The player controls a beautiful girl named Rei Hatada, who in order to “revive” her dead younger sister Mirai Hatada, makes a deal with the devil of the other world that is limbo. The story will progress as you fight the souls that drift about limbo. Also, by defeating specific enemies, “Danmatsuma Thoughts” will appear, which by “crying to purify” will develop the protagonist mentally. In accordance with that, you can obtain weapons called “Shisou,” or “Mental Armor.”
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I'm playing in hard more, and where I'm currently at in the game, the experience so far has been neither good nor bad. Allow me to explain:
Firstly, let me talk about the gameplay, it starts off pretty tasteless, the game acts like a combo heavy hack and slash, but none of the skills chained from basic attacks without baiting the opponent off of their grounded invulnerability or purposefully stopping before the basic attack finisher and then using a skill after (all endlag included). 10 hours into the game and I finally got more skills and options to work with, but the feeling of having to forcefully interrupt an attack to get skill hits is very unsatisfying for me... This has led me to resort to basic attacking and dash cancelling (without endlag) to reset the basic attack chain and repeat this cycle until the enemy is dead or I have to dodge.
This is somewhat fine, but when I see the abilities that look like they should chain together and don't it just feels a bit irritating.
And secondly, the story later in the game gets a bit anti climatic, moments in the game that I think should be tenser and have more emphasis, however, this didn't happen and I find that really annoying.
But it's not like it was just bad things.
The protagonist's designs are really cool and I love their armor (excluding the one that doesn't have armor), even if I think they could show a bit less. The UI for the game looks really good and I love all the decoration that went into it, especially the in-game HUD, the multiple diamond shapes (biased) and the how elegant it all looks.
The english voice acting is actually not that bad, especially when the characters have to scream, the VA's for this game did a really good job. Though this makes my previous point about the game being anti climatic even worse, because even if the voice actors tried their best to sound emotional, the game did not give it enough tension to feel immersive.
Even after all this, I still find the game entertaining, the beginning of the story after the prologue, even if a bit cliché or predictable, still felt really emotional and somewhat real.
If you like magical girls or are interested in this game, I say you should give it a try, but it's not a game for everyone. I'll post another review when I get to finish the game or get too pissed at another missed opportunity.
Firstly, let me talk about the gameplay, it starts off pretty tasteless, the game acts like a combo heavy hack and slash, but none of the skills chained from basic attacks without baiting the opponent off of their grounded invulnerability or purposefully stopping before the basic attack finisher and then using a skill after (all endlag included). 10 hours into the game and I finally got more skills and options to work with, but the feeling of having to forcefully interrupt an attack to get skill hits is very unsatisfying for me... This has led me to resort to basic attacking and dash cancelling (without endlag) to reset the basic attack chain and repeat this cycle until the enemy is dead or I have to dodge.
This is somewhat fine, but when I see the abilities that look like they should chain together and don't it just feels a bit irritating.
And secondly, the story later in the game gets a bit anti climatic, moments in the game that I think should be tenser and have more emphasis, however, this didn't happen and I find that really annoying.
But it's not like it was just bad things.
The protagonist's designs are really cool and I love their armor (excluding the one that doesn't have armor), even if I think they could show a bit less. The UI for the game looks really good and I love all the decoration that went into it, especially the in-game HUD, the multiple diamond shapes (biased) and the how elegant it all looks.
The english voice acting is actually not that bad, especially when the characters have to scream, the VA's for this game did a really good job. Though this makes my previous point about the game being anti climatic even worse, because even if the voice actors tried their best to sound emotional, the game did not give it enough tension to feel immersive.
Even after all this, I still find the game entertaining, the beginning of the story after the prologue, even if a bit cliché or predictable, still felt really emotional and somewhat real.
If you like magical girls or are interested in this game, I say you should give it a try, but it's not a game for everyone. I'll post another review when I get to finish the game or get too pissed at another missed opportunity.
Crystar is an interesting game. It has admittedly been on my backlog for the better part of a year & I finally decided to play it recently & it took me around 30 hours to finish the main story in its entirety. And honestly I admit I’m a little conflicted on it.
