Cris Tales Reviews

2 hours into the game and I've already gotten a pretty good idea of how the rest of it will play out - spoilers, not very well. Initial impressions were the same as everyone else has claimed: the game has some very pretty visuals, well animated cutscenes, and the music - while unfortunately somewhat forgettable, is very nicely composed. There was a lot of effort put into making it a visual marvel, and it shows. Unfortunately, pretty visuals and a decent soundtrack isn't enough to hold together what I consider a very mediocre, borderline frustrating JRPG. The characters have so far been unlikable, follow the most cliche tropes seen in mostly older anime, and the dialogue just feels really flat and uninteresting. It also feels rushed, even though I'm only two hours into the game. Is it possible that the story may become better, more elaborate, perhaps [b]fun[/b]? Possibly! This game loves to boast how similar it is to games like Chrono Trigger, but it misses so many of the key elements in writing that made Chrono Trigger stand out. Speaking of fun: if there's one thing I will give the game credit for, it does have a interesting battle system - and it can be quite fun at first utilizing the mechanics that you're intended to use. I can't testify as to whether or not it improves upon itself, or if it remains stagnant for the rest of the 20-30 hour playthrough, but it will definitely hook you in. This in turn leads to the main gimmick of the game: swapping between the past and future. I won't say it's executed perfectly, but so far from what I've seen, it's quite good! I just wish it was visually conveyed a little bit better. I'd much rather prefer a toggle to switch between past, present, and future - rather than having my entire view obstructed by a huge triangle splitting the screen between past, present, and future. If you were to say, toggle these visuals between the shoulder buttons on a controller (which aren't used at all), I think that would make the visuals seem a bit less bloated. Now beyond all of that, what ruins the experience for me is that the game is [b]INCREDIBLY UNPOLISHED[/b]: visual glitches, auditory fumbles - it is seriously a huge problem; and after being released for almost FIVE years now, on top of normally being sold for almost $50, this is seriously inexcusable. To me, it seems the developers really focused in on the time travel mechanics and battle system, and skipped out on polishing the rest of the game. You also move VERY slowly - the game would seriously benefit from a run button, or the ability to jump. I'm just baffled by the fact that rather than address these issues and make some quality of life improvements, the developers opted to add MORE content to the game rather than fix it's seriously annoying issues. I'd love to try and continue, but I seriously can't commit to a 20-30 hour JRPG if I know deep down it's really not going to be worth my time. I think I'd be more okay with it being the way it is if it we're priced at $10-15, but the fact that it is STILL being priced as brand new in this rough of a state is not helping its case. If you seriously wanted to drop that much money, you could buy Sea of Stars, which is a more fun and proper homage to classic JRPG's. If you can get it for incredibly cheap like I have, I'd give it two hours to see if it's something you want to invest your time into. For me, it'll be put on my back burner, more thank likely never to be picked up again.

I liked the design and it's plot of the story as well as the main characters of the game. However, I'm pretty sure it has bugs recently and Idk if the game is still yet to be updated. One thing I don't like about the gameplay is that you can't exit via menu nor configure the settings like at all. I only found out that there's no way you can exit. But except a shortcut when you press tab + shift and exit the game is the only way to do it. Not absolutely sure if you can still load your save data when playing the game but, I'm still hoping that this game gets bug fixes and therefore it'll run smoothly.

I wanted to give this game a positive review so much. Artstyle and animations are outstanding and they almost carried this expirience for me. Cris Tales could've been a beautiful short experience, but this game stretches every of it's limited resources until all fun is gone. Cris Tales makes you bactrack an every region three times IN A ROW before final boss. World is pretty small in this game, but that doesn't mean that backtracking it three times is fun. I hate set assumption in gaming that a leigh of a game that lesser than 8-10 hours is a flaw. It felt like some developers stretch out their games just because of that. Cris Tales has a small variety of enemies, small cast of characters, detailed animations, complete voice over and a small world map which all begging for a short playtime. Towards the end I still wanted to give this game a positive review, with an asterisk that it's a heavily flawed, but beatiful game with a nice characters. It was already stretched out, felt unpolished at parts, but on top of it game adds 4 dungeouns with teleportation mazes and only half of this dungeons doesen't reuse a previous boss at the end. That was a metaphorical straw that broke the camel's back of my enjoyment of this game. If you liked artstyle and decided to play this game just feel free to drop it at any point when you stopped being amused by a vibrant picture on your screen. Ending doesen't worth it and a last act of the game felt like a chore. BTW I guess stockholm syndrome forced me to try colosseum. That mode was a dissapointing rehash of existing enemies, backgrounds and bosses, including a final boss from a main story on level 30. Imagine how anticlimactic would be beating a final boss after you just beaten him in colosseum with no dialogues or plot. Also because of critical/parry mechanics animations in this game takes alot of time and colosseum run took me 2-3 hours depending on my level.