Summary:
It begins! An electric and energetic introduction to Zack, SOLDIER
Second Class. My most basic expectations get subverted as I see Crisis
Core’s action stylings, and my brain gets toyed with by a virtual
reality training session.
NOTE: I feel and express large amounts of confusion about the mechanics here, but am NOT yet asking for spoilers/tips on how they work. I may come up with more specific and non-rhetorical questions as I learn more (and I’ll usually say when they’re non-rhetorical), but part of the fun of a new game is grappling with the mechanics myself. I also imagine I’ll get to a tutorial soon enough. Thank you. :)
What I Know About This Game So Far
-In the discussion about what to do after FFVII, I learned that it comes somewhere earlier in the timeline than FFVII. Young Cloud? Young(er) Sephiroth?
-Maybe it goes really far back to when Jenova first landed.
-idkmybffjill
(Yeah, I got nothing.)
-I’ve had some experience with spin-offs in the series at least. FFII: Rebirth of Souls (SO PUNISHINGLY HARD) and FFIV: Interlude / The After Years. They’re fun because I have a sense of what to expect with a twist of a setting, or some new mechanics added on. A chance to revisit beloved characters.
-I’m trying out a controller for this game as well in an emulated PSP on my PC. FFVII stretched what my keyboard could do at times with some of the mini-games, so I’m pre-empting that frustration in case Crisis Core has more of those.
---
Intro
-The city of Midgar. PSP graphics are beautiful!
-Train! Helicopter! SPEED! Is this the bombing mission music?
-A dark-haired dude swoops down onto the train. Zack maybe.
-GUY WITH MUTTONCHOPS I DON’T KNOW! RUDE! RENO! AERIS! RED-HEADED GUY WHO’S NOT RENO! SO MANY PEOPLE! AND SEPHIROTH!!
-This is super fast-paced.
-New game time. I get to choose a difficulty mode for the first time in the FF series. Absolutely going normal mode rather than hard mode. No hesitation.
Let’s begin.
---
Midgar
-The music seems to call back to FFVII very explicitly.
-Huh! It looks like Midgar is under construction. Early in the city’s life.
-“Wutai troops have hijacked Shinra Express…” Awesome! This will touch on the war before the base game it seems with Wutai.
-I’m surprised that Wutai troops are in Midgar.
-Zack seems to be the main character.
-The guy behind him, Muttonchops, has the Buster Sword that Cloud started the last game with. How about helping rather than watching, guy?
-Zack’s already racking up quite a bodycount of Wutai soldiers on the train with a smile on his face. And… he can fly?
-“SOLDIER Second Class Zack, on the job!” So this is relatively early even in his career. Not yet First Class.
-And just like the first game, it starts with that music, getting off a train ready to kick ass.
-The troops he’s fighting have Shinra armor, but are Wutai troops in disguise. Talking to Angeal (Muttonchops?).
-LOL - This is taking the “enemy grunts can’t hit the side of a barn” a bit far. He’s talking casually on the phone while Wutai (OR ARE THEY?) (probably) troops open fire on him, a stationary target, with machine guns.
-wait
-wait
-THIS IS AN ACTION GAME?
-There is so much stuff on my screen! I’ve basically never played an action game since… um… I guess Dragon Age 2 counts, but before that the last one I played was probably Mortal Kombat 3 on the Super Nintendo back when it came out. Does that even count? I might have to reach back to playing Turtles in Time or Golden Axe in my childhood.
NOTE: I feel and express large amounts of confusion about the mechanics here, but am NOT yet asking for spoilers/tips on how they work. I may come up with more specific and non-rhetorical questions as I learn more (and I’ll usually say when they’re non-rhetorical), but part of the fun of a new game is grappling with the mechanics myself. I also imagine I’ll get to a tutorial soon enough. Thank you. :)
What I Know About This Game So Far
-In the discussion about what to do after FFVII, I learned that it comes somewhere earlier in the timeline than FFVII. Young Cloud? Young(er) Sephiroth?
-Maybe it goes really far back to when Jenova first landed.
-idkmybffjill
(Yeah, I got nothing.)
-I’ve had some experience with spin-offs in the series at least. FFII: Rebirth of Souls (SO PUNISHINGLY HARD) and FFIV: Interlude / The After Years. They’re fun because I have a sense of what to expect with a twist of a setting, or some new mechanics added on. A chance to revisit beloved characters.
