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Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time – Game Review

Have you ever wanted to play a game with your friends who had a console but all you had was a hand-held console? Well Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time gives you the opportunity. There is a Wii version and a Nintendo DS version, but both are essentially the same. Of course being able to play a game in cross-platform multi player has its advantages and disadvantages.

While both games have different controls they both play relatively identically. If you have not played the other Crystal Chronicles on the DS then here is a quick lesson on how combat works, if you have played it you can probably skip to the next paragraph. Combat is done in real-time, you attack, jump, and pick up items and enemies by pressing various buttons. Spell-casting is accomplished by selecting the spell using the stylus (on the DS) or by pointing at the specific spell icon and selecting it (on the Wii), then pressing another button and holding it down causes a ring to appear, you can then try to line up the ring with an enemy or ally (depending on the spell) and release the button to cast it. The spells include Blizzard, Fire, Thunder, Cure, Rise and Clear. The first three are all attack spells, while the last three are all to be used on allies, Cure heals the target, Rise revives a KO’d target, and Clear removes a status effect. You can combine attacks with jumps, or you can grab an opponent and use the attack button to attack them while you are holding them, or you can perform a charge attack by holding down the attack button till some light has generated around the character and release.

Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of TimeThe gameplay is pretty simple, and the graphics are equally as simplistic, do not expect this game to have really awesome graphics on either the DS or the Wii. The graphics are in 3D, but to be honest they are nothing to write home about, part of the reason is because both games run on the same engine, so the Wii version has the same graphics as the DS version. Of course the game is fun, but it is really not for the hardcore Final Fantasy player, as the game’s puzzles are pretty easy to solve and the story is sort of predictable. Basically the story centers around the crystals, and how they are necessary to keep the balance of things. Unfortunately, although the game has a multi player mode there are issues with that as well.

It should be noted that the single player and multi player modes are the same, and the multi player mode uses the same character from the single player version. There are a couple problems, first it is very hard to find people to play online, but if you are playing offline with friends then your only problem may be that you don’t want to replay the same campaign moments over again on your own. This is the case if you are playing on the DS, if you are playing with someone on the Wii you cannot host a game. Hosting allows you to progress in your single player campaign, so even though you may have helped your friend get through a difficult boss (although the bosses are not too hard once you find their weak spot), you will still need to run it yourself to progress in your single player campaign. Of course you do get to keep any items you pick up and any increases to your character’s stats transfer over. One last thing to note about the Wii version is the user interface, unlike the DS with the screens oriented with one above the other, the Wii version has the screens oriented with one on the left and one on the right. Using the + and – buttons you can make either the left screen bigger (using the + button) or the right one larger (using the – button). This can be a little bit of a pain to work with, but you really do not need to look at the right side screen up close unless you want to get a closer look at the map or your inventory. Generally during dungeon crawls you can simply make the left screen bigger and not worry about the right screen.

Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of TimeTime for a rating, if you are a huge Final Fantasy fan and need to own every Final Fantasy game, then this game is obviously on your list. If you loved the last Crystal Chronicles then I would say this is probably a Cool or even a Cool +. For those who are only sort of interested I would recommend the DS version, as you do not need to deal with the zooming of the screens, I would give the DS version a Cool for fans of dungeon crawling beat-em ups and a meh to meh – for everyone else. The Wii version is really a meh to shite + based on the controls, if you have a DS you are better off buying that version.

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About The Author

Genuwine Jon Hammer

The self proclaimed "Genuwine" Jon Hammer, currently a student studying at Digipen Institute of Technology to be a programmer. I am a huge pop culture nerd, so movies, music, tv, podcasts, and games are all important to me, in fact if I often post about such topics on my twitter.

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Article Information

  • Posted: Wednesday, May 13th, 2009
  • Author: Genuwine Jon Hammer
  • Filed Under: DS, Games, Review, Wii
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