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I am a huge fan of the original Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles who bought the DS games but never really enjoyed them. There were some gameplay tweaks that made the game less enjoyable for me, but also the presentation of the original GameCube title was a big part of what made it special. The handheld system simply couldn't provide the power and memory necessary for the same quality of environmental graphics and soundtrack. So, when a Wii successor was announced (and not those <40 MB WiiWare games), I was excited. However, when it was shown to have completely changed the gameplay, I stopped being interested. I was always intrigued because of the franchise, but never enough to buy the game. Within the last year, I finally decided to purchase it out of regret for not doing so earlier, and a few weeks ago, I finally decided to play the game as an attempt to clear out my backlog.
NOTE: I had a lot of thoughts, as I tried to think of what kept this game from being great. Feel free to skip them.
Playtime: 14 hours 50 minutes (first attempted final boss after 8 hours but found it too difficult)
Positives
Lore - If you're interested in the Crystal Chronicles universe, you get some nice development. You see how the various tribes are living together (or not) far in the future, and some of the lore of the world is further developed. All in all, it's an excuse to continue learning about a world of miasma streams and Yukes.
Graphics - For a Wii game, I was really impressed with the graphics. Square Enix has always been quite good at building beautiful games, so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. The game was a bit inconsistent, but I was amazed to find graphical details like the brick walls inside the capital city be as polished as they were.
Voice acting - The voice acting was surprisingly pleasant in this game! I don't think there was a single moment where I thought, "I should mute this." For a game that clearly wasn't one of Square Enix's AAA projects, I thought the presentation here was well done.
World size/variety - The world really is quite big and because of its size, they are able to make a lot of unique environments. The serene Moogle Woods Station, the autumnal Red Leaf Station, the
... The game also gives you a lot of modes of transportation: by foot, chocobo, train, and eventually
, which helps with the size.
The homage to the franchise's roots - This is only a pro because I love the original game, but this game has a lot of little easter eggs and references to the GameCube title. The equipment system was a nice continuation of the original game's crafting system. However, until the game finally grew on me in the second half of my playtime, most of these references angered me because of the list that follows below.
Areas of Improvement
Combat system - Despite the promise of cool powers, Layle never feels that powerful. Instead, I typically felt like the combat was tedious. One helpful design change would have been some kind of physical and/or close-range attack. Perhaps a kind of explosive 360-degree force push gained through equipment or a skill tied to a recharge meter? The game's combat and combination system systems seemed to work best when you had some distance between you and the enemy, but if an enemy got close, you had no quick way of attacking in response (given the time it takes to lock on to an enemy). Even a decision like tying the dodge to a waggle made the combat feel looser and less responsive than I would have liked (and I say this as someone who liked waggle like Super Mario Galaxy's spin move). Additionally, since the game liked to encourage you to "combine" enemies and items, the ability to more properly aim your throws through a multi-target lock-on system or some other system would have been helpful. Cutscenes showed an acrobatic, dynamic, and powerful action hero that I never got to play as.
Map usage/design - Early on in the game, you are tasked with going to a location (Bridge Town perhaps?) and your helpful moogle guide essentially says, "You must remember how to get there by now, so I won't tell you!" Well, I definitely didn't remember where to go and the map screen wasn't helpful. The way that locations were connected were unintuitive to me, and the fact that directional signposts would only ever be pointing towards two locations at most wasn't helpful. It was a nice idea that you could hold an arrow above your head to guide you places, but often those locations were the neighboring area, rather than the distant places you needed to find. An on-screen realtime map would have been very helpful, as well as an interactive map screen where you could see more landmarks. This problem is alleviated as you learn the world (though those middle Clavat areas never became clear to me), and especially once you get the
, but for a long time, moving around the world was confusing for me.
Chocobo-riding - Speaking of moving around the world, the chocobos could have been so helpful! ...if they had not reduced their helpfulness with some weird decisions. The two main complaints I have with this are that chocobos disappear INSTANTLY when you dismount and that you do not have a cursor while riding one! With these two design decisions, if you are lost, your choices are to either ride around on a chocobo until you stumble upon your location or to dismount and lose your ride when you go to check a sign. The ability to focus on objects while on a chocobo, if not throw them, would have been very helpful.
Camera - In general, I believe this game would benefit from a further zoomed out camera for better navigation, enemy awareness, and traversal. In traversal sequences and particularly in combat, it was never that long before I would once again find myself needing to adjust the camera with some annoyance. Perhaps I never got the hang of using the d-pad for camera control, but I just found myself frequently frustrated with where the camera was aimed.
