FFVII: Crisis Core

tread_softly

June 20th for the EU afaik

Sephiroth_dude

bollix its out this wk,wont have enough cash to buy it

Sephiroth_dude

WELL WHAT ARE YER THOUGHTS ON IT?

ec18

any chance of ps2 release?

Sephiroth_dude

id seriously doubt it.

Retr0gamer

It's not bad but it's dreadfully flawed from what I've played of it. The combat is an absolute mess. The dodge command is far too effective as well as your normal attack command which interrupts almost any enemy command. The random roulette thing spinning in the corner is absolute madness it's so totally random and when the game pauses to show a roullette you haven't a clue what is going on and don't really care either. IT's lso easier than rolling out of bed in the morning.

Graphics are gorgeous for a PSP game. Soundtrack is a bit pants, way too much annoying wailing guitars that cheapen any decent tracks.

Storywise it's fairly pants at the moment. Characters are pretty poor, many of them are jocks although nowhere near as annoying as anything seen in FFVIII. At least there's a lack of annoying emo moments so far. There's some really silly moments, zack must be the stupidest person in FFVIIs universe, he needs everything spelled out to him and usually repeats plans that are said to him or ask obvious questions. I think this is more a problem with the translation. Story is absolute hokum.

Despite all these flaws it's perfectly playable and fun in small doses before repetition sets in. I like the way it's set up as a handheld game unlike many other handheld RPGs. There's a lack of massive towns and save points are more than plentiful meaning that the game can be played perfectly in bitesized chunks. It's above average but by no means great but at least it won't have you nashing your teeth with horrible abrasive design decisions.

My biggest gripe is that you can do a lot better with your money. I bet nobody here has played jeanne d'arc and you can get that quite simply fantastic game for much less than crisis core if you import (which you need to since sony didn't bring it here).

Sephiroth_dude

jeanne d arc is ntsc only though is'nt,would'nt we need an american psp to play it?or are psps region free?

Retr0gamer

PSP's are region free so you have no excuse. It's a Level 5 game for gods sake, the guys behind Dragon Quest VIII. Name one of their games that isn't an instant classic?

GothPunk

Retr0gamer wrote: »

My biggest gripe is that you can do a lot better with your money. I bet nobody here has played jeanne d'arc and you can get that quite simply fantastic game for much less than crisis core if you import (which you need to since sony didn't bring it here).

Jeanne D'Arc is the next SRPG I want to get for my PSP after I finish Final Fantasy Tactics. Where would you recommend getting it? I did a quick Google and came up short, and the place I usually import Japanese/American games from, NCSX, is all sold out of the game.

I do think that you have much higher standards than me when it comes to RPGs so I think that you saying Crisis Core is 'not bad' is a huge compliment to the game.

I think I understand now why I liked the music in Crisis Core and so many stated that they didn't - I'm quite fond of wailing guitars. I guess the soundtrack is a bit of a departure from the original FFVII soundtrack, obviously it's going to depend on the user whether that's a good thing or not.

I'm very interested to hear what you think of the ending.

Sephiroth_dude

well in that case i will get it :-).i did'nt realise psp was region free though

tread_softly

region free for games, not UMDs tho

Retr0gamer

GothPunk wrote: »

Jeanne D'Arc is the next SRPG I want to get for my PSP after I finish Final Fantasy Tactics. Where would you recommend getting it? I did a quick Google and came up short, and the place I usually import Japanese/American games from, NCSX, is all sold out of the game.

I do think that you have much higher standards than me when it comes to RPGs so I think that you saying Crisis Core is 'not bad' is a huge compliment to the game.

Have you tried www.playasia.com or www.videogamesplus.ca

You may be a tiny bit disappointed with Jeanne d'Arc. It's a fabulous game but pales in comparison to FF Tactics which is by far the best game in the SRPG genre.

Thinking about it Crisis Core is similar to FFVII. It's massively flawed but in no way is it flawed in a way that stops it ever being fun. However there's no denying that it's only slightly more complicated than a button masher. My comments on the story might be a bit premature since I've really only started the game. As for the music my main grievance is that the battle theme started to grate after 10 mins playing the game.

Vokes

Im a huge fan of the "wailing guitars" :pac:

Retr0, if the urge takes you, give the Hard mode a whizz. The gameplay is actually pretty decent then, as you'll find yourself having to use a wide variety of the magics, special moves and varied tactics. Hard mode only affects the portable missions though unfortunately.

Definitely a button masher to an extent on Normal mode.

GothPunk

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Have you tried www.playasia.com or www.videogamesplus.ca

You may be a tiny bit disappointed with Jeanne d'Arc. It's a fabulous game but pales in comparison to FF Tactics which is by far the best game in the SRPG genre.

