Crystals Again

Hi people!
Crystals Again is a game made in four hours by Verincia with RPG Maker XP for RPGMaker.net's fourth birthday contest event in 2011.
The title is probably a pun about the omnipresence of crystals in jrpgs, in particular the Final Fantasy series. In this case four heroes have to find four elemental crystals (stones? Gems? the term is often changed) NOT to save the world or anyone, but just as a gift for the princess' birthday! Uhmmmmm ok!

The game is pretty classic... a party-based jrpg where you go around deserted areas and fight various monsters, beasts and creatures in... you guessed (and I feared) that, random encounters! Sigh.


I was simply taking a walk on the beach and... BAM! Mutant fishes attack!

Ok, so this is all I can say about the gameplay: a classic jrpg with a party of characters that fight the deadly fauna of the various dungeons. The game is challenging but it can become pretty easy once you get enough money to ger some good weapons. The only issue is that equipment is really overpriced considering there is not a really great differences between the bonuses you can get, to there is no need to have the best weapons to finish the game! On the other hand consumables are pretty cheap, so make your shopping wisely!

Going around and exploring the (small) world is pretty simple: there are some mages that act as teleport points between the city and the dungeons you will have to explore. Four dungeons for four elemental crystals, of course. The weird thing is that you do not even need the mages since you can actually walk on water to reach the various islands with the dungeons (probably an oversight)!
The crystals, strangely enough, are found looking around so there are no boss battles inside the dungeons, even if every locations comes with its own fauna. Anyway do not worry, to end the game you actually will have to face a final boss battle! Well, what is a search for mythical crystals without a boss battle?

Visually there is not much to say: the game uses RTP assets both for graphics and music (the menu screen is just a default RPG Maker XP background with the game title added on it), but mapping while not terrible it's not really inspired either, but then there was that "walk on water feature" that may considered an error. Also you do not even have the maps for the shop, since the buy/sell menu is initiated as soon as we interact with the door!


Oh, so there is a tradition of Transporter Persons! I did not know this!

Final Verdict
Crystals Again is a simple, mediocre dungeon delving adventure, not bad but really basic and with some imprecisions (anyway it's a complete game!). The premise is interesting and the game would have been much more interesting if there was... something else! Funny characters, dialogues, and maybe a characterization of the "four young people" (who are them? What are their characteristics?) that are doing this mission. Instead no, they have a name but are blank slates, I mean a single dungeon but more characterization and story would have made this game much more interesting and fun!