-I’m trying out a controller for this game as well in an emulated PSP on my PC. FFVII stretched what my keyboard could do at times with some of the mini-games, so I’m pre-empting that frustration in case Crisis Core has more of those.
---
Intro
-The city of Midgar. PSP graphics are beautiful!
-Train! Helicopter! SPEED! Is this the bombing mission music?
-A dark-haired dude swoops down onto the train. Zack maybe.
-GUY WITH MUTTONCHOPS I DON’T KNOW! RUDE! RENO! AERIS! RED-HEADED GUY WHO’S NOT RENO! SO MANY PEOPLE! AND SEPHIROTH!!
-This is super fast-paced.
-New game time. I get to choose a difficulty mode for the first time in the FF series. Absolutely going normal mode rather than hard mode. No hesitation.
Let’s begin.
---
Midgar
-The music seems to call back to FFVII very explicitly.
-Huh! It looks like Midgar is under construction. Early in the city’s life.
-“Wutai troops have hijacked Shinra Express…” Awesome! This will touch on the war before the base game it seems with Wutai.
-I’m surprised that Wutai troops are in Midgar.
-Zack seems to be the main character.
-The guy behind him, Muttonchops, has the Buster Sword that Cloud started the last game with. How about helping rather than watching, guy?
-Zack’s already racking up quite a bodycount of Wutai soldiers on the train with a smile on his face. And… he can fly?
-“SOLDIER Second Class Zack, on the job!” So this is relatively early even in his career. Not yet First Class.
-And just like the first game, it starts with that music, getting off a train ready to kick ass.
-The troops he’s fighting have Shinra armor, but are Wutai troops in disguise. Talking to Angeal (Muttonchops?).
-LOL - This is taking the “enemy grunts can’t hit the side of a barn” a bit far. He’s talking casually on the phone while Wutai (OR ARE THEY?) (probably) troops open fire on him, a stationary target, with machine guns.
-wait
-wait
-THIS IS AN ACTION GAME?
-There is so much stuff on my screen! I’ve basically never played an action game since… um… I guess Dragon Age 2 counts, but before that the last one I played was probably Mortal Kombat 3 on the Super Nintendo back when it came out. Does that even count? I might have to reach back to playing Turtles in Time or Golden Axe in my childhood.
-I think it was CJWriterGal who said I wasn’t prepared for this game. I
took it in a jokey, “emotional things will happen” sort of way. That
will still likely be the case, but I was 100000% unprepared for the
genre. Unless this is a brief mini-game – but this looks to be the real
thing, the main combat system.
-I’m freaking out a bit right now. Sensory overload! Sensory overload!
-Chill, Coldrun. I can do this. Take it slow.
-So my analog joystick thingamajigger controls where I move. Square dodges, triangle blocks (though block does jack against the machine gun hits). Circle activates an ability, X does… something.
-Target window is in the top right of my screen. I seem to…
-OH GOD A THING IS HAPPENING
“Modulating Phase!” Then a slot machine wheel of faces and one is Sephiroth (??) comes up with numbers and WHAT’S GOING ON.
-Paused it. Ok. The left one is associated with “AP,” the middle with “MP, the right with “HP.” The bottom right of my screen let me cycle through different abilities. Basic attack, Assault Twister, and some powerful x-aga spells. Assault Twister was yellow, and that seemed to use AP (attack power?). The magic used MP, and me getting hit because I suck at action games used HP.
-So what’s modulating phase? Not sure. The numbers were 4, 2, 5 in the end, and the MP face was the only one that changed. I have no doubt I’ll get a tutorial on this coming up, so just starting to see what’s there for now.
-Phase modulation gives “Chain Slash Lv. 2” which, again, no clue. He just did a slashy dance and didn’t seem to hit anything.
-“Conflict Resolved.” I guess that’s Crisis Core’s version of victory fanfare. Interesting touch – very corporate, and Zack is part of Shinra after all.
-Time to head upstairs.
-Some people fleeing downstairs. Fleeing from Wutai troops, or maybe even from THE CRISIS CORE? (lol no)
-WHAT THE FUCK KIND OF INTRO IS THIS THAT’S A BEHEMOTH
-hahahaha and the music is super metal or something
-I seem to be able to get a few hits on him before he whaps me, so I hit 3-4 times, and then back away and dodge.
-Maybe I’m supposed to stay behind him? …nope. He tail-whapped me.
