| Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core - Special Edition (PSP) | 
| From: Square Enix
Category: Video Games
Buy New: £35.49
New (3) Used (1) from £35.10
Rating:  25 reviews
Platform: Sony Psp
Genre: role-playing-games
Color: Alice Blue
Media: Video Game
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 7.2 x 4.3 x 1.1
EAN: 5060121823174
Release Date: June 20, 2008
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand New and Fully Guaranteed - Over 90% of orders are dispatched same day or next day by First Class post. Please note Danish customers may incur custom charges.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 20 more reviews...
 9 Out of 10 on Gamespot? I'll have what they're smoking August 3, 2008
Sir Squidshaker (UK)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Crisis Core acts as a prequel to Final Fantasy VII and focuses rather disjointedly on the events before Cloud joins AVALANCHE and the original game which shook the late 90s begins. If you've not yet given it a go but consider yourself a moderate fan of FFVII, then you'll probably have a few questions. Does FFVII:CC weave a narrative worthy of merging into the oncoming plot traffic of its predecessor? Does it whisk you back a decade in time and fill you with warm, nostalgic memories of a time spent staggering between glorious pre-rendered works of art and whirling random encounter transitions? Are some of the darker elements of the plot handled with a degree of mystery and subtlety? The short answer to all of these questions is a faintly dejected `not really'.
Advent Children hardly set the stage for reassurance. Whilst the visuals and action were bang on form; the pacing was sloppy, the introduction to the final encounter was about as epic as a cucumber sandwich and for some reason Square lovingly topped the whole experience off with the kind of whimsical 'feel good' ending usually confined to daytime movies about mischievous runaway moppets.
The trend of outstanding CG effects remains strong and character models and overall animation in the glorious array of FMV sequences rival anything showcased in the aforementioned movie spin-off. The musical score as we've come to expect from anything made by Square fluctuates between varying levels of greatness. The voice acting however... well, let's just say three out of four isn't bad.
It's not that there's much particularly wrong with the English dubbing besides the odd awkwardly delivered line tripping over the clumsy dialogue like it's an obese cat sleeping in a doorway, the issue is that there's not much right with it either. To make matters even more distressing, we've been outright denied the opportunity to switch to Japanese audio with subtitles.
The combat system is very much your straightforward hack and slash picnic, Press X to hit target with sword until said target collapses in a heap, and Press Square to perform a roll-stroke-dodge combination which can be used to cavort out of danger (or often into it, should you get a bit carried away). You can also scroll through a selection of spells and skills which you've either found on your escapades or created using Materia Fusion. It all seems perfectly acceptable until the fetid abomination which is Crisis Core's limit break system rears its ugly head, anyway.
The DMW (that's `Dull Meter Watching' for those in the know) System does away with all that overrated nonsense everyone keeps banging on about, baloney like fast paced combat, strategy, customisation and fun and instead replaces them with a much more desirable spinning wheel.
If the battle designers of Crisis Core are to be believed then not only is the brutal crucifixion of strategy in games long overdue, but also slot machines are apparently a vastly superior form of entertainment far beyond our human comprehension. The best approach is to just go along with it. Struggle against the flow of the DMW and you'll have gnawed the corners off your PSP sooner than you can say "modulating phase", though it's difficult not getting a little deflated/annoyed/homicidal when it happens on the very last badly injured enemy.
Nonsensical happenings crop up now and then leaving you scratching your head or twisting it in a lupine manner trying to work out what on earth just happened. On one occasion, Zack had to save a village due to be bombed, from being bombed twenty seconds sooner by what I can only assume was a secret invisible rocket-launcher located in another dimension. To save the day, our dashing hero strikes the rockets with his sword, forcing them to rather smoothly split in two as if they were forged from Danish pastry. The entire scene makes absolutely no sense and worst of all forces you to partake in hideous `QuickTime' events a la shenmue. These silly attempts to crowbar in needless gameplay elements with no thought for context breaks flow and calls into question just what in Gaia possessed the designers to implement such sloppy game elements in the first place.
Overall, Crisis Core is saved by its gorgeous visuals and stunning FMV sequences but underneath all that you can't escape the sinking feeling that you're plodding through a shallow and often befuddling stab at an action RPG.
The Good
- Impressive FMV sequences
- Masses of quick side-missions which can easily be picked up when on the go
The Bad
- The tiresome DMW System ends up slowing down gameplay the point of agony
- Clunky dialogue and voice acting
- Fragmented story Frisbees immersion straight out of the window
- Side-missions suffer from `Quantity over Quality'
- Many scenes are lacking in the dark atmosphere which made the original stand out from the RPG crowd of the 90s
- Some real odd moments of nonsensical happenings
5 stars? Really? C'mon now, it isn't THAT good... July 4, 2008
J. Bishop
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
I actually imported an English language, region free version of this from Hong Kong months ago, and i was really excited about it. Let's get to the point shall we, good things first. The cut-scene graphics are insane. No other way to put it. Just incredible. The game play is pretty good too, easy to control, and the materia leveling system is an interesting change from the original FFVII. That's about it.
Now, the story is, regardless of what everyone else says, rubbish. I honestly don't understand how any intelligent person could think otherwise. It's Hollywood-esque idiot fodder filled with shallow, two-dimensional characters, minimal dialogue (replaced almost entirely by ridiculous, if mindlessly entertaining fight scenes) and has no emotional depth whatsoever.
