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Empty Nostalgia

  • Seeric
  • 05/22/2013 09:20 PM
  • 2215 views
This review is based upon a full playthrough of the demo version released prior to 5/21/2013 as well as an additional playthrough of most of the content available in the demo version released as of 5/21/2013.

While advances have been made over the years both in terms of what games are capable of and in terms of game design principles, sometimes it can be fun to find a game which emulates an older era. Unfortunately, while Crystal Catch clearly seeks to bring back memories of NES-era classics such as Dragon Warrior, its current incarnation suffers from many design decisions which range from questionable to completely broken.

The plot of Crystal Catch is extremely simplistic. A boy whom players get to name (I'll be referring to him as Hero for the sake of this review) decides to play a game at night and, after winning a battle in the game which serves as the tutorial, Hero himself is suddenly teleported to a fantasy village, told he has been chosen to collect the eight Power Balls and defeat Nark, and then given some armor (or rather, his sprite is given some armor since he certainly doesn't start with any) before being sent on his way. The story is flimsy to say the least, but it fits in with the era which this game seeks to emulate and the fact that Hero speaks while in his room at the beginning of the game and then becomes a mute protagonist after being teleported is actually a rather nice touch.

However, in terms of aesthetics and design Crystal Catch definitely has some issues. Most, if not all, of the music is RTP-based and there's simply not much to say about it. Graphically, the game also is largely RTP-based with a few exceptions. Namely, the sprites for enemies are all hand-drawn and this gives them a certain charm, but they also clash with the RTP-based backdrops and Hero's sprite. This graphical inconsistency is especially apparent outside of combat as all encounters are visible, but some enemies are represented by custom sprites which look like the enemy itself (ex: a walking leaf enemy does indeed look like a walking leaf on the world map), others are represented by what is presumably a placeholder graphic consisting of a white square with eyes and a mouth, and yet others are represented by RTP sprites, such as an orc representing a golem-type enemy and a zombie representing a spider enemy. There are a few other graphical and musical oddities as well, such as one cave being completely devoid of music, campfires consisting of a single, inanimate sprite and the residents of the dwarf town having human sprites. However, inconsistent graphics and heavy RTP usage can be tolerated or even forgiven if they are used well. Unfortunately, this picture highlights some of the major layout issues in Crystal Catch:



There are multiple issues here which extend throughout the game. Most notably, space is not utilized well as houses, villages, and even dungeons often have big, open areas with absolutely nothing in them or just a piece or two of non-interactive furniture thrown in seemingly at random. Nearly every area of the game also feels very square-ish to the point that even some of the more maze-like maps give off the impression of navigating from one end of a square to the other. Lastly, the graphics come off as being fairly drab as an overabundance of brown and grey is utilized; the fact that about half the demo takes place in a mountainous region contributes somewhat to this, but the sparsity of furniture and the almost complete absence of more colorful environmental objects such as vines is definitely felt amongst the brown rugs, dirt floors, stone floors, stone walls, and slightly-darker dirt floors. Puzzles are also completely absent and, though players can technically go anywhere they want, there is a clear order of difficulty progression and most maps are quite linear aside from a few dead ends.

However, what is by far the largest overarching issue in the demo is the complete lack of a reward or a sense of accomplishment throughout the game. Aside from a dagger found in a pot in the starting town and a (demo exclusive) silver ingot in the dwarf town, treasure chests or objects containing items not directly related to the plot are quite literally nonexistent. With very few exceptions, objects in towns cannot be interacted with and those few which can be interacted with only give a very brief bit of flavor text or some gameplay information (such as the differences between the types of magic) and dungeons frequently have sidepaths which simply lead to dead ends or empty rooms; at one point there is a locked gate blocking a 'treasury' with nothing in it. It seems likely that treasure chests not directly related to the plot are simply not yet in the game, but the lack of even a chest or two containing so much as a potion is simply inexcusable.

This lack of reward extends to the combat system as well. For example, to reach level 2 the player must grind out 10 experience points and, unless the player beelines for the Power Gloves (more on these later), the only enemies which can possibly be killed at the starting level give 1 experience and 1 gold; the second enemy type in the game gives 2 experience and 2 gold and anything beyond it is so strong that players will need to wait until around level 5 or so simply to stand a chance. What's more, while in a NES RPG (and in most RPG's for that matter) a new level is a cause for celebration which grants a notable increase in strength, here a new level grants a handful of HP and puts one, possibly two, stats up by a single point. For the most part, the only stat which actually matters in terms of levels is HP as any other stat rises to such a negligible degree that it takes over a dozen levels to even remotely notice any difference in power. Furthermore, Hero does not learn even a single skill in the game on his own as every spell is tied to a piece of gear, which, while a potentially interesting system, is the most deeply flawed part of this already large issue.

Equipment in Crystal Catch simply doesn't make sense and I feel it is necessary to discuss it in detail as so many of the problems, both in terms of balancing issues and in terms of a lack of reward, stem from it. Aside from the Dagger which can be found in the starting town, the cheapest weapon in the game is the Club, which costs 40 gold; since the only enemies players could realistically take on for the first five or so levels respectively give one and two gold each, this takes quite a while to obtain. Unfortunately, the Club only grants two more points of Attack than the Dagger and the difference in damage isn't even noticeable against the weakest enemies in the game. However, if players really save up they can buy a Short Sword for 70 gold...which has the exact same stats as the Club. Presumably, the difference here is one of damage type as some enemies are said to be weak against slashing damage and so on, but, aside from a few enemies which are outright immune to certain forms of damage, this difference is rarely noticeable other than as a difference of literally one or two points of damage. Even when it comes to stone enemies which are explicitly stated at being resistant to slashing damage the 'Drarven Axe' (the most expensive weapon in the demo at 300 gold) deals more damage than the 150 gold Long Spear, presumably a 'piercing' weapon, simply because it grants a higher boost to Attack. Having weapon descriptions which stated what type of damage each weapon dealt or at least how much attack power each one grants would have helped to somewhat alleviate this problem, but even then there are some very real balance issues in terms of supposed weaknesses and weapon prices.

