Club Retro 2021: June - Hitchhiker's Guide to Gaming
Jun 30, 2021 19:42:04 GMT -5
Post by paulofthewest on Jun 30, 2021 19:42:04 GMT -5
Crystalis is a Action RPG developed by SNK for the NES.
The battle system is the reason to play the game. Crystalis' main attraction is the charging of your sword for different powers. Each of the four main swords have three levels of power that you must discover throughout the game. The first being a simple bolt, second level is a unique powered up attack, and the third is the ultimate attack that consumes some MP. Therefore your strategy, most of the time, is which sword to use and at what level. (Although, sometimes no charge is preferred.) Since you must stand still to charge there is an added element of when to charge, to run, or stick with a level 1 shot. These strategies are apparent when you fight Dragonia's Finest Four, as each keep you moving and you must choose when to charge and when to attack. The developers, in order to alleviate charging time issues, made your character move significantly faster relative to other creatures, with the exception of the finest four.
While the majoring of the game is dungeon crawls, there are overworld puzzle/fetch quests. One wonderful feature of Crystalis is when you acquire the telepathy magic which allows you to talk to each of the four wisemen. These wisemen give you hints and directions on where to move next so you're never completely lost.
The story and characters are on the good side of things, but the delivery is terrible. Even now, I'm still fuzzy on parts of the story so I have probably filled in sections. From what I gather,
you assume the role of one of two scientists that come out of stasis at a specific time in order to restore the world from an apocalyptic nuclear war. The war so changed the environment that new monsters appeared throughout the land. To save what was left, the scientists (not just you) at the end of the war created a floating tower to house the technology for when the world was ready. They also created an android (Azteca?) to watch over the land and help lead the world in a better direction for mankind. While people were rebuilding, Dragonia seized power and wants to take control of the tower to further his grip on the world. The four wise men are to aid you (the young scientist from stasis) with the swords and skills they have created. Your are to defend the world, destroy dragonia, and use Mesia (the other scientist) to destroy the tower so no one is tempted again.
To bad they don't explain that until the last 10 minutes of the game where you, for some reason, are fighting robots generated from the central computer of the tower.To compound the delivery problem, the game has Engrish. Some are benign, "Your level is increased" or "the utmost fear of people is released." Others become misleading: "Proceed back into the cave and visit the town." Well, I just came from a cave with a town and see another cave over there. Which is it? (They meant to say "Follow the path behind me.") The Engrish also make some parts useless. Remember that telepathy ability? At one point you must find the Love Pendant. Sounds groovy, except the one hint a wise man gives you is "I left it in a river." Well thanks man, I'm riding a dolphin in the middle of an ocean. I guess I'll comb the ocean. Good thing the dolphin is as fast as me.
There are also a couple of lame situations the game puts you in. When acquiring the third sword you must run past a bunch of enemies that can only be damaged by the sword your are retrieving. This might not be too bad, except certain parts of the dungeon are two enemies wide. O, and the enemies turn you to stone. The other situation that pops up is that you can't defeat a boss unless you have reached a certain level. And no, you can't escape the boss battle. If you start a fight with one of the final four and hear that ding sound, your only choice is to die.
The last significant issue is switching swords. It is just a pain, there is no way around it. You must press select then control pad over to the correct sword, then press a, then select. To compound this issue, if you want to use a ball (to get the level 2 power) you must also arrow down (after selecting the correct sword) to the ball and select it as well. Your eventual reprieve is when you acquire the bracelet for the sword (level 3 power) then selecting just the sword allows you access to level 1 and 2 powers for said sword. If you want the third level you will need to select the bracelet. This may not have been so bad, except significant parts of the game make you switch between swords to as enemies have mixed immunity.
Pros:
+ Unique sword powers add a fun element
+ Wise men give you a plot arrow and hints on what to do next
+ The dungeons have a nice long length
+ boss battles meld well with the sword charging element
+ Really, I love the battle system
Cons:
- Engrish
- Plot delivered terribly
- dungeon path can break the laws of physics. I'm not saying bend where some things are bigger/small. I mean you see a treasure chest above you, but the path to it is down not up.
- sword swaps are a pain
- level grinds are a strong requirement
- Because of the poor translation, sometimes you simply don't know what to do.6.5/10: Crystalis is worth a quick try to see if you like the battle system. If you do, you will love this game. If not, move on as there are too many other issues that detract from the overall game.