Now I won’t waste too much time talking about this game’s mechanics cause I’m pretty sure most people have done that several times. I have always been one who prioritises gameplay over everything else cause well this is a game. I’m not saying everything else is unimportant it’s just if you can’t make a game fun to play? Then you’ve already failed. Doesn’t matter how incredible your story is, if I’m not enjoying playing I’m unlikely to keep going. So that already marks a couple points off Crystar right off the bat cause this game? It’s dull. It’s repetitive. And its combat lacks any sort of depth. The dungeons are incredibly samey & don’t have a lot of variety to them at all. Most encounters you resort to the same tactic mashing the same buttons over & over. Several hours in it really did get mind numbing & yeah it’s just not very fun at all. So with all that in mind you’d think I don’t like this game very much
However despite its majorly unsatisfying gameplay loop, I can still say I liked Crystar. It’s an extremely compelling story about grief & loss & I think it handles those themes really well for the most part. The art & characters are also pretty fantastic. There’s a lot of depth to the cast I feel & the performances in the English dub are pretty solid. Though I will say I found some dialogue…very cringe inducing (looking at you Kokoro) but I’d say that I did really like the bond of the party as you go through Purgatory the main area of the game. There’s a lot of complexity to the cast with my favourites being probably Rei & Sen. And the way the narrative explores the trauma of each of the girls is incredibly compelling. I think there’s a lot to be said about this game’s narrative & how much it pulls on the heartstrings especially in the latter chapters.
Now while yes I enjoyed the narrative for the most part…I’m going to say the endgame? What the fuck. This entire section was absolutely mind boggling since you need to repeat several chapters multiple times just to get all the endings. It felt like padding for the sake of extending the length. And while yes I will say the combat does improve slightly around that point, it’s still mostly the same throughout. I’ve never been much of a fan of multiple endings with exceptions going to games such as NieR Automata. However I will admit on the true ending path, all these different outcomes really did make the journey worth it. Even if I also will say that the true ending left me feeling a little…underwhelmed.
Honestly if you trimmed this game by 10 hours & fixed up the gameplay to make it less tedious? This would be a pretty easy recommendation from me but no matter how much I enjoyed Crystar, I can’t really recommend this title to anyone without first warning them about its many flaws. It was a good game though, one I definitely am glad I persevered with even despite the repetition.
Now I won’t waste too much time talking about this game’s mechanics cause I’m pretty sure most people have done that several times. I have always been one who prioritises gameplay over everything else cause well this is a game. I’m not saying everything else is unimportant it’s just if you can’t make a game fun to play? Then you’ve already failed. Doesn’t matter how incredible your story is, if I’m not enjoying playing I’m unlikely to keep going. So that already marks a couple points off Crystar right off the bat cause this game? It’s dull. It’s repetitive. And its combat lacks any sort of depth. The dungeons are incredibly samey & don’t have a lot of variety to them at all. Most encounters you resort to the same tactic mashing the same buttons over & over. Several hours in it really did get mind numbing & yeah it’s just not very fun at all. So with all that in mind you’d think I don’t like this game very much
However despite its majorly unsatisfying gameplay loop, I can still say I liked Crystar. It’s an extremely compelling story about grief & loss & I think it handles those themes really well for the most part. The art & characters are also pretty fantastic. There’s a lot of depth to the cast I feel & the performances in the English dub are pretty solid. Though I will say I found some dialogue…very cringe inducing (looking at you Kokoro) but I’d say that I did really like the bond of the party as you go through Purgatory the main area of the game. There’s a lot of complexity to the cast with my favourites being probably Rei & Sen. And the way the narrative explores the trauma of each of the girls is incredibly compelling. I think there’s a lot to be said about this game’s narrative & how much it pulls on the heartstrings especially in the latter chapters.
Now while yes I enjoyed the narrative for the most part…I’m going to say the endgame? What the fuck. This entire section was absolutely mind boggling since you need to repeat several chapters multiple times just to get all the endings. It felt like padding for the sake of extending the length. And while yes I will say the combat does improve slightly around that point, it’s still mostly the same throughout. I’ve never been much of a fan of multiple endings with exceptions going to games such as NieR Automata. However I will admit on the true ending path, all these different outcomes really did make the journey worth it. Even if I also will say that the true ending left me feeling a little…underwhelmed.
