[Review] Moero Crystal H (Nintendo Switch)
Being a man of culture myself, I was pretty excited to play Moero Crystal H for the Nintendo Switch. I must say it’s a fantastic little game with a lot to offer, beautiful visuals, awesome colors, and fine details.
The game itself is a dungeon crawler, with turn-based RPG mechanics. Think Persona Q but with Ecchi content. Usually, I am not a big fan of the 1st person POV in JRPG’s, but it truly works because the backgrounds in the dungeons themselves are very vivid and vibrant.
Time in the dungeons is fantastic due to the quality of life features, which I really hope to see similar games implement. Such as an auto battling system which makes grinding a thing of the past. Also once you’ve covered the map you can take advantage of the auto movement feature which allows you to place a marker on the mini-map for your party to travel to. In my opinion, these features are simple godsends, and a highlight of the dungeons.
I didn’t feel bored looking at the same background between battles or anything like that. The same can’t be said with enemies. The sprite work for the enemies, although unique, can get boring very quickly. Stronger enemies in later dungeons use the same sprites with a name change and a color pallet swap.
I felt as though it was a missed opportunity, for example, you could have had different evolutions of enemies like how it is in pokemon. Imagine the bean girl, turning into a beanstalk in later dungeons, with more powerful attacks. I would have also liked to have seen actual attack animations for enemies and party members alike. I understand that 1st person RPGs tend not to have this because of the POV, but it would make sense to maybe have a 3rd person view for battles, in a similar vein to games like Criminal Girls.
Speaking of Criminal Girls, Moero Crystal H has a similar system in place for fan service. You can change your party member’s costumes, and recruit new party members through the Scratch Mechanic. People gave games like Criminal Girls a hard time for its motivation mechanic, this game takes it to another level, but not as well. Scratch feels as though it was implemented last minute to make sure lewd game assets weren’t being put to waste. It feels cheap, in the sense that all you are doing is hovering over the character's erogenous zones and occasionally tapping or swiping the screen. The least they could do is turn it into an actual mini-game.
Also, the scratch mechanic is poorly implemented for the Nintendo Switch. Once you know where the zones are it’s incredibly easy to tap furiously on them and finish. There is no fun in finishing prematurely. Secondly, Scratch can’t be done in when the switch is docked. It’s incredibly difficult to successfully complete that segment. Let’s just say playing in docked mode is a flaccid experience. Because of the lack of optimization, I am put off playing this game on my TV.
The story is quite humorous, featuring a lot of jokes and tropes that anime fans may enjoy. From the classic onsen scenes, all the way to weird and wonderful hentai puns. This game has made me laugh out loud on numerous occasions. I couldn’t hold my laughter when I saw Otton for the first time, because of his character design.
On the point of character designs, I must say this game excels in that department, and I expect no less from a capable studio-like Idea Factory. I only wish that we got to see more costumes that matched the character's personalities. Believe it or not past, the game's crazy story or the fan service, these characters do have meaningful backstories, which I did want to see and experience more of.
All in all, I really did enjoy this game, and I am looking forward to future entries in this franchise. This has been one of my favorite reviews to write, because of the nature of this game, as you can tell this game doesn’t take itself to seriously and likes to have fun. And if that interests you definitely pick this game up, give it a go you won’t regret it.
Overall rating:
7.5 / 10
Pros:
+ Great Humour + Interesting plot and Characters
+ Beautiful Character Designs
+ Unique and Wonderful World Design
+ Quirky Fanservice
Cons:
- mediocre execution of scratch mechanics - repetitive, predictable and sometimes frustrating gameplay
This review covers the Nintendo Switch version of Moero Crystal H. I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to Idea Factory and EastAsiaSoft for providing me with the opportunity to play this game. Moero Crystal H is now available on Nintendo Switch.