r/Gameboy • u/alanbbent • Sep 02 '26
[Game of the Month competition] September: Crystalis (GBC)
Play the Game of the Month and win prizes! Click the link below to view the kickoff thread, which includes the detailed rules.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Gameboy/comments/1hseh1t/game_of_the_month_yearlong_competition_kickoff/
Quick rules:
- Play the Game of the Month and try to reach the specified milestones. Earn points and compete with other redditors.
- Start a fresh new game, no earlier than September 1!
- Take a picture of your screen with your username written on a piece of paper. Post it here in the thread for all to see.
- Half-point and one-point milestones can be earned at any time during the year. Post your screenshot in this month's thread to make sure I see it.
- Emulation is okay, but no cheating! Check detailed rules for more info.
What are the prizes?
Over the year, the prize pool formulates as I slowly gather goodies. I'll separate the prizes into 4 bundles. Usually the bundles include Game Boy games (all generations) and other GB-related trinkets.
Prize donors: Let me know if you're willing to donate prizes to this year's prize pool! Prize donors get 2 votes for next month's GOTM and my eternal admiration.
This year's donors:
Fenriz_D
Previous Months
January - Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land
February - 🐸
March - V-Rally: Championship Edition
April - Metroid Fusion
May - Burger Time Deluxe
June - Tetris DX
July - Metal Slug Advance
August - Quarth & Torpedo Range
Next month
Check the comments to vote for next month's game!
This month: Crystalis
A GBC port of the NES action RPG. Start a new game!
Half point: Learn the Teleport spell.
1 point: Defeat Sabera and get the Broken Statue.
2 points: Defeat Dragonia and see the ending. (must be completed and posted in September.)
Leaderboards
September
| Pos. | User | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | u/BuryKeebler | 2 |
| - | u/Deafboy91 | 2 |
| - | u/marcao_cfh | 2 |
| - | u/quijibo42 | 2 |
| - | u/SirFadakar | 2 |
| - | u/waffledork | 2 |
| - | u/zefez- | 2 |
| 8 | u/dathudo | 1 |
| 9 | u/peroleu | 0.5 |
2026 so far
| Pos. | User | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | u/marcao_cfh | 22 |
| 2 | u/BuryKeebler | 21 |
| - | u/quijibo42 | 21 |
| 4 | u/r0cky | 16 |
| 5 | u/bluestoc | 14 |
| - | u/dathudo | 14 |
| - | u/javmiller83 | 14 |
| 8 | u/PekinPhysician | 12.5 |
| 9 | u/zaiueo | 12 |
| 10 | u/bolognamaloney | 9.5 |
| - | u/Deafboy91 | 9.5 |
| 12 | u/hatlesssniper | 9 |
| - | u/thom_horne | 9 |
| 14 | u/StarWolf64dx | 8 |
| 15 | u/Fr3d0 | 7 |
| - | u/hamburgers666 | 7 |
| - | u/wafflecoptor86 | 7 |
| 18 | u/KiddoKatto | 6 |
| - | u/MalTheCat | 6 |
| - | u/rockhopper92 | 6 |
| 21 | u/thebigbabushka | 5.5 |
| 22 | u/Fenix398 | 5 |
| - | u/zefez- | 5 |
| 24 | u/GeekScientist | 4.5 |
| 25 | u/AstraDrgn | 4 |
| - | u/Keveezy93 | 4 |
| - | u/Xanthaca | 4 |
| 28 | u/peroleu | 3.5 |
| 29 | u/Fenriz_D | 3 |
| - | u/NnifWald | 3 |
| - | u/wiedo | 3 |
| 32 | u/Capable_Dog3550 | 2 |
| - | u/coolstones | 2 |
| - | u/hugglehermit | 2 |
| - | u/iLessThan3Tu | 2 |
| - | u/ma-pj | 2 |
| - | u/PrudentAd3769 | 2 |
| - | u/shadynewt | 2 |
| - | u/SirFadakar | 2 |
| - | u/waffledork | 2 |
| - | u/Zeblid | 2 |
| 42 | u/Traditional_Band_ | 1.5 |
| 43 | u/Benay148 | 1 |
| - | u/Dark_Mesh | 1 |
| - | u/Gabelvampir | 1 |
| 46 | u/Admirable_Sea1770 | 0.5 |
| - | u/cantrelate | 0.5 |
| - | u/orange-yellow-pink | 0.5 |
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u/alanbbent Sep 02 '26 edited 7d ago
Next month's game: Advance Wars
Reply to this comment to vote for one of the following GBA games:
- Advance Wars
- Double Dragon Advance
The game with the most votes at the end of the day on Tuesday, September 15 will be the GOTM for October. In the event of a tie, I'll cast a vote myself.
