I have made a point to avoid playing games while they are still in early access. My experience with betas have left me jaded when playing games that are not yet finished. But when I played the demo for this game a few years ago and I was already impressed. So when I saw news that this would be the last update before the game gets to full release, I decided I would take the risk. If they were so close, I figured the main story would probably be finished or close to at the very least. Unfortunately this would not be the case, but with the game getting every close to 1.0, I look forward to returning to finish this adventure.
Story: Meet Lea. She’s a nice young woman with a very unique set of problems.
First and most obvious, she is stuck in an MMO called Crossworld, which is played a little differently then we think of them today. Instead of loading up a game on a computer and putting a headset on to talk with fellow gamers on the screen, this game is played by hooking up a VR setup called a CrossGear. Instead of a sprite representing them on a screen, they fully interact with “instant matter” avatars. These avatars are not just data, but physically exist while the player is using them in a specially housed world physically setup on a moon (the company running this, “Instantainment Ltd,” will not say where). And while someone can help Lea to log in and out, when she is not logged in, she is not conscious.
Second, Lea has no memories of her life before the moment her avatar was booted up for the game for the first time. Both her and her friend Sergey Asimov are trying to use the game to correct this issue.
And finally, Lea can not talk. While the game is generally sound, Lea is one of the unlucky few who’s speech system will not sync up right, leaving her mute in the game. Thankfully this too, Sergey is attempting to help resolve by slowly adding more words she can choose to use in-game manually.
But even from the get-go, Lea’s journey through this fictional world she finds herself stuck in goes awry as an unnamed blue avatar takes an interest in her, both in the fact that she is not in a place avatars should be and “somehow different.” He immediately challenges her on the spot and setting up your first boss fight. From here on out, you will guide Lea through the game as she attempts to keep her secret problems from the other gamers and in hopes that playing will help her remember what her life was before the game and even perhaps a way out.
Unfortunately as of the time writing this review, we simply can not find out. Since at this time the game is still in early access, the developer has with-held a large portion of the story till the full 1.0 release (which should be released soon, but we do not have an exact date). You basically get enough to get to know and even like the cast of characters you will play along side as well as a couple major reveals to Lea’s story. But just when the game is getting ready for a major step in the plot, you get a message saying “sorry, please wait for the full release.” Now at this point if you choose, the game does not need to be over since the game will not only let you play onward, but there are places later in-game you can reach, even if the plots around them are not yet ready for you. But story wise, this is the end for now.
5/10
Graphics: Any fans of old-school games are going to LOVE how this game looks. Bright, colorful, and detailed, this really is the best looking 16-bit game I have seen in a LONG while, rivalling if not beating many of the classics of that era. You will play from a birds-eye-view as you guide Lea and her party across forests, deserts, caves, and the even snow-covered cliffs as you explore and fight your way across an overworld that, while not quite finished, already begins to rival some of those classics as well. It all looks great and for the most part runs like liquid as well. I have to mention that last point only because depending on your power under the hood, you might see a little bit of slowdown late in the game, as some of the last encounters would put some bullet hell’s to shame with how much they throw at you at once. Add to this some of the biggest bosses this side of Diablo 3, and you have one hell of a feast for the eyes.
However, as good as it looks, sometimes the game suffers from the inherent limits of it’s artistic choices. This comes to be especially true in jumping puzzles as it is far from always obvious what platforms are at what height so that even as the game never stops shining, the veneer can sometimes wear a little thin.
8/10
Sound: This is a title that chose to be 16-bit and stick with the style through think and thin, and this becomes obvious with the audio department as well. You will get no voice acting at all in this game and sound effects are relatively limited to the kind of sounds you would have expected an SNES/Genesis to provide with booms, thuds, slashing and the like. The music is even in a midi style, but this again is a bright and shining point for the game. The sound-track is absolutely brilliant fitting the themes of it’s areas perfectly and sticking in your head well after you turn it off.
8/10
Gameplay: Most of this game is simply smooth. As mentioned in the graphic section of this review, you will play as Lea in a top-down birds-eye-view of the game as you run around exploring a vast world and killing monsters, but this is an incredibly simplified explanation.
Combat in this game is incredibly open. At it’s base it takes inspiration from games like Legend of Zelda and fuses it with twinstick mechanic. I played this game with a controller, and found swapping between them smooth as simply pushing the right stick in a direction to shoot or not to use melee, keeping both exceptionally easy to swap between. However, each has a little more depth to them. Your attack melee is generally going to hit harder and in a wider area directly around you, but you can only do three in a row before Lea will have to put her weapon away for a moment… unless you dash to reset this counter, leaving melee to be a frantic option available to you that you will need to master the flow of before it becomes fully effective.
