Please take into account that a 5 to me means average, anything higher is above average. 5-6 is serviceable but nothing special or groundbreaking, 6-7 is serviceable with some good aspects, 7-8 consists of good to great aspects, but a there are still noticeable problems and annoyances, sometimes to a degree that will turn a player off, and deter it from being a 9-10, or a game of masterful craftsmanship, where a game has very minorest, are either unnoticeable entirely or small enough that the rest of the quality in the game masks it.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Secret of Mana. Hyper Light Drifter.
CrossCode is the result of taking the very best mechanics and design philosophies of these three excellent games, and it never feels like an unispired clone of any, never resting on these laurels, for it never completely replicates these games.

Story: 7.5 ( While they play with tropes, there are still too many )
The first noticeable difference when you start playing is the setting / narrative as a whole. The plot of CrossCode shares almost no similarities to the plot devices of the other games. That isn't to say it's completely original, which it isn't. As it draws from the best gameplay mechanics of the three games already mentioned, so to does it draw from, or replicate the best concepts and themes of existing franchises, creating something better in the process, while managing to feel unique regardless of similarities.

Some might compare it to the .Hack series, but in truth it is more similar to that of the high fantasy series Otherland, novels where people are becoming trapped within it's virtual cyberspace, comatose in the real world. And just like in the Otherland books, CrossCode has a diverse amount of areas, all with important and well-thought out narratives, quests, and characters, each one totally different from the next and never staying on one genre setting, stretching across the fantasy and science fiction genres. It isn't just a science fiction story and world, and it isn't just fantasy. It does a great job of balancing the two. Unfortunately, it still uses tropes that have been repeated ad nauseum in this industry, and that's the anmesiac protaganist. On the other side of the coin is the developers played with this trope a bit, making your character mute because the code of the MMO she is in isn't working properly with her avatar, causing you to slowly learn phrases over the course of the game. You get flashes of dreams and visions as you progress throgh the story, but none do a decent job of really hinting at Lea's origins, almost as if the developer cares more the world's story than the character's, but this is only from the perspective of where the story goes to now, as there will be much more to come.

Because it's Early Access it's hard to judge how compelling the narrative is, or might become. As it stands now, the areas you do get to explore that are essential to the playable story sequences feel like a patchwork at times, with a lot of dense activity in one area but not much further away it feels completely empty of gameplay of any sort. Fortunately, in these areas you can easily see where something might be added. Finally, in regards to the story is the Guild that you join, as well as other factions' quests. To put it simply, the Guild is my favorite part of the story so far, has the most promising of the main narratives, and the amount of quests you can find throughout the world that aren't even connected to the guild but to other factions, and even many that are completely unique, is very impressive, especially considering much more will be added.

Gameplay: 8 ( Great Combat Action / Horrible, Micromanagement Economy

The second thing that helps CrossCode stand apart from the other games, where gameplay is concerned, is the by having a combat system that has more depth than what you would except from a game of its kind. Within the game-world, Leah is considered a Spheromancer class, which is the jack-of-all-trades. There are five elements, one being neutral, each with their own skill trees and combat arts that you unlock throughout the game, and then switch back and forth between them. While every element you use has the same type of combat arts ( Melee, Guard, Ranged, etc ), the skills for each of them changing depending on the mode, so you have a nice degree of flexibility in playstyles. The four elements you get to use are capable of overheating after a fashion, so it forces you switch between attack styles and keeps you on your toes. Finally, when you unlock a new element and skill-tree you will discover that you have the same amount of skill points to allocate as you did for the others, so every style will always feel equal and not underpowered.

While I applaud the combat and action in general, there are other areas that hinder the game from being truly exceptional. The first of these issues is the economy and how acquiring gear, items, and materials work. To be frank, it's obtuse, unintuitive, and downright awful. It simply becomes a chore of trying to keep track of every material you need to trade for more of another material for more of another, to get a piece of equipment or a certain amount of item. On top of which you still you need to spend your hard earned money as well. It makes no sense to have a bartering system where the NPCs charge you for buying items that also require the several different types of materials. They always require several types of materials, usually multiple of both, and many of these can only be found by trading other materials to vendors at a completely different part of the game-world. Because materials are the only form of loot, meaning all equipment and items needs to be found via the economy and chests, their is a severe progression problem.

The gear that you do get after the hassle is actually a highlight, as besides the normal attribute changes, they almost always come with unique passive traits. A gear might give you a bigger time window for making a perfect guard and counter attack, or make it quicker to aim, move faster, more critical hits, etc. There are a lot of traits to be discovered, which can make a noticeable impact. It is just unfortunate the amount of unneccesary backtracking and micromanagement needed to acquire items and equipment. Even for consumables work in this fashion, where you need two to three types of materials, and typically several of each. When you discover that some of the consumables, be it defensive gains or strength-based ones, come in three degrees of strength and a few degrees of length, the longest being sixty seconds, you will most likely not go through the hassle of acquiring them or will hardly use them because you will want to hoard them, despite them not being all that important.

You will acquire AI-controlled teammates which is a great addition to the game, and also a very perplexing one. This is where, besides the graphics, the game resembles Secret of Mana the most. You set tactics for your companions and that's all the control you have over them. Their addition drastically impacts the gameplay for the better, each companion being a specific class and having their own unique abilites. Which is where it gets perplexing, and in all honesty, disrespectful to the player / consumer. The game goes to great length to explain six other classes that exist in this MMO game-world only to force the player to be the jack-of-all-trades. You cannot switch classes at any point and there are not sub-classes. The closest thing to a subclass is using particular companions, but so far in the game you basically only have two unique class-based companions available to you. The reason is balancing issues, which is inexcusable when they basically tease you that they are there and you can't play them. To be fair, it's more disrespectful than ruinous gameplay.

Graphics: 9
Sound: 7

Overall: 8/10