Thanks for that, I've never tried videogamesplus

Maybe I should give FFT a break then and get Jeanne D'Arc, I'm only on Chapter 2 in FFT anyway.

SofaK wrote: »

Retr0, if the urge takes you, give the Hard mode a whizz. The gameplay is actually pretty decent then, as you'll find yourself having to use a wide variety of the magics, special moves and varied tactics. Hard mode only affects the portable missions though unfortunately.

Definitely a button masher to an extent on Normal mode.

I think that's the first thing you notice when you start the game, it's too easy at the start. I haven't recieved my English copy yet, I've been looking forward to playing 'Hard Mode'.

Although some of the missions are quite repetitive, there are some gems in there, if I can find an online guide to the good ones I'll post it. Plus there are lots of items, accessories and materia to find.

thomohawk

finally got my hands on a copy of ffvii crisis core for the psp and im impressed greatly with it.i like the battle system(better than ff12 anyways).i wouldnt mind playing it on my tv but unfortunately ive got the old version(1003 version) of the psp and have looked high & low for a component cable so i can play it via my tv and cant get one.there only seems to be cables for the newest psps. if anybody out there knows of a cable that exists please enlighten me!!

Sephiroth_dude

did'nt even know you could hook your psp up to your tv :eek:.

Lilith306

thomohawk wrote: »

finally got my hands on a copy of ffvii crisis core for the psp and im impressed greatly with it.i like the battle system(better than ff12 anyways).i wouldnt mind playing it on my tv but unfortunately ive got the old version(1003 version) of the psp and have looked high & low for a component cable so i can play it via my tv and cant get one.there only seems to be cables for the newest psps. if anybody out there knows of a cable that exists please enlighten me!!

There is no TV cable for the old PSP only for the PSP Lite.

noodler

Retr0gamer wrote: »

It's all Sephiroths fault we have nothing but girly FF bad guys with stupid reasons for being evil. We need more pure evil nutjobs like Kefka. He had a great reason to destroy the world, he was a total control freak and out and out headcase.

I am just about to go into the Tower of Kefka in ff6 and have to say I do not understand hoe ppl consider Kefka such a great baddie. He is pretty childish in his phrases etc, alo of what he did (poisoning Doma) can bee seen as simply a result of war? Anyway, I think he was written for kids, doesnt give an imposing presence in 2d and you never really get a good feel for his character.

Also he wears a clown's suit, if there are revelations in the tower which will make me change my mind then I apologise. Anyway, good game, such a shame about the speed.

Retr0gamer

Which version are you playing? Kefka is a different character altogether in some of the poorer translations of the game.

I really like Kefka, he starts off as a comic relief but then does some really cruel and evil things and of course he also

destroys and enslaves the world

Anyway whatever way you look at it he is a far superior character than Sephiroth ever was. Sephiroth learns about his mother takes a mickey fit and decides to destroy the world.

Killing Aerith

was an effective way of making you hate him but it doesn't beat half the crap Kefka pulled off. I think what annoys me about Sephiroth was that his reasons for what he did were very weak, Kefka's were much stronger. Seph really is a poorly fleshed out character who's appeal only lies in one quite emotional moment and his excellent character design. Kefka also has the laugh.

Anyway none of the FF bad guys can hold a candle to Suikoden 2's Luca Blight. Now there is a crazy and cruel bastard with a wonderfully fleshed out backstory that makes you feel sorry for him despite him being a evil ****er.

noodler

I had to put up with a bunch of you can'y judge Kefka til you have played ff6, fair enough, I have spent the last month slaving through it. I don't think its just the 2D.
I know we shouldn't get into a full blown argument here, but Seph is angry SPOLIERS


because he has been lied to for his entire life. He burned a village, wnats to destroy not enslave etc Kefka just wants magic, also the finger wag in ff6 took away alot of the power of serious moments for me. I was genuinely angry when Leo dies tho, he is someone I would have like to have seen alot more.

Oh the PSX version by the way...let the criticism commence.

Retr0gamer

Well with 2D games you need to use a little more imagination especially for snes games which had a lot of memory restrictions which reduced the amount of animations they could use. Playing the PS1 version won't help either, the translation isn't the best and a little sanitised.

It's fair to say that sephiroth was angry when he learnt he was being lied to. But come on it wasn't that big of a revelation. I know some one that found out they were adopted and got really angry, it's basically the same thing as what happened to seph except with less sci-fi meanderings. They got over it without burning any villages or deciding that they were the only being worth ruling the earth. It was such a big change in personality that it was silly.