Yet another major issue with equipment is most of the gear which grants any sort of magic is entirely useless. Equipping the Air Wand denies players the ability to equip a shield (even the best shield in the demo grants an almost negligible amount of protection though so this isn't a big deal) and gives access to Quicken, a buff which presumably boosts Agility though the difference is imperceptible, and Wind 1, a spell so weak that using normal attacks with just about any other weapon in the game would be more effective and one of the two bosses in the demo is even completely immune to Wind 1. Meanwhile, the Fire Staff allows players to equip a shield alongside it and grants access to Fire 1 and the magic-boosting spell Fire Charge; The effect of Fire Charge is again almost entirely imperceptible (ex: an enemy which took 25 damage from Fire 1 unbuffed took 27 damage from Fire 1 after using Fire Charge) and both of these fire spells cost 5 MP in a game where even at Level 27 Hero only has 26 MP so melee weapons are once again the better option. The Heal Charm, an accessory which costs 300 gold, grants Heal Force 1, which restores about 30 HP for 3 MP, but Healing Potions (which can for some reason only be found in the first town, making for quite a bit of backtracking) restore 50 HP and only cost 10 gold each, making the Heal Charm more or less useless aside from the stat boost of 10 Mystic which it provides (assuming a player uses magic at all); a Mage Robe also exists which costs 340 gold and allows players to cast the Barrier spell for 5 MP, but, as with other stat-boosting spells, Barrier's effect isn't really noticeable and the 700 gold Bronze Armor provides nearly double the defense of a Mage Robe. Lastly, the Water Staff simply does nothing - it has no spells attached to it and there is nothing special about its normal attack; the Star Pendant, a 300 gold accessory with the vague description of "Magical Pendant that Star residents use." does grant Aqua 1 in addition to providing a 10 point boost to Mystic, making it the only remotely viable magic item in the game. Perhaps having the Power Balls each grant a spell or two would have helped somewhat, especially since each is tied to an element and it would give the player something in the form of a tangible reward for finding them, but even then the magic available in the demo ranges from useless to on-par with melee and Hero's MP is simply far too low.

Lastly, I want to discuss the Power Gloves as this weapon is perhaps the largest flaw in the entire demo. Players need the Power Gloves to obtain the second Power Ball in the game and the gloves are on the second floor of a fairly short cave which can be reached by going more or less in a straight line North from the starting town. Both the enemies in the cave and on the path leading to it are slow-moving and can be easily avoided while the Power Gloves themselves can be taken without incident. When equipped, these gloves not only grant access to Rockfall 1, the best spell in the game by far at 8 MP, but they give an enormous 20 point boost to Attack; the Drarven Axe, the second-best weapon in the demo, gives a boost of 10. What's more, the Power Gloves can be turned into the Silver Gloves if the player has a Silver Ingot, 200 gold, and is at least level 15; the Silver Gloves grant a massive boost of 32 points of Attack and grant access to Rockfall 2, which still costs 8 MP and can (sometimes) even outdamage the normal attack damage of the gloves. The only downsides to these gloves are that the player cannot equip a shield while using them (this doesn't matter much at all) and a single enemy in the game is completely immune to them and Rockfall 2, meaning players will be forced to run from it unless they have Aqua 1 from the Star Pendant (the enemy in question is a poisonous rabbit and it is also one of only two enemies other than the bosses which does anything other than use a normal attack). While I was certainly grateful for the Power Gloves during my playthrough of the game since this weapon turned what would have likely been over a dozen hours of grinding via mashing the normal attack button into about 4-5 hours of grinding via mashing the normal attack button, something has definitely gone wrong when what is by far the best weapon both physically and magically can be obtained at Level 1 without a single fight.

While I wish there were more positive things which I could say about Crystal Catch, the truth is that I simply can't. Although I did not come across any game-breaking bugs in my playthrough, the lack of any sense of accomplishment in any aspect of the game, the sparse and artificial area layouts, the severe balance issues between pieces of equipment and spells, the hours of battles which consist of nothing other than repeatedly using normal attacks and possibly a potion or two against bosses, and various lesser issues all added up to make Crystal Catch more-or-less completely unenjoyable. In the end, it's important to keep in mind that significant changes can, of course, always be made between a demo and a full release, but for now Crystal Catch needs a lot more balancing, more playtesting, more polish, and simply more care before it could be considered a game worth recommending.

Posts

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edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
Good, thorough review! Your feedback should help the developer fix things, we should hope. Sometimes, you need to take one for the team ...
I think the review kicks ass too. Thank you for the review. (I did break my own demo with the Power Gloves too...) Thanks for beating my demo as well. I have plenty of work on my hands, and what you have written certainly is helpful.

Edit: I also feel honored that so much care and attention to detail was put into the review, and for that I am extremely grateful.
Thanks for taking my review well and sorry if it comes off as a bit harsh; the game definitely needs work, but it has some neat ideas which could work well once you get the balance down.
The title hurts, but my game is not quite there yet, so I''ll take it. Right now I am doing some map fixes and then I will work on balancing in the demo. When my demo feels right, I will expand. My game is beatable (When I remove the demo blocking soldiers) but I want the game to be properly constructed before I send out my full game.


I failed to make a Dragon Quest Reincarnation? I must work harder to make this man proud of me. Yuji Horii at the left, me at the right.

masterofmayhem
I can defiantly see where you’re coming from
2610
I love the Power Glove. It's so bad...

Sorry, someone had to say it.
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