Something new and strange has happened in the world of One Credit Reviews. I played a game at random, as per usual, but I ended up playing an arcade game that doesn't suck, and is, in fact, quite fun to play. It's actually a shame I had to stop after only one quarter. What you get for that quarter is a hell of a lot of value. Even if this game is 50 cents, it's still quite some value. If it costs a dollar, you are in one of the worst arcades imaginable.

The game being fun is kind of a problem though. It's a lot easier to tear things down than to find the reasons a game is enjoyable. That means I actually have to put more effort into this article. The jokes aren't writing themselves today. This is the first time I have done a One Credit Review and been happy afterwards. This game is surprisingly epic. It's a beat-em-up, it's an RPG, it's Gradius too.

The Crystal of Kings is an arcade game from 2001 though. An arcade cabinet for a sidescrolling beat-em-up in 2001. This game feels like an anomaly. I already played through two Metal Gears at this point. I played Super Mario 64 five years before this game came out! I'm having an existential crisis about the release date of this game. Was it delayed for ten years? Did they lose the cabinets when a warehouse collapsed in on itself? None of these questions were answered by adding one credit to The Crystal Kings. In consideration of the game itself, let's just say wizards did it.

The game looks like an anomaly too. The animated clay models make some enemies pop and animate in a distinctly mid to late 90's arcade style. It holds up much better than the polygon driven games of the day, that's for sure. The graphics most closely resemble Primal Rage from the mid 90s.

As I've mentioned in previous articles, I play these games through MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulation), which means that there can be some issues that would not occur if I were able to hunt down these rare arcade machines and fire them up. This game has sound issues. This is immediately noticeable by the complete lack of sound during the introduction screen. It's too bad, because this isn't a simple intro, this is an entire pamphlet about why you are one of the crystal kings in The Crystal of Kings on the search for crystals. It'll all be explained in this pamphlet here, let's get started.

God dipped out, you're on your own. Here's some world ending garbage he got bored of.

Oh my god these words are too big. Oh no, god is gone what do I do now!?

See, this is what I hate about fiction. "at one time." You made up this story! You know the time! Just pick a time, geez! Now for my beef with the rest of the sentence. It gives me too many questions. Is it important that this is "the most prosperous land?" How and why did the crystal become stained with an "evil ebony?" It sounds like your least favorite coworker spilled ink all over your fancy paperweight.

Wait, so Gary in accounting fucked up my paperweight, then stole it and trademarked it as "The Crystal of the Dark Kingdom?" Is this a fucking NFT thing? Did you make my paperweight an NFT!?”

Crystals, crystals, the magical fruit…

Hey, this crystal isn't stained with evil ebony! What are trying to pull?

No wait, do over, I have more…

Fantastic work boy. You fetched the dark crystal!

Dammit boy, drop it! Drop that reality-shattering crystal before I have to bop you on the nose!

Hey boss, you need to check the wording on your speeches. Are these marching orders or a mission statement?

Okay, that makes more sense, let's roll out boys! Sorry, goblins. Gobloys.

So I guess that whole part was from the villian’s perspective, or at least, an evil narrator's perspective. Now we let’s here it from the heroes!

Gah! I wasn't too bothered by the old graphics until I saw an actual rendered face. There was a time when the uncanny valley was the goal of computer graphics. "Cocco!! Listen well! Everyone else, stop snickering!"

"All these big words again. I know you're like, the king, probably, and I'm but a humble soldier, you got to dumb it down a little man, sir, sire. …also, is the "Crystal of Estorea" the same as the "Crystal of Darkness?"

Alright I have a dictionary now. You said 'pilfered' which means to steal a small amount of things or stealing things of relatively little value. I thought the crystals were like, the most valuable thing in the world, and that there are only a few of them. Are you just using big words to sound more kingly? No, it's not embarassing. I know people expect a lot out of you. You don't have to try so hard though, just be yourself and we’ll understand."

Finally, it's our heroes, the young, smooth, well proportioned heroes of the world.

Oh and this quiet bald guy. Does he already have a crystal?!

No prob Cocco, you get a crystal too! Now go fetch the Crystal of Darkness boy, go get it!

So everyone in the party has a crystal? Then I think the bad guy has at least two crystals. I've seen green, red, and purple. I assume the purple one is the Crystal of Darkness. But they said the Crystal of Darkness was ebony. Was that a metaphor? Like it was tainted with evil, not that it actually changed color? How did this all get so complicated!? Whatever, I just have to lead the Comrades of the Crystals and gather any capital C 'Crystals' we can find. Yep, just Cocco and the CoCs, out to save the world.

I haven't even inserted a coin yet!

Let's not beat around the bush. I murdered SO MANY innocent civilians attempting to flee all the magical chaos. Too bad that lead them straight to me.

Right from the moment I have any control, innocents are being beaten to death. I assumed the person standing in the bottom left was just a statue since there are two identical NPCs in an identical pose on each side of the door. Their acting like statues! It's not until I played back the footage and noticed the crying child amid all the mayhem that I had realized my horrible, horrible mistake. I just created the person who's only goal in life is to find the source of magic and destroy it, to avenge his family and town against those murderous magic users who act like gods.

