Crisis Core FFVII here in June Comments by Robert Purchese

Too close to Brawl for comfort. Might leave this for a month or two so that I can play through it distraction-free.

I reckon EG will follow Edge with their marking on this.

Much as I love the reproduction of Midgar and the world in this game, plus the goosebumps playing through the latter sections of the game, the optional side missions (where a bulk of the gameplay time is) are terminally dull... and the game can easily degenerate into a physical attack slug fest, since its by far the most effective tool for dispatching enemies.

.::: A 6 is fair. This is pure fan-service and in that light it's fantastic (the ending makes it worth the effort). Yet, the game underneath is shallow and the DMW system feels hopelessly detached from your actions.

The problem is that large swarms of the missions make themselves available to you at one time and pretty much all of them are totally devoid of character. You may as well ignore the pre-amble that goes with them because you sure as hell know its going to be a jaunt across one of about 6 locations to find the visible boss area and defeat what is within. The only change being the increment in difficulty.

I would have rather had a lesser amount of missions and perhaps some plot to go with them, some form of diversion to distract you from the fact that they are that jaunt to the boss guy and nothing else. Some cut scenery during the procedings. This then brings us back to the combat, I had a huge swarm of materia, but the most effective and efficient route throughout the game is to stick something like the barrier materias on your person, status buffs and perhaps assault twister and its derivatives and just mash your way through with the 4 x combo X button attack.

Why bother with Poison, Silence, Drain, Osmose... all of it, when you can quite easily X button your way to success?

The most successful instances of SquareEnix combatting this has been in FF 9, X and X-2. By having characters dedicated to certain roles, you were forced to go for attack, support, magic balances. Ok, you now only have Zack to control, but I didn't really find myself in situations where I felt I had to think of a cunning tactical strategy to combat a situation, and also with the attack mechanic not being as sophisticated as God Of War, it felt kind of unrewarding on that aspect.

The DMW tries its best to combat this, no MP cost encouraging players to go on magical attack fests, but the trusty old X wins through, even in the face of the yellow command materia.

Having said that, I enjoyed my playthrough, especially after abandoning the missions. The interation with Midgar residents, the little SOLDIER set plays, the classic FF7 moment right near the end... all lovely. It would have been nice if there was more of a free roamy world and you actually had to visit Junon or Gongaga etc to go take on the missions there.

Edit:

Did FFX get a terrible score? I enjoyed it myself, especially just belting about being a completist and populating the monster arena. Some of the cutscenes are a bit cringy, but I liked it. A hell of alot more than the letdown of X2.

I enjoyed Crisis Core far more than FF VII and X. The battle system while shallow, was great fun IMO - though I do understand why some felt detached from the DMW. I have to agree that side quests were woeful. You would think that they could at least create more environments, but the majority were drab. Ignoring the side quests, I thought the main campaign was memorable. Plus I didn't button mash 'X' my way through, instead taking my time to use the Materias equipped properly.

Five! Bloody hell. Still one mans trash is another mans treasure. Its a solid Final Fanasy... the plot is certainly a bit more memorable than XII's. It looked lovely, had some lovely music... plus was very floaty-nice in its pacing! Liked the combat mechanic, although that was bettered by X-2's great combat.

Must pick up X again. I sold my PS2 to fund a house move, then bought one again, then sold that and got a 60GB PS3... just never managed to reclaim X in the interim period. Not going to get it until I finally finish off XII though!

Great to be in Midgar and the strong connections and backstory to the rightly epic FFVII universe. The game over the long run was a bit samey for me, I tried to be creative and to use various materia but really can manage with few key materias and button mashings!

I would have thought they would retain key RPG elements instead of making it largely a third person action game, seem too much emphasis was placed on bitesize gaming for portable PSP.
Believe there was perception that fully fledged RPG game would be difficult to make the transition successfully to handheld format, but I recall seeing there was a research which strongly indicate most people use PSP in bedroom!

Yay! I've had it on pre-order ever since SE announced the special edition with the art book :D

"I would have rather had a lesser amount of missions and perhaps some plot to go with them, some form of diversion to distract you from the fact that they are that jaunt to the boss guy and nothing else."

+ oo

I quite enjoyed FF:Crisis Core. It's certainly one of the better PSP games out there.

I thought you were saying + "ooooh" there!

I do like the fact that its a completely original game, and only on PSP. Same for God Of War recently. Aside from the side missions, its not really pandered to being a game geared towards a portable platform. I always got a feeling of disappointment when reading previews to games where the statement "we've tailored the game to the platform" sits somewhere within it. Like Liberty City Stories initial short and dreadful missions... which you pelted through to get to the good stuff. If I'm out and about, stuck in the middle of a cutscene or something, don't really mind slapping it on sleep if I really have to... not that much of a goldfish that I forget whats happened when I resume! Heck I even pause a fight and resume it a week later or something!

Whatever. I know I must have this game. It looks brilliant in so many ways, and is clearly what the PSP was made for.
10/10 baby.

I love the way so many criticisms leveled at this game is that its too shallow, or its side stories don't have the same depth of its consoles peers, or the battles aren't as engaging as with other RPG's.

