My feedback of this game

[Emilkof]

I bought this game on the Switch and from what I had seen from trailers and gameplay videos, I was pretty hyped to play this. I've 100% a number of Zelda games, Alundra, etc and 100%/beaten a number of puzzle games such as The Talos Principle, The Witness, Portal, etc. It was a no-brainer that I would like this game.

But my hype died fairly quickly when I got into the game. My opinion is that this game has very serious issues with pacing. It's to the point that a game that I would have otherwise given a 9/10, is now somewhere around a 5-6/10. Yes, I think the issue with pacing is that egregious. It's all about excessiveness, it doesn't know when to stop. The individual puzzles are well-designed, it's just the sheer quantity of them thrown at the player that is the problem. The puzzles aren't necessarily difficulty as I didn't have to look up the solutions to any of them yet (I'm on chapter 8). It's the tedium.

Another problem with this is the Emilia race trophy which is missable. As a completionist, I feel like I need to complete these trophies, but since this one is missable, I have to run a dungeon once to learn the gimmicks, fail the race most likely, then reload the save and run it again. This is usually at least 3 hours or more of only puzzle solving, per dungeon (and it's probably going to get worse as I get to the later dungeons). A possible solution is to either just remove this trophy, or to have the option of racing Emilia whenever you want(in an uncompleted instance of the dungeon). The only problem with this is that if you do it later in the game it's obviously going to be easier since you are overleveled, not sure how that can resolved.

I will say I really like the overworld layout, it's possibly the best I've seen. Almost every chest is well positioned such that you have to take a detour, sometimes from another screen, to get it. I don't mind this because the chests are optional, and can be retrieved whenever you want, unlike the tedium of the dungeons which kinda force you to go through it at that moment in order to progress.

It's a shame, but this game could have potentially been one of my favorite games if it weren't for this very serious flaw with pacing. It's like the game is trying it's hardest to make itself not fun every time it gets so close to being there.

Edit: Added my thoughts on other aspects of the game. I actually do think this game does many things right, it's just the thing it does wrong has too much of a negative impact.

[Bucket kicker]

i agree (sort of). i think more combat sections / mini bosses would help a lot with dungeon pacing. do remember that most longer dungeons have a "break area" so that you can easily leave do, some quests and come back to where you left off. as for the dungeon races, don't bother on your first play-through. there is a new game + that adds a LOT of stuff and you can just rush through the dungeons in NG+.


TL;DR : take a break if the amount of puzzles get annoying and wait until NG+ to do dungeon races + flawless duels.

[Emilkof]

Originally posted by LuVenBen:

TL;DR : take a break if the amount of puzzles get annoying and wait until NG+ to do dungeon races + flawless duels.

This game makes me want to not want to play it and you are telling me to do NG+? I can't possibly imagine doing it again.

Just failed the chapter 8 first temple race (blob boss) twice now. Very close to wanting to quit this game.

Edit: And they have THREE dungeons back to back in chapter 8? Who thought that was a good idea?

[Bucket kicker]

Originally posted by Emilkof:

Originally posted by LuVenBen:

TL;DR : take a break if the amount of puzzles get annoying and wait until NG+ to do dungeon races + flawless duels.

This game makes me want to not want to play it and you are telling me to do NG+? I can't possibly imagine doing it again.

Just failed the chapter 8 first temple race (blob boss) twice now. Very close to wanting to quit this game.

Edit: And they have THREE dungeons back to back in chapter 8? Who thought that was a good idea?

don't play the game if you don't like it. gaming is supposed to be fun and/or relaxing and if you're not getting that... why bother?

[DaBa]

Well, to each their own. I utterly enjoyed the long puzzle sections as I simply like well made puzzles. And Cross code is chock full of them and makes you utilize the same abilities you use in combat which is excellent game design, it helps make the whole experience more coherent.

I also find the pacing rather well done. The game doesn't jump from one thing too another all the time and lets you enjoy a particular aspect of it for a period of time, but not too long so it overstays it's welcome. You have long explorations sections with combat in between to provide some action, it's all punctuated with dialogue and story reveals that are just the right length to not become tedious. Then you have long puzzle sections and themed dungeons to break up exploration. With enough fights in between to offer variety. So, where I stand the pacing is just right. Even the big story section the game has (outside of the prologue) I feel is in the exact right moment in the game to not put people off, it's at the point where you are very invested in what's going on and they made it so it takes you by surprise, making it more interesting than it would be if it was all just laid out plainly.

But, I tried playing this game twice myself. First time I got bored of it because I focused way too much on doing all the side quests in the first two areas, to the point where that consumed all my time and caused me to keep running around. The second time around I decided to not let that happen and focused on the main quest and exploration instead, and the game instantly clicked. Ended up doing all the side quests and post game content anyway after I became very invested in it.

[Emilkof]

Got the Emilia race trophy, looks like you can save scum the dungeons room by room.