Shooting on the other hand, starts with a cone that slowly slims to a straight line as you hold down the aiming control to keep in shooting mode. This is in fact, how Lea will aim her shots, getting more accurate as you keep it in use. In addition while you do have rapid fire, you may want to hold back and charge your shot before firing as this will do more damage, go longer, and even be able to ricochet off of walls (in fact many puzzles rely on this).
In addition to this you also have a shield/dash button, the function of which depends on if you are moving or not. A shield will greatly reduce the damage you take so long as you are facing the right way to block it, but it can be overrun and destroyed if you rely on this too much, removing it from being the “instant safe” button some may be tempted to make it. Moving while hitting the button will make you glide in what ever direction you are going and temporarily makes you invincible as part of a dodge mechanic. HOWEVER, you can only do this three times in a row, making it too part of the general flow of combat instead of a crutch letting you just not get hit as long as you like.
But that is only the basics, as fairly early on you will get circuits to add to a board to enhance your character. To those who are used to ARPG games, this is your skill tree, and the circuits will unlock stat buffs as well as “arts” which you can then use (provided you have enough SP, which builds in combat and charges to a base minimum over time) but hitting another button while engaged in the techniques mentioned before. Some work with shields, others with melee, and really there are at least two options for each base technique you can do which you can switch between on this board at will. You just can’t do so during combat as the menu to reach it is not available at this time.
And that’s just one board! As you play, two more will open up to you before you reach the end of the plot currently available, each based on one of the elements in the game. They are all independent and you can swap between them on the fly. Generally they are going to be more powerful then your base mode, but again, the game balances this by only letting you use their powers so much before you overload and are forced back to your base. This overload and the meter marking it will both reduce over time (and much faster out of combat), but once again, to use it most effectively it will be up to you to learn the timing of when to open what.
And for those of you looking for a challenge, you will find it here. Most of the time when you enter a new area, you will find all the monsters a few levels above you, making even those initial base fights a challenge, but do not assume just because you climbed up a few rounds that they will suddenly become easy. Some of these monstrocities will remain a challenge even if you have a few level on them, so enjoy.
In addition to tougher monsters, the puzzles in this game are going to give you a run for your money as well. Some will be legitimately tough to figure out how to proceed, but others are just tough to execute… and that sadly is the one weakness this game has. There are puzzles in this game that can be incredibly frustrating just because they are timing puzzles and feel awkward due to it, like when you have to guide a shot through a course by melting and freezing things but it’s not quite as fast as you would expect it to. Other times physics themselves can make what should be relatively easy exceptionally hard. Specifically in the second dungeon, there are a lot of puzzles requiring you to push water bubbles into a place and burst it into steam to turn windmills and cause whatever you need to happen for as long as the windmill has the energy to keep going. The problem is the bubbles move kinda floaty and when you burst them, the steam is in a cone shape, so it can be incredibly frustrating to possition them “just right” for these puzzles, and that goes double when you need to set this up for multiple entries.
But platforming in itself also needs some work. When you run to the edge of a platform, you will automatically jump, allowing for platforming, different levels, and even some puzzles here. But while the game looks amazing, the very 2D style graphics can be absolutely TERRIBLE about alerting you to what height platforms are on, and as a result you will overshoot and and smack face-first into the side of many platforms before you get through the path you need to find.
8/10
Bugs: This game is early access, but I can’t say I ran into any real issues outside of the restraints the art puts on the game as mentioned in the gameplay style.
Overall: I don’t like doing early access games often. Simply put, I’d rather wait and get the game when it’s finished. And while Crosscode certainly proved why itself, it still offers a lot to the player even in it’s current state. If you like old-school adventure titles, you will enjoy just about everything about this game as it stands. And even as I honestly believe you might be better served to wait till the finished release drops, I wouldn’t blame your impatience.
Score:
7/10
System Requirements:
- 2Ghz dual core CPU
- 2 GB RAM
- Any accelerated graphic card running today should work (1GB of VRAM recommended
- 600MB hard drive space
- Windows XP
System Specs:
- AMD A8-9600 APU
- 16 GB RAM
- Radeon R7 built in graphic processor (minimum using 0.5GB of RAM for VRAM)
- Windows 10
Source: Steam
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