I remember in FFVII back when it came out, I was blown away, reading the official playstation magazines 8 page spread on it in October/November before it came out, I've never felt the same about a games release, before or since then. It's childhood excitement really, to expect to get that again now, with a handheld game would just be naive of me.

Some boss battles took over 40minutes. Interactive cutscenes lasted over an hour.
It'd be like playing Metal Gear Solid 2 in 10 minute stints. Complete madness.

This game for better or for worse was created with a more casual handheld audience in mind. If your looking for a console RPG your looking in the wrong place, play a different game. 5 or 6/10 in my eyes is absurd considering the technical achievement alone. I'll see what this game gets on here once Eurogamer reviews it but I honestly believe a score such as that to be a misjustice. Maybe because of nostalgia, but also because I've been a gamer for 20 years now and I'm only in my early 20's so thats most of my life. I know what a 5/10 game looks like, I've had the misfortune of playing them.

If the Lost videogame warrants 7/10 this is a 9.

God what a rant, I should buy an ink well and some special paper.

As I said, I've had yonder PS1 FF7 on my psp thanks to cfw... more than happy to slap the thing on sleep mid fight if I'm dashing off a tram or something. In fact, some of the main quest Crisis Core stuff is quite lengthy itself! I get that its meant for a casual handheld perspective regarding the missions, but I still believe they needed fleshing out somewhat, because for me they became X button mash quests to the final boss guy and nothing more. I was purely going through for a levelling/materia build purpose and I got to a point where I thought "ENOUGH!" and went and thoroughly enjoyed the main quest instead! This is coming from someone who was quite happy to run in a figure of 8 in the tiny room of the sunken seaplane in FF7... desperately levelling up 4 x Cut and getting those Level 4 limit breaks!

A little bit of interjection to the side missions, some plot past the initial blurb/statement ... and that would have been fantastic, and then more than willing to look over the fact you rely on good old trusty Buster Sword to plough through. Other than than, its a fantastically presented main story, gorgeously realised, with tiresome side missions.... and sadly its with them that the replay and hours come into effect.

I'll play through again, if only for the joy of being in SOLDIER and seeing how it all develops.

And now I'm late for work.

Magic Pots and Movers were best for AP in the final dungeon, rather than the Gelnika monsters which were pretty tough :P

"the optional side missions (where a bulk of the gameplay time is) are terminally dull... and the game can easily degenerate into a physical attack slug fest, since its by far the most effective tool for dispatching enemies."

True, apart from a few that are backed up by an actual story component (Yuffie) or offer an entirely new, albeit small, area (tanker) they are horribly repetitive. Nonetheless, I've made it through ~ 77 % and I'm not even halfway through the game.

"I would have rather had a lesser amount of missions and perhaps some plot to go with them, some form of diversion to distract you from the fact that they are that jaunt to the boss guy and nothing else. Some cut scenery during the procedings."

I agree.

"Why bother with Poison, Silence, Drain, Osmose... all of it, when you can quite easily X button your way to success?"

What difficulty did you play it on?


The game won't degenerate into a physical slug fest (as fast) if you choose the (NA) 'Hard' mode. The materia system is somewhat deep - somewhat -, the music mostly is truly good, the story is good, voice acting and writing are as well and a lot of the main areas are well designed, especially the later ones.
The DMW isn't that random. There are EXP, and there is materia that lets people influence what character/summon they get. It also adds to the story.
This is a great game and depending on one's point of view it deserves a 7-9 out of 10. Even without the extra missions, that is. Deducting from that score because of optional extra content doesn't seem right. Plus, this is a PSP game. The largest one to date, I would say. It may be fan service. However, at the same time, it is one of the systems best games and a good game in absolute terms.

On a sidenote, people who haven't completed the US version's Hard mode should probably be a little more careful with their preliminary 'reviews'.

The Gelnika monsters were tough, barring the tiny tiny room where you find Rude and Reno. Plenty of creatures to steal turbo ethers from, and loads of AP from the 4 x octopus jobbies. The other creatures are just too nasty with the status effects, fun to fight, not if you're grinding it out though!

Plus I like to save the Northern Crater as a special treat once I'm all powered up. Cloud cutting a path through the entire lot of them, beating down with 4 x cut, ultima weapon and a bit of omnislash....

I played through on the default difficulty, although I could still see myself buffing up the materia and going for a sword and barriers approach. Dunno, perhaps I will revisit on New Game+ to see whats going on. I know there are plenty of challenges in there for hard battles, for example one of the missions I went into, all the monsters were shielded against my lightning sword! So that required an accessory rejig, but was still the same old jaunt.

I did enjoy the near endless stream of slow worm thing with the 2nd to last Costa Del Sol mission.

I've already finished crisis core twice :) Its a great game. 8 or 9 out of 10. The battle system is actually really good once you get used to it and the story is epic. Graphics are probably the best on the PSP and the control system is good too. You really become attached to Zack and its very sad when he dies. Before u shout SPOILER at me, it's not a spoiler coz if u played ff7 u would know zack dies.

Japanese audio? No? Don't care then.