That was only my first horrible, horrible mistake. Plenty more to come. Like the soldier I immediately take down as he was running from the monsters in fear. Too bad son, turns out the humans are the real monsters.

To be fair, to me, an indiscriminate murderer, these towsnfolk are pathetic. The malnourished and feable mother I can understand, but how does this armored up soldier go down in one hit? If man's so weak, something was going to kill him, It just happened to be me.

(Also, to be fair, I thought this guy was already dead! I won't let his bread go to waste though.)

You would think I had learned my lesson very quickly, but instead, I very quickly create another orphan. It's not my fault, that elderly woman and her young child ran up on me like a cheetah! I acted on pure instinct. It's a war, lady! Try to be a little less intense the next time you're running for your life.

No I'm not done yet. The worst one of all came when I discovered my magic powers. I learned of them when I magically destroyed a woman and her son seen it with his own eyes. Turns out she was escaping from a hideous, elephant skull having troll. She technically escaped. I'm sure all these orphans that faded off are all in their secret clubhouse planning my death. I bet they would be riding bicycles and wearing baseball caps too if those had been invented already.

To. Be. Fair. I feel bad emotionally for what I've done, but the gameplay itself heartily rewards indiscriminate murder. Unlike most games that penalize you for hurting civilians, this game rewards you points, and the innocent villagers even drop health and bonuses. There really are no gods here.

Now that the villagers are taken care of, I can focus in on the real enemy, the enemy. Let's start with this big troll. This is one lovable troll I think. I'm a fan of the giant human with an elephant skull design. Also incorporating some elephant-like attributes like the trunk-turned-crystal, the tusks, and them big Dumbo ears. All wrapped up in those Donkey Kong limb proportions. How can you not want a plush of this ugly monstrosity?

(He's gonna be so tuckered out after this battle)

There are also the four legged skeletons roaming around, but the enemy is animated like it's a friendly, lost dog. They even stand around panting like they’ve just been frolicking about at the skeleton dog park. Why are these enemies appear so non-threatening upon closer inspection? I thought this was a straightforward game at first, but now I'm not so sure. There are a lot of things that don't quite jibe with the idea of a pure evil army of darkness. If you look at this footage, you will also see unarmed goblins named March Drummer, and Ensign Bearer. This war clearly has rules of engagement and the humans have disregarded all of them. If anything, this human town was probably built on an ancient orc burial ground.

Only in medieval western fantasy are elephants considered fantastical and exotic. Everyone else just sees a big boring elephant like we see all the time. The real star of the show is the archer goblin up top. He is having the BEST time. I was going to give this goblin a backstory, but fuck that, just dance! You don't need no reason to dance.

The elephant went down, but I'm happy to say that the goblin riders escaped to party on another day. That felt less like an intense boss fight and more like wrangling some drunk college kids that broke into a zoo while trying to re-enact The Hangover..

I also found another crystal, but I don't think this is the capital C kind. It is pink and not round. Looks more like a rupee. It restored my energy but no further explanation is given. Time for stage two.

There is some deer. I didn't think to kill them. I've lost my evil edge so fast. There is a dragonfly with a samurai sword! REPEAT. Well, I won't repeat, but get a load of this guy! I think it would be very difficult for a bug with those wings to carry anything, so just having the sword is impressive to me.

Unfortunately I think hovering in the air doesn't give you the best momentum to threateningly swing a sword. Also, you're a giant bug! That's enough. It's a good look, I know you are into anime right now, but the sword is too much.

I'm overdoing it too. This was the funnest part of my short playthrough. I gathered a couple of fairies, that work as back up ammunition just like the "Option" upgrades in Gradius. Out here with my fairies, dropping bombs and stacking up that MP. Now that I got a posse, I have to really go HAM to impress my crew.

A giant lightning genie ought to show who means business. Death business. Your death.

But it all came to an end once I got stabbed by an angry fish man. Wait, it's actually a lizard man… who jumped up out of a river? Should have called him a salamander man. Just say ‘salamander man’ out loud, it feels great.

Well now I'm dead, destroyed by my own hubris, and also by being speared through the chest for attacking the lizard people's habitat with bomb dropping magic fairies.

Everything has been great during the gameplay portion of the game, and that story happened too. The final test comes with the insertion of two letters. A, okay, that worked. R? That R is incomprehensible. I had to deduce it was an R by making sure it was between the 'Q' and 'S' or else I would have looked elsewhere for my 'R' shaped needs. We got a blank space, though, so no need to ruin my initials. Even better, a period. Even better, an exclamation point!

This game will definitely be replayed, especially once I can get a second player in on this action. It has a surprising amount of heart for what appeared to be a generic fantasy beat-em-up. I want a plush of that troll! What do you mean there's no market for The Crystal of Kings merchandise? Just craving some Comrades of the Crystals is all I'm saying.