Kefka definitely wasn't just after the power of magic. He wanted it because he could use it as a tool it cause death destruction and misery. He was pretty good at that from the beginning but with it's power he really did take it to a whole new level. Kefka was always a sadistic crazyjob, there were no unbelievable personality changes.

noodler

Well Seph felt he had more of a connection with one race than another (a little misguided I'll admit) and felt the people he had thought he was part of were actually not the right heirs to the planet. If you really want to analyse, how did Gestahl not see Kefka for what he was until it was way too late (FC)? Assuming there was no personality change.

Retr0gamer

I still don't think it's a good enough excuse to explain seph's actions fully.

As for the other comment about Gestahl, well he knew full well that Kefka was a complete power hungry nutjob. He thought he could control him and being his best general he was invaluable so he never got rid of him. It was his own fault for not seeing just how badly f*cked up Kefka was and that he wanted power so badly he was prepared to go through even Gestahl to get it. If I remember correctly there's a scene when Gestahl explains where Kefka came from and he even says himself that kefka was mad due to the experiment not going as well as planned.

noodler

Seph is injected with Jenova cells. That leaves the Sktizo door open to all sorts of personality chnages if you wanna force it (Cloud's an obvious example). Maybe Jenova was controlling Seph, same way Seph could control Cloud?

I just felt Kefka was going o be something amzing but felt more like a bumbling cartoon villian.

Mark Hamill

noodler wrote: »

Seph is injected with Jenova cells. That leaves the Sktizo door open to all sorts of personality chnages if you wanna force it (Cloud's an obvious example). Maybe Jenova was controlling Seph, same way Seph could control Cloud?

I always assumed that Jenova was controlling everyone with jenova cells in them (Sephiroth, Spehiroth clones, Cloud-who she calls a puppet after you fight her when Aeris dies). Crisis Core helps to explain more why Sephiroth seemed to go from finding out he was a scientific experiment to all out earth destruction, with no real interference from the outside (ie what happend to Genesis and Angeal influenced him)

Retr0gamer

Seph is injected with Jenova cells

Ah, now this something I forgot.

Yep ,after Sephiroth fell into the lifestream he was being controlled by Jenova completely, same with cloud and the clones but to a lesser extent. In fact the Sephiroth you see for most of the game isn;t sephiroth but a projection from the mind of Jenova that is so powerful it becomes a physical manifestation. The sephiroth regeneating in North Crater is the real one. So everything after nibleheim is pretty well explained when it was jenova behind it all. However going loco in nibelheim is still poorly explained for me.

GothPunk

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Ah, now this something I forgot.

Yep ,after Sephiroth fell into the lifestream he was being controlled by Jenova completely, same with cloud and the clones but to a lesser extent. In fact the Sephiroth you see for most of the game isn;t sephiroth but a projection from the mind of Jenova that is so powerful it becomes a physical manifestation. The sephiroth regeneating in North Crater is the real one. So everything after nibleheim is pretty well explained when it was jenova behind it all. However going loco in nibelheim is still poorly explained for me.

Just out of interest, have you gotten to the Nibelheim arc in Crisis Core yet? I think that it explains what's going on a whole lot better, without actually changing anything from FFVII. It's just that the improved graphics and sense of time seem to portray his emotions better. This is one of the reasons why I loved Crisis Core - you grow to like Sephiroth as a friend/good guy, and then you watch his downward spiral over the course of a week (If I remember correctly). His unstable state of mind brought about by learning that he is the result of a genetic experiment enables Jenova to take a hold of him more easily. So he goes from being angry and not knowing who he is to believing that he/Jenova is the rightful heir to the planet. I never really thought that it was poorly explained, although perhaps the explanation is a little subtle in FFVII. Perhaps Crisis Core will sort things out for you.

Just something interesting I've noticed as a difference between the Japanese and Enlish versions of the game - the English version has more voice overs. In certain scenes, where you see Zack talking on his phone in the opening scene for example, in the Japanese version there was only highlighted text along the bottom of the screen, whereas in the English version we get text and a voice over. I thought that was kind of cool.

As for the translation, it's pretty good once the 2nd Chapter starts, although there are parts here and there that don't translate as well. However, it seems to be pretty faithful so far. If you really care that much about the translation you can check out SilentTweak.net for an excellent translation from the Japanese version.

Retr0gamer

I'm getting there but finding it harder to play the game as I go on since it's a little repetitive. I'll see what i think when I get there. Usually these prequel things tend to mess with what was perfectly good already so not holding out too much hope.

noodler

I was always under the impression the Seph who burned down Nibel was the REAL one. THEN he got frozen not properly returning until disc2.

You can compare kid's finding out their adopted to finding out your a manufactured alien! (essentially)

matthew26

I remember reading some sort of article about the game explaining how Jenova is the real villain instead of Sephiroth. I had mixed feelings about it though.