Crisis Core tries to do a lot of things, but ultimately gets into it's own way by failing to use the hardware it had to operate on to a degree that would have made an interesting playing experience.
My TLDR is that this could have been a really good game, if it came out on the PS2 instead of the PSP and would have had another editor or two to supervise the dialogue and character-writing.
How do I get there: Well first we have to aknowledge that Crisis Core is incredibly ambitious; being the action focused prequel to one of the most influential video games ever made... on a handheld console from the 2000's. For what it is, I can deffo give it credit and in this particular case I think it would work a lot better on the console it released on, than an emulator, as the entire game structure is designed to have you take breaks and hop in and out of gameplay over the cause of your playthrough. Binging this on an emulator like I did, which, without a doubt, harmed my enjoyment, as the missions especially were not meant to be played back to back, trying to balance missions and story in one sitting.
Crisis Core is held back by it's combat to a degree that it felt painful to play at times. The distance between Encounters can be hilariously short, which really wore me down over time. Exhibit A
Also does the combat lack responsiveness, which you CAN actually get used to tho and make it bend to your will pretty good, which is also the point you will realize that combat lacks mechanics. I complained out loud about the absurdity and tedium of the final boss, which was neither hard, nor interesting and in my eyes just a huge waste of time. It had enormous downtime, didn't manage to kill me once, but took painstakingly long to beat with all of the spawning ads and the DMW machine doing god fuck knows. CC is also really easy, just... not fun.
On to the story. The fuck. This one of the messiest told plots in recent memory. It's not bad per se, just clumsily progressed through weird writing (which might be the translation, I cannot confirm that), confusing set-ups and unclear character motivations for the majority of the runtime. The gameplay inherently kills the pacing here but as the hardware also necessitates not a lot of story can happen in between of the grand set-pieces. The philosophy of handheld games is super interesting, kinda weird and doesn't necessarily translate to game experiences we are used to rn and I can appreciate that too in a way. It's just as it is.
I want to end this on a good note tho, that being that I LOVE the visuals of this game. I think it looks waaaay better than Reunion. KH artstyle FFVII is looking clean as heck and on my emulator, I only doubled the resolution, instread of cranking it up to make everything super sharp and modern comicy looking, as it made for a whole vibe of it's own. Some of the locals are downright gorgeous, especially Shinra manor for instance.
The music is not really what I expected, nor did it fit my taste all of the time, but it does something unique and I can appreciate that it feels other-worldly with the choices of instruments of genre to sepperate itself from OG FF7.
My fav thing tho are the hella 2000-ish animations and especially the WAY TOO cool pre-rendered curscenes. That Sephiroth/Angeal/Genesis fight on the Junoon Canon is one of the greatest animated fight scenes period. It's quality in universe only being overshadowed by the fight in the church in Advent Children. I wrote a defense of that film on my letterboxd if ur interested lmao.
My time with Crisis Core wasn't all bad. I think there could be a lot to love for a lot of people. I'm sad I wouldn't necessarily call my self a CC connoisseur, but even I got something out of this title. The ending even managed to break through my frustration and got me hooked a lil again. I mean I knew all of it, but seeing it for the first time in game was still kinda cool.
Not really looking forward to playing Dirge of Cerberus now anymore tho.
My TLDR is that this could have been a really good game, if it came out on the PS2 instead of the PSP and would have had another editor or two to supervise the dialogue and character-writing.
How do I get there: Well first we have to aknowledge that Crisis Core is incredibly ambitious; being the action focused prequel to one of the most influential video games ever made... on a handheld console from the 2000's. For what it is, I can deffo give it credit and in this particular case I think it would work a lot better on the console it released on, than an emulator, as the entire game structure is designed to have you take breaks and hop in and out of gameplay over the cause of your playthrough. Binging this on an emulator like I did, which, without a doubt, harmed my enjoyment, as the missions especially were not meant to be played back to back, trying to balance missions and story in one sitting.
Crisis Core is held back by it's combat to a degree that it felt painful to play at times. The distance between Encounters can be hilariously short, which really wore me down over time. Exhibit A
Also does the combat lack responsiveness, which you CAN actually get used to tho and make it bend to your will pretty good, which is also the point you will realize that combat lacks mechanics. I complained out loud about the absurdity and tedium of the final boss, which was neither hard, nor interesting and in my eyes just a huge waste of time. It had enormous downtime, didn't manage to kill me once, but took painstakingly long to beat with all of the spawning ads and the DMW machine doing god fuck knows. CC is also really easy, just... not fun.
On to the story. The fuck. This one of the messiest told plots in recent memory. It's not bad per se, just clumsily progressed through weird writing (which might be the translation, I cannot confirm that), confusing set-ups and unclear character motivations for the majority of the runtime. The gameplay inherently kills the pacing here but as the hardware also necessitates not a lot of story can happen in between of the grand set-pieces. The philosophy of handheld games is super interesting, kinda weird and doesn't necessarily translate to game experiences we are used to rn and I can appreciate that too in a way. It's just as it is.
I want to end this on a good note tho, that being that I LOVE the visuals of this game. I think it looks waaaay better than Reunion. KH artstyle FFVII is looking clean as heck and on my emulator, I only doubled the resolution, instread of cranking it up to make everything super sharp and modern comicy looking, as it made for a whole vibe of it's own. Some of the locals are downright gorgeous, especially Shinra manor for instance.
The music is not really what I expected, nor did it fit my taste all of the time, but it does something unique and I can appreciate that it feels other-worldly with the choices of instruments of genre to sepperate itself from OG FF7.
My fav thing tho are the hella 2000-ish animations and especially the WAY TOO cool pre-rendered curscenes. That Sephiroth/Angeal/Genesis fight on the Junoon Canon is one of the greatest animated fight scenes period. It's quality in universe only being overshadowed by the fight in the church in Advent Children. I wrote a defense of that film on my letterboxd if ur interested lmao.
My time with Crisis Core wasn't all bad. I think there could be a lot to love for a lot of people. I'm sad I wouldn't necessarily call my self a CC connoisseur, but even I got something out of this title. The ending even managed to break through my frustration and got me hooked a lil again. I mean I knew all of it, but seeing it for the first time in game was still kinda cool.
Not really looking forward to playing Dirge of Cerberus now anymore tho.