's where my praises end. I got up to completing chapter 3 when I realized my level and gear were really weak (I was getting bodied by bunny rabbits), so I decided to do a few side quests to get some better gear and level up. I did about 10 or so quests and they were all incredibly boring and monotonous, while also barely rewarding me with anything. To buy items at shops you don't just use money, you have to go out and gather the materials yourself which is incredibly annoying. That's pretty much when I realized this wasn't for me. I'm sure it gets better once you level up more and get better gear, but I'm just not interested. The UI feels really clunky with too many menus and you can't rebind buttons to your mouse for some reason so I can't play how I would want to anyway.

I never heard about this game before it got highly recommended to me. Out of curiosity I decided to give it a shot and... wow I can't believe I was missing out.

It's kinda jarring how overlooked this gem is, an amazing indie game that does so many things and offers an experience like no others.

It has a premise that glue you on the screen from the moment you start, as you begin explore this MMORPG inspired world to discover the secrets of the main character and the people around her.

The writing is really charming, and gives a lot of personlity to most of the roster and the setting they are part of.

The gameplay has a top-down perspective that combines different things from various geners: you have the energy and range of games like Enter the Gungeon but also really great puzzles from titles like A Link to the Past. It all merges together to create an incredible experience. It is even abe to feature an incredible combat, that leads to really fun and ismart gimmicks for enemies and especially bosses, that makes every encounter interesting and fascinating to discover.

I do have some nitpicks, like I feel that sometimes the maps can feel a bit too large and dispersive, and some of the puzzles and dungeons can feel a bit too long for my taste... but that can also be my lack of general orientation (and possible lack of brain cells) that stops me from praising it more,

I feel I am not really that far into the story (the game is surprisingly long), but for now I can safely say that Crosscode is a masterpiece. An absolute recommendation for every fan of videogames.

...Lea Hi! :D

Now for the real talk. I burned myself out trying to finish it and gave it a scarcely deserved 3 star rating. I have more good than bad to say, aint nobody wanna read allat tho.

I'll see about the rating when i tackle A New Home at a tame pace

Probably the holistically best game, I've ever played.

Great story: The setting is fun, being that you're meant to be playing in a MMORPG and they play with that to it's fullest extent. The worldbuilding is sort of lacklustre, given that you're almost always in the fake world of the MMO, you don't get much info on the outside and the MMO's worldbuilding is more reminiscent of old school MMO's, which is to say barely present. While not mindblowing, the plot is still really good and grounded in the growth of the characters. It has enough twists and hooks to keep you guessing, just wish there weren't hints for some possible twists that never ended up meaning anything. The characters are all great too. The game has one of the best protagonists I've ever seen, and she's still not the best character in the game, that's Emilie.

Great gameplay: The combat is fun even for me and I'm not one to really care much for combat. Something just really clicked with the game for me. Elemental overload could be done away with and that would make it perfect. The puzzles in the game are immaculate. Really making you think about everything you have at your disposal, without ever feeling like there was a nonsense solution. The exploration was done better than all but one other game I know. It was consistently rewarding and you always saw the number of chests in an area to know when you could stop. Hint for anyone confused with the height part of exploring: just aim a shot, the shadows of the aiming line will show you everything you need to know.

Great graphics and music: The pixel art is gorgeous and so is the soundtrack. I found an old version of the main menu theme they used in early access and I wish they used that instead, but otherwise I've no complaints on either.

Overall in every aspect that I think a game can succeed in, Crosscode does and then some. Play it

One of the most hot and cold games ever made. The amount of brilliant ideas this game has makes it comparable to other indie title greats like hollow knight, hades, celeste...but I feel that, more so than not. it falls flat on its face in execution.

The gameplay mechanics themselves are incredibly well made and thought out. The combat is very satisfying with loads of build options that vastly change how you approach battles. The level up system is excellent too, getting better armour, weapons and stats via questlines and level up feels good and you can instantly see the difference it makes. This is all fine and dandy until you run into the baffling game design decisions made throughout the entire game.

The puzzles are well made but the insane amount of precision and timing for the game to actually let you progress is infuriating. Most of the time on these puzzles I figure out what I need to do, but can't do what the puzzle asks of me consistently and it results in me fiddling with the controls for minutes trying to make minor changes to my aim until the game decides that I may progress. This is especially bad when you have to complete multiple puzzles in a sequence to progress into the next room, since if you fail during any one of them, you are gonna have to repeat the whole segment all over again, fidgeting with you aim and all.

The side quest design in this game is genuinely one of the most tedious I've ever seen. 80% of the time you will be looking for, and getting lost on your way to the quest itself due to the poor map (the map just tells you in which room the quest is located, which is an issue since the rooms can be quite large). The quests themselves are fine but the pure amount of backtracking makes me want to not even bother with them. I kid you not, some quest required me to run to and from 2 locations on 3 separate occasions.

This game is also heavily reliant on platforming for level progression which would be fine if it wasn't for the non existent depth perception. More often than not I'm just making leaps of faith when it comes to platforming due to the fact that 95% of the time I do not know if the platform I'm jumping towards is above, below or the same level as I am. Similarly to the puzzles, the platforming is, more often than not, sequenced - if you fall, you have to do the whole sequence all over again, which you can imagine is an issue if you don't know what platforms you can and can't jump to.

