Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time

Also playable on the Wii, Echoes of Time resumed but didn't quite explore Ring of Fates' formula, instead preferring to smooth out the controls and revise a few mechanics. Their party system - for example, dropped the established characters and returned to the more flexible debut, fully adopting its character creator/selection (whereas RoF saved it for multiplayer) along with the recruitable, blank canvas allies of SaGa, or perhaps even from contemporaries like Etrian Odyssey. That change - in turn, led to another case of give and take: Seeing as they would conflict with such a moldable party, the unit-exclusive tools of before were demoted to handling optional loot, and the dose of elemental puzzles (first expanded by its predecessor) and action-adventure fundamentals (e.g. levers, movable blocks, floor switches, keys, etc.) was further increased to compensate. As a result, these dungeons gain in convenience and complexity what they lose in originality. Even if the story is as cliched and illogical as ever, the RPG aspects are still mostly forgettable, and fits of hack 'n' slash mashing continue to disrupt gameplay, this remains the more focused and accomplished of the two DS titles.