-Another phase modulation. “Power Surge!” Ok.
-The left side of the screen is yellow, with “Warning!” screaming out. Hm. My health is low-ish (253/582), but not THAT low.
-A new thing: “Single Status 7: Endure”
-I beat it! Yay!
-And now a dude has his sword to my back, but is speaking in a way that makes me think it’s a teammate/teacher.
-AND THAT PERSON IS SEPHIROTH
-He just cut Zack’s sword in half.
-Seems to be taking this a bit far.
-Then the other dude came in and saved him at the last second. Angeal. Who’s giving Sephiroth the stink-eye.
-IT WAS CYBER TRAINING LOLOL – well, it wouldn’t be FFVII if it weren’t fucking with my brain in like a thousand different ways already. And Sephiroth wasn’t even there. In a cool effect, his face melted away, turning into Angeal’s.
-My guess: Angeal is a SOLDIER First Class that Zack is apprenticed to.
-His sword in reality was actually cut in half! How?
ANGEAL: “Zack… Embrace your dreams.”
ZACK and ME: “Huh?”
ANGEAL: “If you want to be a hero, you need to have dreams… and honor.”
That seems a bit random of a thing to say, but I’m sure the reason will get revealed as I learn more.
---
Next time: Ummm… Zack doing things?
-I’m freaking out a bit right now. Sensory overload! Sensory overload!
-Chill, Coldrun. I can do this. Take it slow.
-So my analog joystick thingamajigger controls where I move. Square dodges, triangle blocks (though block does jack against the machine gun hits). Circle activates an ability, X does… something.
-Target window is in the top right of my screen. I seem to…
-OH GOD A THING IS HAPPENING
“Modulating Phase!” Then a slot machine wheel of faces and one is Sephiroth (??) comes up with numbers and WHAT’S GOING ON.
-Paused it. Ok. The left one is associated with “AP,” the middle with “MP, the right with “HP.” The bottom right of my screen let me cycle through different abilities. Basic attack, Assault Twister, and some powerful x-aga spells. Assault Twister was yellow, and that seemed to use AP (attack power?). The magic used MP, and me getting hit because I suck at action games used HP.
-So what’s modulating phase? Not sure. The numbers were 4, 2, 5 in the end, and the MP face was the only one that changed. I have no doubt I’ll get a tutorial on this coming up, so just starting to see what’s there for now.
-Phase modulation gives “Chain Slash Lv. 2” which, again, no clue. He just did a slashy dance and didn’t seem to hit anything.
-“Conflict Resolved.” I guess that’s Crisis Core’s version of victory fanfare. Interesting touch – very corporate, and Zack is part of Shinra after all.
-Time to head upstairs.
-Some people fleeing downstairs. Fleeing from Wutai troops, or maybe even from THE CRISIS CORE? (lol no)
-WHAT THE FUCK KIND OF INTRO IS THIS THAT’S A BEHEMOTH
-hahahaha and the music is super metal or something
-I seem to be able to get a few hits on him before he whaps me, so I hit 3-4 times, and then back away and dodge.
-Maybe I’m supposed to stay behind him? …nope. He tail-whapped me.
-Another phase modulation. “Power Surge!” Ok.
-The left side of the screen is yellow, with “Warning!” screaming out. Hm. My health is low-ish (253/582), but not THAT low.
-A new thing: “Single Status 7: Endure”
-I beat it! Yay!
-And now a dude has his sword to my back, but is speaking in a way that makes me think it’s a teammate/teacher.
-AND THAT PERSON IS SEPHIROTH
-He just cut Zack’s sword in half.
-Seems to be taking this a bit far.
-Then the other dude came in and saved him at the last second. Angeal. Who’s giving Sephiroth the stink-eye.
-IT WAS CYBER TRAINING LOLOL – well, it wouldn’t be FFVII if it weren’t fucking with my brain in like a thousand different ways already. And Sephiroth wasn’t even there. In a cool effect, his face melted away, turning into Angeal’s.
-My guess: Angeal is a SOLDIER First Class that Zack is apprenticed to.
-His sword in reality was actually cut in half! How?
ANGEAL: “Zack… Embrace your dreams.”
ZACK and ME: “Huh?”
ANGEAL: “If you want to be a hero, you need to have dreams… and honor.”
That seems a bit random of a thing to say, but I’m sure the reason will get revealed as I learn more.
---
Next time: Ummm… Zack doing things?