Don't expect to care about any of the characters, most of which are just plain irritating (espescially Genesis - seriously, all that stuff about 'Loveless', gay. Just gay. And what's it even for? A reference to a poster in the original? Who cares?). Even old characters Cloud and Aeris (Aerith in my version), previously deep, intriguing and mysterious have become dull, shallow and, frankly, pointless.
Superb cut-scenes aside, in-game graphics are okay, but not that special. Game areas are small, quite bland, lack interactivity and are essentially a series of corridors that allow for little or no deviation, which brings me to my next point; this game is ENTIRELY linear. Don't expect a world map or much in the way of decision making. There are side missions to keep things 'varied', and in all fairness there are a lot of them (some 300), but the problem is that they are all EXACTLY the same. I became bored long before i finished them all.
Gameplay, arguably any game's most important aspect, is actually one of Crisis Core's stronger areas. You equip materia and accessories to allow more command options/attacks/magic in fights, which occur randomly, and also to boost stats. It's a simple setup that's quite fun, at first, but since it basically boils down to just running around pressing x over and over again, soon becomes a bit tedious. And with the materia upgrade system it's quite simple to boost your stats through the roof very quickly, rendering most magic and special attacks obsolete. Also, with regards to the materia system, i found that i rapidly accumulated VAST quantities of useless materia, and sorting through it all became a serious effort.
Well, i think i've ranted enough. In conclusion, if you like simple, undemanding gameplay and the sort of story that you might find in a terrible soap opera or cheesy American drama then maybe this is for you, but i personally was massively disappointed. I think this game is little more than a cash-in from those evil, money-grabbing fools at Square-Enix (who frankly haven't produced the same caliber of games since the Enix people got involved. You know it as well as i do. Be honest.) who know that all the millions of FFVII fanboys out there will happily spend money on this regardless of how lame it is. Anyway, that's it. Clearly i'm in a minority on this one, but hey. There. My opinion. The end.
 Final-ly a begining! June 30, 2008
Mr. J. Gorton (England)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I have played and completed this game, it was rather easy but there are alot of things to do (i still have things waiting to do) i bought this game and it took me 7 days to complete it (not repetative gameplay) so it is fair easy to do, but the tasks are still there so its not 100% done. Further more what i dislike about this game (just the one thing) is that a certain character is in nibleheim when sephiroth goes mad, this isnt shown on the origional game story and is rather confusing to get my head around. The game offered me alot of action and suspense with many surprises along the way, it was very fun but i would advise any experienced RPG player to start on hard mode if they want a challenge. The endin nearly had me in tears but i expected it to happen as i am not daft lol. (i wont spoil the ending for anyone). On a final note, this game cleared up alot of thing on past characters, past story line and now it all makes sense, i had fun playing this game eventhough it didnt make sense at one part.
 FANTASTIC!!!! June 26, 2008
Daniel Nathan Grist (bristol,uk)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
If youve played ff7 then this game is simply amazing, some might think its changed to much as i did for the first hour or so of game play but as with ff7, i got sucked into the story and it just made sense.
combat does get samey as some have said but frankly most ff games do and its after many hours of gameplay, its the story and other aspects of the game that grab most people and this has it all. it still has most of the depth youd find on a console version and the story line is (i think) the best out of all ff games (as an add on to the ff7 story line). its definately worth a play.
the things that might put people off are this game is more channeled than ff7. you cant explore the whole world as in ff7. you can explore alot of midgar etc and do the 300 side missions when you want but the side missions are from a static location(your instantly transported to the mission location, complete it then come back), the campaign is different you follow that around the world.
and for those ff7 fans who wont play it because they think the story line isnt full of suprises play it and like me youll definately be surprised.
Like Final Fantasy, Only Very Accessible June 24, 2008
M. Robinson (Huddersfield, England)
If you've every played a numbered Final Fantasy title then you'll know that it can take a good few hours before you settle into the game and you get to the stage where you're not fumbling around with weak characters. Crisis Core is a welcome change to this since you're right into the action very quickly and thanks to the new combat system, you really feel part of the action. It does this by being a great average of hack-n-slash gameplay and the kind of quick thinking strategy of FFXII. In fact alot of this game will remind you of FFXII, most noticably the way you move through level areas (the line of blue dots to show where the next screen is). Graphically its close to the early PS2 outtings for Square-Enix, games like Kingdom Hearts and FFX come to mind, but the quality is very high and extemely playable. Of note here is the sheer amount of FMV present. Not only is there a large amount of story played out this way (with some scenes lasting much longer than in any other FF game) its particularly exciting to see the summon monsters rendered fully every time they are called. Whilst the 'random' battles systems will no doubt infuriate many with its obviousness and repetitiveness, the overall mix of story vs action is very well balanced. But perhaps the best feature of the game as a whole is the multitude of side quests or 'missions'. Unlike in other FF games (notably FFXII) missions can be undertaken at anytime by simply standing at a save point and selecting Mission from the menu. No more spending hours trailing back-and-forth just to activate the next quest. This means also that charater leveling is much faster and more accessible to those who enjoy that aspect. From almost the start of the game there are enough side quests to give you the level increase to have a serious advantage over any opponent. Although the story can seem a little trite in places with somewhat desperate attempts to crowbar-in FFVII references and explanations, its a satisfying outting made all the sweeter by its superb playabilty. So it may not be as in-depth as a numbered title, but its fast accessibility will keep any Final Fantasy fan happy.
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