Honestly if you trimmed this game by 10 hours & fixed up the gameplay to make it less tedious? This would be a pretty easy recommendation from me but no matter how much I enjoyed Crystar, I can’t really recommend this title to anyone without first warning them about its many flaws. It was a good game though, one I definitely am glad I persevered with even despite the repetition.
being a woman is so hard, I have so much respect for everything they go through
the dub for this is racist and a hate crime, I will not elaborate.
Your enjoyment of Crystar will depend on your ability to turn off your brain during the combat segments, because the gameplay is absolute ass. If you can do that, however, you will find a powerful Faustian narrative that repurposes concepts of Ancient Greek philosophy and literary theory to deliver a metatextual story-about-stories about healing through trauma and becoming a better person through catharsis.
Sen is so cool I wish she was my husband.
Sen is so cool I wish she was my husband.
A good story wrapped up in a boring bundle.
Crystar has been sitting on my pick back up pile for a long time now. I started this game a few years ago but just stopped playing it for no particular reason. With the release of Crymachina I thought it would be fun to go back and finally finish Crystar. By the end I found myself really enjoying the story but really just wanting to finish the game and get it over with due to its horrible midpoint gameplay choices that followed through until the end.
What did I enjoy about this game ?
To start off, the story was very nice and one that will keep you interested until the end. The story of Crystar is simple on a base level, having you play as Rei , a girl whose sister has died. In order to get your sister back you make a deal with the devil that sets you out on a journey in Purgatory / Limbo. Crystar does a good job building up its story to its eventual climax giving you multiple characters you will meet and care for throughout the runtime. Beyond that , the OST is great and has tracks you will want to listen to when you are not even playing. Furthermore , the artwork is simply amazing making you wish they had even more of it in game because I loved the character artworks , specific cutscene artwork.
Sadly this is where it gets tricky.
I want to touch upon the story real quick because while I think it was overall great I was not fond of the ending. There was so much aftermath we the players deserved to see but simply didn't. My biggest complaint which ultimately ruined the game however was its gameplay and runtime of the game. First off, the game doesn’t have a high quality feel to it which is FINE not every game needs to have a AAA feel to it. However, this doesn’t mean you can have boring and repetitive gameplay and think it will be passable. To simply put , the gameplay is BORING and downright BAD not ever feeling fluid or fun. Hits don’t feel impactful , certain skills are insanely OP making what you use severely limited as you will end up using what is OP. This sadly translates over to characters as 2 out of 4 characters overpower the other 2 by a crap ton. By the end I saw myself using literally 1 character as there was ZERO reason to use anyone else. Furthermore, the loot pool is boring as it all comes down to numbers and looks. The weapons will not have special effects or stats the higher the tier they will simply look different and have better numbers. You will not sit and think about what to equip, you will just equip what is best and move on. The game features an upgrade system which is utterly useless as upgrading weapons do not really boost the stats to a degree that makes it worth grinding for. All these small things will begin to add up quickly and maybe wouldn’t have taken as much of a toll on me if it wasn’t for the runtime of this game. By now you would think these would be my biggest issues right? Well you would be wrong weirdly enough. I always find enjoyment in games and do not mind middle of the road gameplay HOWEVER the story makes one of the worst decisions gameplay wise. The story hits a point in which you will have to replay the SAME EXACT MISSIONS OVER AND OVER. Doesn’t sound bad at first but when you take into account how long and boring levels are you will literally lose your mind by the end. I cannot fathom why they force replays of the same levels over and over when they simply could have saved so much time by skipping so much of that portion of the game. By this point I literally found myself confused as the game makes you go through so much just to get new story scenes that eventually lead into its ending. It truly makes for a dreadful experience and one that I was not sad to see finished lol.