All of this coupled with the occasional annoying enemy makes the game frustrating as hell to play, especially due to the fact that the game does so much right. It feels incredible to play, the controls are smooth as butter, the pixel art is fantastic, the music incredible...but all of that falls flat on its face because of the issues I've mentioned before. Its like if you build a ferrari and decided to put cinder blocks in place of the wheels. This game feels like it should be fantastic, and in segments it really is, but the glaring issues made me drop it halfway through.

Crosscode is a game that teeters on the brink of gaming greatness were it not for a handful of creative choices and restrictions that prevent it from soaring to those heights. The game is a remarkably enjoyable action RPG with really fun combat. At a cursory glance, the gameplay might appear to be uninteresting and not your style, but the combat mechanics have this rhythmic energy reminiscent of classic Zelda combat. Unquestionably, Zelda serves as a profound wellspring of inspiration for this game, with its traditional Zelda-like dungeons and puzzles which will definitely interesting any veteran Zelda players to this game.

Nonetheless, where Crosscode falters is in its tendency to overstay its welcome. The dungeons overstay their welcome, diluting the overall experience. If you were to take out four puzzle chambers from each dungeon, I feel the game’s pacing would benefit a lot. Additionally, puzzles throughout the main overworld can be sometimes annoying due to how complex and long they take. This compounded by the fact that you sometimes cannot tell which platforms you can jump to accurately due to the elevation not being clearly defined, it often times made me skip any of the optional puzzles. Yet at the same time, once these puzzles are finally solved after persistent effort, the satisfaction is unmatched.

Combat for the most part is good but often times it also does tend to overstay its welcome. Fights are often harder than they should be – enemies hit you hard, but you don't hit them hard enough. Thankfully, there are generous accessibility options, which are honestly ahead of the curve in terms of accessibility in games in general, to make enemies do less damage, but your attacks still feel a bit weak. The boss fights, though, are awesome and are again reminiscent of the classic Zelda formula – you figure out their weak points using the dungeon items and then go all out on them, which is super satisfying.

The game's MMO setting is interesting, but it gets a bit tiring when you're supposed to care about the story of the game inside the game. Lea and the main characters are cool, especially during Chapter 7, and their well-written enough so that you can get invested in most of their stories. Anything to do with the “real-life” portions of this game are great. However, the game will continue to insist on elevating the MMO's story as if it were just as import as the main cast’s story, and that’s when I begin to lose interest. The game already establishes that the MMO’s story isn’t real and all of these characters are NPCs, so why should I care or be invested in it? Luckily once Chapter 7, the game makes it clear that those story’s will not be the focus going forward which I was grateful for.

In the end, Crosscode is a really enjoyable action RPG, almost hitting the top marks if not for a few things holding it back. The combat is fun, even if it can be tough sometimes. It's worth playing, even with its issues, thanks to its world and exciting battles.

One of the best action puzzle RPG with simple mechanics I have ever played. What hooked me initially is how good the combat feel is specially how smooth and responsive it is. The combat really shines with elemental swapping to use different skills or to exploit weaknesses which feels really good. The skill, level and equipment progressions are refreshingly simple and not obtrusive. Rather, the game still values mechanical skill over stats.

The other hook is the mute main character herself who is quite expressive and endearing despite her limited vocabulary. Her story is quite nice as well as how the game uses its MMORPG setting wisely which is thankfully not too meta and more sincere. Side quests are strangely non-trivial which is a nice surprise. Overall, the game is well rounded exceeding my expectation for an indie game.

While I can shower this with more praise, I do have some gripes. This game has SO MANY PUZZLES that can turnoff players, but the quantity and quality kinda make this special in this genre although it is a valid pacing concern at times. The only puzzles I do not like are timed and precision based since analog aiming may not be the most accurate specially with the added pressure of enemies or bosses. Still, it is impressive the game choose its mechanics wisely and crafted so much synergy from it.

The camera with the art style can be quite unclear in terms of the Z-axis or vertical plane where it is hard to determine if a two edges are on the same level. I do wish for an accessibility option to display walkable edges and their height (perhaps with color) to mitigate this. Without some hint, platforming jumps can feel like trial-and-error and unnecessary knowledge checks.

I do like the aspect of trading instead of merely buying outright; however, it kinda feels artificial in the late game where many merchants are bundled together each with only 4 trading item limit. It does add some flavor and intentionality, I do think it can be better streamlined if the interface allowed for more. Some trades as well require an unusual large amount of craftable items bordering on unnecessary which can be an issue.

I do have some other gripes such as aim sensitivity, but overall this delivers such a great amount of value and content as well as heart which I really appreciate. Very much recommend this game and is a new personal favorite.

CrossCode is one of the most consistently excellent experience's I've ever had playing a game. The combat is fast, frenetic and nuanced, with plenty of build variety. The exploration is both incredibly fun and rewarding. The dungeons and puzzles are so intricately designed and satisfying to plow through. But most of all, the writing gives birth to so many extremely likeable and interesting characters. Lea is an incredible protagonist, who's journey towards self discovery is realized so beautifully, and all her companions are written with a similar level of care. The game as a whole feels so alive and inviting, it's such a comfy experience that isn't afraid to go to some dark places to develop its characters and bring them to greater heights.

10/10.