Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core

I have dedicated my time to the US version since it arrived a week ago. Let me be honest, this is brilliant. Let me explain why.

The story is set prior to the events of FF7 following the story of Zack who starts as Soldier 2nd Class under Angeal (first class and one of Sephiroths buddies.) Things start to go wrong when one nutty scientist starts meddling and basically, many of Soldier go rogue because of two guys, Genesis and Angeal. However, you'll meet Cloud in the game and will see Zacks links to him, you'll meet Aerith in the game (name changed as it is the US version)and you'll meet others such as Sephiroth, the turks and you'll see how they influence the story in the prelude to FF7.
The graphics are superb, the best is definately the FMV which is great throughout, particularly the training fight between Genesis, Angeal and Sephiroth about a quarter of the way in at Junon Harbour. The areas have been lovingly recreated from Junon Harbour, to Midgar, to the Shinra Building and the church in the slums, PLUS there are some new areas as well. Character design is beautiful, you'll want for nothing in the presentation.

The combat is probably the weakest point. Its sort of in real time, where you choose the command and then watch, but its a little unusual. It feels fine though. You can equip materia (there's a good selection from Fire, to Barrier and Death, all which can level up to Master) however, you won't have a choice over armour etc as I had expected. You can choose your accessories though. Then there is the DMV-like a slot machine. Get two equal numbers and a piece of materia will level up, plus you'll be treated to a limit break. Get 3 the same and Zack will level up. It's a little random and it seems to take away the control from the player, but the fights are impressive, especially when you do get the chance to summon!

There are lots of bonuses as well. There are LOADS and I mean LOADS of bonus missions. These are brief but allow you the chance to level up and earn new items. Then there is the mail system which will irritate most. You can join clubs such as the Sephiroth fan club or the Loveless fan club, but it doesn't seem to mean much, apart from the odd piece of Mail. Then there is the opportunity to merge materia. It is odd at best. I've tried lots of combinations but only managed to create any new, decent materia on the rare occassion. I guess walkthroughs will sort that problem out. The music is also great, a mixture of FF7 and new really enhance the overall experience.

I can't think of anything that I have missed. The game will be great, unless you hate Final Fantasy, although personally, I think this is the best game on PSP so far!

So here we are at the end of the so called 'compilation of Final Fantasy VII' experiment by Square-Enix that began with the shallow(But spectacular) film Advent Children, continued with the so-so Dirge of Cerberus and a couple of mobile phone games that those of us outside Japan will never play, and finishes here with a surprisingly excellent prequel centred on the most under developed and explored character in the original FFVII: Zack.

Firstly, if, like me, you're going into this expecting a JRPG, then forget that right away. Core Crisis is an action title through and through, having far more in common with games like Kingdom Hearts and Rogue Galaxy(Minus the jumping) than Final Fantasy games. The levelling up and stat building is mostly outside your control, being almost a case of luck, as they use the always in action during battle 'DMW' or 'Digital Mind Wave'(Glorified fruit machine reels basically) to determine when you get a level up or a bonus status boost or some such during fights. It's pretty random to be honest, and seems a touch unnecessary to me, but you'll spend all your time focusing on actual combat anyway, with the real time nature of battle requring some nifty thumbwork at times(This game is no pushover). Sadly, it does have random battles, but being on a handheld and looking as good as this does, I guess it was unavoidable, and the real time nature of the fights coupled with no 'in area' loading times does help a fair bit. The game is a lot of fun to play, but the battles lack variety unless you make the effort to experiment with materia use and fusions and such.

Of course, the story is the real reason we're all here for this one though, and far moreso than Advent Children or Dirge of Cerberus, the story in Core Crisis delivers AND manages to stay true to the spirit of the original game at the same time.

Taking place several years prior to FFVII, you assume the role of Zack Fair during his days as a 2nd class SOLDIER member desperate to reach 1st class status under the training of his mentor and friend Angeal in the middle of a crisis of SOLDIER members going missing on missions, most notably a friend of Angeal's called 'Genesis'(Remember the winged guy from the 'epilogue' ending to Dirge of Cerberus? That was Genesis, this is where you finally get the back story on what that was all about), who appears to have been cloned into an army that is intent on wiping out SOLDIER.