Do not 100% this game
As a trophy hunter my #1 rule is to get my feelings and review out of the way when I finish a game. I NEVER allow trophy hunting to affect my overall feeling of a game but I felt the need to add this section for people who do like Plat hunting. DO NOT GO FOR THE PLAT ITS INSANELY GRINDY AND BORING , that is all.
In the end
I am really bummed out because if there was a great gameplay loop to back up the great story that is already present I believe we could have had a really good game on our hands. I am very intrigued to dive into Crymachina as I played the demo and personally really enjoyed it. The physical for Crystar is quite expensive now for a US copy so I 100% do not recommend hunting a copy down however if you catch it on a deep sale digitally then give it a go if you understand what you are getting into.
Crystar has been sitting on my pick back up pile for a long time now. I started this game a few years ago but just stopped playing it for no particular reason. With the release of Crymachina I thought it would be fun to go back and finally finish Crystar. By the end I found myself really enjoying the story but really just wanting to finish the game and get it over with due to its horrible midpoint gameplay choices that followed through until the end.
What did I enjoy about this game ?
To start off, the story was very nice and one that will keep you interested until the end. The story of Crystar is simple on a base level, having you play as Rei , a girl whose sister has died. In order to get your sister back you make a deal with the devil that sets you out on a journey in Purgatory / Limbo. Crystar does a good job building up its story to its eventual climax giving you multiple characters you will meet and care for throughout the runtime. Beyond that , the OST is great and has tracks you will want to listen to when you are not even playing. Furthermore , the artwork is simply amazing making you wish they had even more of it in game because I loved the character artworks , specific cutscene artwork.
Sadly this is where it gets tricky.
I want to touch upon the story real quick because while I think it was overall great I was not fond of the ending. There was so much aftermath we the players deserved to see but simply didn't. My biggest complaint which ultimately ruined the game however was its gameplay and runtime of the game. First off, the game doesn’t have a high quality feel to it which is FINE not every game needs to have a AAA feel to it. However, this doesn’t mean you can have boring and repetitive gameplay and think it will be passable. To simply put , the gameplay is BORING and downright BAD not ever feeling fluid or fun. Hits don’t feel impactful , certain skills are insanely OP making what you use severely limited as you will end up using what is OP. This sadly translates over to characters as 2 out of 4 characters overpower the other 2 by a crap ton. By the end I saw myself using literally 1 character as there was ZERO reason to use anyone else. Furthermore, the loot pool is boring as it all comes down to numbers and looks. The weapons will not have special effects or stats the higher the tier they will simply look different and have better numbers. You will not sit and think about what to equip, you will just equip what is best and move on. The game features an upgrade system which is utterly useless as upgrading weapons do not really boost the stats to a degree that makes it worth grinding for. All these small things will begin to add up quickly and maybe wouldn’t have taken as much of a toll on me if it wasn’t for the runtime of this game. By now you would think these would be my biggest issues right? Well you would be wrong weirdly enough. I always find enjoyment in games and do not mind middle of the road gameplay HOWEVER the story makes one of the worst decisions gameplay wise. The story hits a point in which you will have to replay the SAME EXACT MISSIONS OVER AND OVER. Doesn’t sound bad at first but when you take into account how long and boring levels are you will literally lose your mind by the end. I cannot fathom why they force replays of the same levels over and over when they simply could have saved so much time by skipping so much of that portion of the game. By this point I literally found myself confused as the game makes you go through so much just to get new story scenes that eventually lead into its ending. It truly makes for a dreadful experience and one that I was not sad to see finished lol.
Do not 100% this game
As a trophy hunter my #1 rule is to get my feelings and review out of the way when I finish a game. I NEVER allow trophy hunting to affect my overall feeling of a game but I felt the need to add this section for people who do like Plat hunting. DO NOT GO FOR THE PLAT ITS INSANELY GRINDY AND BORING , that is all.
In the end
I am really bummed out because if there was a great gameplay loop to back up the great story that is already present I believe we could have had a really good game on our hands. I am very intrigued to dive into Crymachina as I played the demo and personally really enjoyed it. The physical for Crystar is quite expensive now for a US copy so I 100% do not recommend hunting a copy down however if you catch it on a deep sale digitally then give it a go if you understand what you are getting into.