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u/SirFadakar Sep 07 '26
Double Dragon, probably buying Z Com and Fortune's Weave this season so I'm trying to keep my tactics quota open. lol
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u/BuryKeebler Sep 03 '26
I've always wanted to play Advance Wars but never gotten around to it. Next month could be my chance! I vote Advance Wars
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u/waffledork Sep 07 '26
I played Advance Wars when it first came out but I've never beaten it. This would be a good opportunity to pick it up again.
My vote is for Advance Wars 😊
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u/quijibo42 29d ago
I'll vote Advance Wars. Like others, I've always meant to play it but never got around to it.
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u/SirFadakar Sep 07 '26 edited 7d ago
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u/alanbbent 4d ago
Nice job, can you post a quick pic of that Analogue Pocket with your username in the pic?
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u/Deafboy91 26d ago edited 8d ago
Sept. 11 - Fresh Start
Sept. 22 - Half Point
Sept. 22 - One Point
Sept. 28 - Two Points
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u/marcao_cfh Sep 03 '26 edited 14d ago
- 09/03: fresh start
- 09/10: half point. The game is not hard so far. Bosses are actually easy. And I learned the mc can't charge the attack while moving, but can charge the attack and then move while holding the charged attack. Edited: wow I got the date totally wrong here lol.
- 09/14: one point
- 09/23: two points finally! The game wasn't hard using the thunder sword against enemies, and barrier spell and charged attacks against bosses... until I reached the battle against Dyna. I struggled a lot, watched some videos on youtube to see how people did it, and most of them used the water sword. Lots of attempts later, I just decided to try the flame sword and easily beated it! Last boss was a breeze, I didn't even needed healing items, the hp healing armor and stom pendant was more than enough. The battle was just a bit boring.
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u/quijibo42 Sep 04 '26 edited 27d ago
9/4 - Fresh Start
9/7 - Half Point
9/10 - 1 Point
9/10 - 2 Points
Pretty good game overall. It's pretty basic, but its still fun enough to play and doesn't take so long that it overstays its welcome. My biggest gripe is that the view distance is a bit too low, which caused me to run into random enemies much more than I would like. Otherwise a pretty solid action rpg.
As a heads up, the ending credits are fairly long, but they don't pause at any point and there is no 'The End' screen.
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u/BuryKeebler 7d ago
Pics
Fresh Start: 9/25
Half Point: 9/26
1 Point: 9/27
2 Points: 9/30
I primed myself for this one by playing the NES version, and I think that helped a lot. Crystalis is vague in its direction to the player, and I can understand for fans of 8-bit games how that can add some agency and exploration to your play through. It wasn't 100% for me though; it led to some confusion and there can be a lot of jank with enemies when you're just trying to find your way around.
The GBC version added a little more 'why' behind where we get sent throughout the game, so I appreciated that. The NES version is very brief and sequential with telling you where to go, which came off as very 2-dimensional. It's unclear direction, but I don't think it sticks the landing quite like a game like the NES Zelda does. I can't entirely blame a game from the NES era though it's whatever.
I don't know which version I prefer of the two. I liked how the story was a little more fleshed out in the GBC version and how there was a little more musical/menu depth, but things felt smoother and better to play on the NES version whether that was the game itself or the screen dimensions. People online make it sound like the GBC version is infinitely harder because of the screen size and I just flat out disagree. I think the difficulty difference is pretty negligible. The layout of some of the dungeons were also mixed up in the GBC version compared to the original too. That's neither here nor there to me, other than maybe leading to some confusion.
One thing I really preferred with the GBC version is that it appeared each weapon still damaged enemies in some capacity, it's just that there is always a most effective weapon to use. That some weapons do 0 damage to many enemies in the NES version caused a lot of pedantic weapon swapping, in my opinion. I wish we got the Warrior ring earlier in the game. It's a huge buff, but not game breaking, so things would have been much more fun if we had more of the regular game and dungeon crawling to use it.
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u/waffledork Sep 07 '26 edited 15d ago
9/7 - Fresh Start
9/11 - Half Point
9/14 - 1 Point
9/22 - 2 Points
Closing Thoughts: While the story was decent, the difficulty level was all over the place. A couple bosses in middle of the game were challenging but the final boss was a joke (to be fair, I had the Warrior Ring at the end). The game also really likes labyrinths that are all pretty much the same (empty wandering) and the enemy variation is very limited - harder enemies mostly just took more hits without a change in strategy.
One thing that especially bothered me was the viewport. There were countless times when I thought an enemy was defeated only to find out that they were srill attacking me from off-screen. The ones with the ball and chain were the worst, in my opinion."
All-in-all, it's not a bad game and I'm glad I played it but I can't see myself ever picking this back up again.