Villain - For a character who is "revealed" to be the villain midway through the story, it couldn't have been more obvious in both appearance and behavior. They also acted increasingly stereotypical as they became more and more maniacal. While I found most of the characters to be quite likable, this one was not very interesting. *evil laugh*
The story of the world - In the original Crystal Chronicles, each level opened with a telling of the history of the area through small, narrated tales. I thought it was quite effective in establishing the history of the world. In this game, something similar seems to implemented through the scrolling of text at the bottom of the screen when you are in an area. From the little I read, these background blurbs were actually entertaining or interesting, but how they are presented is so poor: these lines of text get interrupted for all kinds of reasons, it's hard to read them if you are trying to accomplish other tasks in the game (like combat), and the descriptions that are multiple lines long get broken up and interrupted in weird ways that makes following the stories difficult. My suggestion would have been to divide up the world into 6 or so regions, and each time you enter a region, you're given a camera overview of the area, perhaps with some narration provided by a character. Then, for each smaller, specific area, I would have included an encyclopedia that catalogs the flavor text that currently just scrolls across the screen. I do want to read it (!), but the game makes it difficult.
Ending - The last sequence (even before
) implies that Layle has powers that you don't have access to (example:
). It would be awesome if these powers were present and usable earlier in the game. Additionally, the actual ending of the game has a hole or two that I don't think were explained.
It was also kind of unsatisfying for the ending fight sequence to have escalated how it did with the electric guitar music (it was just so random) and not really provide any explanation or justification for it.
Plot/writing - I'm not sure if something was lost in translation, but there were a few parts that seemed rough to me. I felt that the story was kind of set up poorly and seemed to be missing some exposition. Maybe I missed something, but I felt like I only fully knew the game's premise because I remembered the preview coverage from years ago. Additionally, characters occasionally "knew" things they shouldn't have. I also felt that the game had the characters react terribly to certain situations; for example,
.
Wii-ification - This game was halfway split between being Square Enix's "Zelda" and being a Wii minigame collection. Sequences that felt more like minigames (like the butt-bumping game...) or just required intensive shaking of the remote were not my favorite, partially because they didn't seem particularly polished. I felt that they either needed to be improved or removed.
Music - This was a disappointment, mostly because of the original game. FFCC has one of my favorite game soundtracks of all time, while this game's music mostly ranged from passable to boring to annoying (the repetition caused by being in the same areas over and over again didn't help). There were a few tracks that I enjoyed, though I later found out that several of those were the ones that were composed by the original composer, Kumi Tanioka. I missed the unique instrumentation and sound that the first game had that seemed to mostly be missing in this game.
Mail system - This was an interesting way to communicate objectives in this game (and a nice callback to the original). I wonder if this could have been developed further somehow, perhaps worked into sidequests or objectives. It didn't annoy me. It just seems like there was potential for more.
Overall
The game grew on me. While originally I found it very frustrating because of how different it was from the original games, I eventually came to enjoy my experience with it. I missed the RPG experience, party system, multiplayer gameplay, and great atmosphere, but this game is still entertaining. It feels like it could have used another 6 months or a year of development time to smooth out the rough edges. As the last Crystal Chronicles game currently released, I hope there is more in this franchise's future.
NOTE: I had a lot of thoughts, as I tried to think of what kept this game from being great. Feel free to skip them.
Playtime: 14 hours 50 minutes (first attempted final boss after 8 hours but found it too difficult)
Positives
Lore - If you're interested in the Crystal Chronicles universe, you get some nice development. You see how the various tribes are living together (or not) far in the future, and some of the lore of the world is further developed. All in all, it's an excuse to continue learning about a world of miasma streams and Yukes.
Graphics - For a Wii game, I was really impressed with the graphics. Square Enix has always been quite good at building beautiful games, so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. The game was a bit inconsistent, but I was amazed to find graphical details like the brick walls inside the capital city be as polished as they were.
Voice acting - The voice acting was surprisingly pleasant in this game! I don't think there was a single moment where I thought, "I should mute this." For a game that clearly wasn't one of Square Enix's AAA projects, I thought the presentation here was well done.
World size/variety - The world really is quite big and because of its size, they are able to make a lot of unique environments. The serene Moogle Woods Station, the autumnal Red Leaf Station, the
ethereal Between Existence and Oblivion
warp system
The homage to the franchise's roots - This is only a pro because I love the original game, but this game has a lot of little easter eggs and references to the GameCube title. The equipment system was a nice continuation of the original game's crafting system. However, until the game finally grew on me in the second half of my playtime, most of these references angered me because of the list that follows below.
Areas of Improvement
Combat system - Despite the promise of cool powers, Layle never feels that powerful. Instead, I typically felt like the combat was tedious. One helpful design change would have been some kind of physical and/or close-range attack. Perhaps a kind of explosive 360-degree force push gained through equipment or a skill tied to a recharge meter? The game's combat and combination system systems seemed to work best when you had some distance between you and the enemy, but if an enemy got close, you had no quick way of attacking in response (given the time it takes to lock on to an enemy). Even a decision like tying the dodge to a waggle made the combat feel looser and less responsive than I would have liked (and I say this as someone who liked waggle like Super Mario Galaxy's spin move). Additionally, since the game liked to encourage you to "combine" enemies and items, the ability to more properly aim your throws through a multi-target lock-on system or some other system would have been helpful. Cutscenes showed an acrobatic, dynamic, and powerful action hero that I never got to play as.