As the story unfolds, you're treated to all manner of wonderful tie ins with FFVII's story(The 'Nibelheim flashback' is gloriously recreated here perfectly) and tons of little easter eggs and bonuses you can discover if you look hard enough in addition to Core Crisis telling it's own separate story that gives a great amount of depth to Zack's back story to boot. The game explores the significance of Cloud's 'Buster Sword' and Aeris'(Or Aerith to give the new translation of her name) relationship with Zack which was barely touched upon in FFVII and even shows the early days of Turk leader Tseng's career, Sephiroth's days with SOLDIER when he was an actual 'good guy', and also provides some explanation as to what those 'Loveless' posters you saw all over Midgar in FFVII were all about. The game is just jam packed on the story front, and almost entirely manages to avoid the usual tiresome emo pifalls so many RPGs fall into through the simple act of the central character being a genuinely upbeat, optimistic, wise cracking hero type, something you don't see enough of these days. This game has the characterisation of familiar characters down pat, when Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus seemed to just forget the events of FFVII entirely on that front.

The game is also a visual feast, with strikingly detailed character models that are animated really well, and look just stunning during the cutscenes(There are some of the usual lovely CGI cutscenes here too of course). The locations are nice too, but a lot of familiar FFVII locales have been changed around a lot to accomodate the new full 3D nature of the visuals, while some(eg. The Shinra building's lobby in particular) are perfect recreations. It looks excellent.

The soundtrack is of course fantastic, providing updated, sometimes amazing revamps of Nobuo Uematsu's most enduring game soundtrack of all time, with most of the old FFVII tunes covered(Tell me that Nibelheim theme doesn't send a shiver down your spine) and a really nice ending vocal song(In Japanese, with no translations though), this game is a major nostalgia trip.

Lengthwise, the main story alone is around 17 hours long, with an extensive array of side quests, missions and hidden stuff that will easily push the game over the 40 hour mark if you want it to. It'll certainly last you a while, and the multiple difficulties and new game+ mode offer some replay value.

Overall, this is a must buy. The sole complaint that I can think of is that the combat is too samey from a fairly early stage. Beyond that though, you get a great little adventure title and a glorious nostalgia trip to boot for your money.

Even if you didn't like other FFVII spin offs, you will like this one, it goes right where the others went wrong.

I'm going to be different from most of the other reviews here because I am the one person in the entire world who managed not to play Final Fantasy VII. I know, I know, I've missed out on the Best Game Ever TM. And I plan to rectify my omission at some point, I guess. However, I DID play FFX which I loved.

This game (which I was desperate for and imported) is clearly a very polished and complete package. Beautiful graphics. Long storyline, nice and varied, good characters, great voice acting. I like the idea of the arcadey combat, although it does get a bit samey even if I match around my materia. I like the side missions although they, again, are a bit samey, repeatedly running the same ten or so areas with different mobs.

However, for some reason this game just hasn't grabbed me. It's hard to put my finger on what the problem is - I think it's the lack of a party for the combat, so running poor old Zack around feels a bit lonely, as if there's no real interaction with anything. And the combat is neither a proper hack'n'slash game (a la God of War) nor a proper JRPG either - it's something of a hybrid. It reminded me a lot of Key of Heaven, although it didn't suffer from KOH's problem with overpowered magic attacks. On the other hand the move set is more limited than KOH's. I like the fruit machine thingy, that's clever (albeit a bit random as to when level ups occur) and I admired Square Enix trying something a bit different... but it's not quite scratching my RPG itch the way I had hoped.

I appreciate that for anyone who lost their heart to FFVII, you can add a star to the score above simply because of the satisfaction of tying up the loose ends, and it must be nice (if heartwrenching) to see Aeris/Aerith alive again... good scenes with her, BTW. Very well done.

Undoubtedly a good game, and a remarkably polished package (with tremendous FMV, for those who like FMVs) but a bit of an FF-lite. It feels extremely linear, almost claustrophic. It's a linear walk through a good storyline with ho-hum random combat scenes. Again and again and again.

So if what you're looking for as a good FF story to work your way through, that's definitely here is spades. You'll have a blast.

If on the other hand a strong story alone won't be enough for you, and you demand good action from your RPGs, then maybe this will leave you a tiny bit cold, like it did me. If action is your bag or if very linear things leave you unsatisfied, then invest in the Monster Hunter games which are IMO, in terms of the minute-to-minute quality of the RPG gameplay (which is what really counts, after all) dramatically better than the rather limited hacking that Zack puts in. I felt like I had my own adventures in Monster Hunter, rather than being guided through someone else's.

But it's a good game, no doubting that.