Map usage/design - Early on in the game, you are tasked with going to a location (Bridge Town perhaps?) and your helpful moogle guide essentially says, "You must remember how to get there by now, so I won't tell you!" Well, I definitely didn't remember where to go and the map screen wasn't helpful. The way that locations were connected were unintuitive to me, and the fact that directional signposts would only ever be pointing towards two locations at most wasn't helpful. It was a nice idea that you could hold an arrow above your head to guide you places, but often those locations were the neighboring area, rather than the distant places you needed to find. An on-screen realtime map would have been very helpful, as well as an interactive map screen where you could see more landmarks. This problem is alleviated as you learn the world (though those middle Clavat areas never became clear to me), and especially once you get the
warp system
Chocobo-riding - Speaking of moving around the world, the chocobos could have been so helpful! ...if they had not reduced their helpfulness with some weird decisions. The two main complaints I have with this are that chocobos disappear INSTANTLY when you dismount and that you do not have a cursor while riding one! With these two design decisions, if you are lost, your choices are to either ride around on a chocobo until you stumble upon your location or to dismount and lose your ride when you go to check a sign. The ability to focus on objects while on a chocobo, if not throw them, would have been very helpful.
Camera - In general, I believe this game would benefit from a further zoomed out camera for better navigation, enemy awareness, and traversal. In traversal sequences and particularly in combat, it was never that long before I would once again find myself needing to adjust the camera with some annoyance. Perhaps I never got the hang of using the d-pad for camera control, but I just found myself frequently frustrated with where the camera was aimed.
Villain - For a character who is "revealed" to be the villain midway through the story, it couldn't have been more obvious in both appearance and behavior. They also acted increasingly stereotypical as they became more and more maniacal. While I found most of the characters to be quite likable, this one was not very interesting. *evil laugh*
The story of the world - In the original Crystal Chronicles, each level opened with a telling of the history of the area through small, narrated tales. I thought it was quite effective in establishing the history of the world. In this game, something similar seems to implemented through the scrolling of text at the bottom of the screen when you are in an area. From the little I read, these background blurbs were actually entertaining or interesting, but how they are presented is so poor: these lines of text get interrupted for all kinds of reasons, it's hard to read them if you are trying to accomplish other tasks in the game (like combat), and the descriptions that are multiple lines long get broken up and interrupted in weird ways that makes following the stories difficult. My suggestion would have been to divide up the world into 6 or so regions, and each time you enter a region, you're given a camera overview of the area, perhaps with some narration provided by a character. Then, for each smaller, specific area, I would have included an encyclopedia that catalogs the flavor text that currently just scrolls across the screen. I do want to read it (!), but the game makes it difficult.
Ending - The last sequence (even before
Layle goes Super Saiyan
flight
For example, why does Layle still have a crystal?
Plot/writing - I'm not sure if something was lost in translation, but there were a few parts that seemed rough to me. I felt that the story was kind of set up poorly and seemed to be missing some exposition. Maybe I missed something, but I felt like I only fully knew the game's premise because I remembered the preview coverage from years ago. Additionally, characters occasionally "knew" things they shouldn't have. I also felt that the game had the characters react terribly to certain situations; for example,
Layle's non-reaction to the discovery that the king was a crystal
Wii-ification - This game was halfway split between being Square Enix's "Zelda" and being a Wii minigame collection. Sequences that felt more like minigames (like the butt-bumping game...) or just required intensive shaking of the remote were not my favorite, partially because they didn't seem particularly polished. I felt that they either needed to be improved or removed.
Music - This was a disappointment, mostly because of the original game. FFCC has one of my favorite game soundtracks of all time, while this game's music mostly ranged from passable to boring to annoying (the repetition caused by being in the same areas over and over again didn't help). There were a few tracks that I enjoyed, though I later found out that several of those were the ones that were composed by the original composer, Kumi Tanioka. I missed the unique instrumentation and sound that the first game had that seemed to mostly be missing in this game.
Mail system - This was an interesting way to communicate objectives in this game (and a nice callback to the original). I wonder if this could have been developed further somehow, perhaps worked into sidequests or objectives. It didn't annoy me. It just seems like there was potential for more.
Overall
The game grew on me. While originally I found it very frustrating because of how different it was from the original games, I eventually came to enjoy my experience with it. I missed the RPG experience, party system, multiplayer gameplay, and great atmosphere, but this game is still entertaining. It feels like it could have used another 6 months or a year of development time to smooth out the rough edges. As the last Crystal Chronicles game currently released, I hope there is more in this franchise's future.