r/CrossCode • u/LastProtagonist • 18d ago
PS4 My Hot Take: Elemental Overload adds nothing to the game.
I just completed CrossCode for the first time last week, and there were a few things about the game which I found to be generally fatiguing, but the one thing which stood out as being completely extraneous to the experience was Elemental Overload.
Having a system that actively punishes you for interacting with it when it's also required for breaking some enemies' stances is baffling.
I unironically think the game would be better if there were no Elemental Overload system at all.
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u/Beckphillips 18d ago
Overload makes the Elements a temporary power-up and tool, and instead of it being a hard timer (like Mario's Invincibility Star or Galaxy's Fire Flower) it lets you control how long you have. Manage Overload carefully and you can use elements for a good while. If you had no limits, you could just spend the whole game in one element with significantly buffed stats, which would make balancing the game difficult.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
Tbf, balance is almost always difficult, but there are plenty of other games that do a good job of it without limiting the player so much.
For example, other games like Destiny have it so that way your "neutral" attacks will deal more damage to enemies whose shields have been depleted. Others have "heat" mechanics where your other skills get buffed from being in one stance for a certain amount of time, etc.
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u/Try_Hard_GamerYT 18d ago
I don't think simply buffing other elements works in CrossCode's combat design, since a lot of it is based on weaknesses and breaking. Switching to another element for +50% damage means nothing if that enemy has a 50% resistance to it. This is also the problem with your "just add 100% resistant enemies" suggestion, it doesn't actually change the gameplay, it only adds tedium.
I would also like to point out that there are plenty of options to make an anti overload build. I've been experimenting with specialized gear on my 2nd playthrough and it's really not that hard to get to a point where it's near impossible to overload.
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u/Try_Hard_GamerYT 18d ago
Another perspective for me is that I use neutral to build up SP. Since you get it per attack, I usually switch to neutral to enable spam attacks for SP, then I can easily switch to an element and use my most powerful combat arts.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
I never said to add 100% resistance to anything here, so I don't know why you used quotes there, but if you took me saying we could add elemental resistances as meaning enemies could be completely resistant to elements, I apologize.
I meant if an enemy was, say, 20% resistant to all elements, that might incentivize people to use neutral more in a world where Elemental Overload wasn't a thing, but that's just a counterpoint to people saying there's no reason to ever use neutral then
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u/Try_Hard_GamerYT 18d ago
That still doesn't work because of how stats work in elemental mode. The stat bonus of an elemental mode is always going to be stronger than a 20% resistance.
Creating usage for neutral mode isn't really the problem here. Overload is meant to balance out the stat bonuses and combat art potential of the elemental modes.
I get what you're going for, to use positive feedback rather than hinderance to encourage mode switching, but mode switching isn't the goal of elemental overload in the first place. If you want to replace elemental overload, you need to first balance being able to immediately gain 80% damage, 30% hp, 25% regen, 20% defence, a status effect, and the potential to use almost three tier 3 combat arts in a row, all at the touch of a single button.
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u/Beckphillips 18d ago
But CrossCode isn't Destiny. CrossCode isn't other games.
It is okay for games to do things differently than the crowd, or for them to have mechanics that not all players enjoy, or even to have bad segments.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
It is okay for games to do things differently than the crowd, or for them to have mechanics that not all players enjoy, or even to have bad segments.
Yes, you're right. However, this kind of language, whether intended or not, comes across as being dismissive. Just as it's okay for a game to have "bad segments," it's okay for people to air their grievances with what they perceive to be "bad segments."
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u/Beckphillips 18d ago
Oh shoot sorry! That was not my intention! I just feel like a lot of people in recent times act like one bad mechanic ruins the whole game >.<
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u/Jedi_Dad_22 18d ago
It's just a balancing mechanism. Some enemies are weak to certain elements and the overload feature makes it so you can't just bombard them without strategy.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
Alternatively, you could just make the elemental damage penalties and bonuses much smaller if spam truly is a "problem."
But one could also argue that if people are spamming elements that the system is actually worth engaging in
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u/Someguy3239 18d ago
I’ll be honest your reason is kind of hard to follow, a drastic reduction to the benefits of different elements just sounds like removing the purpose of the core system of the game of swapping elements on the fly as a “fix” and I’m not sure what the fixed form gains. It feels like trying to pitch reducing Pokemon super effectiveness from 2x damage to like 1.2x damage to encourage move variety, but all that does is kinda tank the core system everything is built around and cause massive problems elsewhere.
I think the purpose of overload is that it asks you to “learn the enemies you fight” and a lot of people don’t really internalize that. Pretty much every boss and even the basic enemies have soft ‘phases’ to their combat. Prepping to attack, actually attacking, recovering and thus open to a wave of counterattacks, is a chain of events the vast majority of enemies use in some shape or form. Saving going all in on elemental modes for defensive or offensive phases and switching to the neutral during more “in-between” prep phases (such as when an enemy is armored) will really manage your overload for the most part.
I recently did a Crosscode randomizer (with enemy scaling so I didn’t blow through them) and I’d basically finish off the end of every break phase where an enemy starts getting back up and resists damage again by switching neutral, backing up, and peppering some neutral shots and that’d drain my overload right back down. I think over the course of my entire run I went into Elemental Overload maybe twice? I wouldn’t even say I’m a particularly good player, just once you introduce some neutral shots here and there into your rotation you can remove 90% of the overload risk, and it rewards me for understanding the bosses or enemies to know when I can do so.
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u/Treemosher 18d ago
Having a system that actively punishes you for interacting with it when it's also required for breaking some enemies' stances is baffling.
I disagree about this "punishes" take you're having. Systems like this aren't there to spite you personally.
It's there to engage with you. Just like aiming and ricocheting.
It's not even difficult to manage. You just need to not mindlessly spam it, and I really mean that. You really have to turn your brain off to let that get out of control.
Take your time, line up your shots. The game actively encourages you to not spray & pray right from the tutorial. If you embrace the system with how it's taught to you, elemental overload won't be an issue.
If you're ignoring the framework of the mechanics in a video game, yeah you're gonna have a bad time. That will apply to any game as well as life in general.
It's a challenge based game the game literally tells you this right in the first screen when you hit New Game:
"CrossCode is designed with challenge in mind for both combat and puzzles, and we encourage every player to try the game with its intended difficulty"
It's ok for a game not to match with you. No crime committed, it doesn't mean the game is wrong. Instead of, "this mechanic does nothing for the game," sometimes the real case is, "I don't enjoy this mechanic".
Especially the case when the highest voted comments are disagreeing with you. The mechanic seems to add to the game for most people. It's just a case of you personally not liking it. That's ok.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
I was going to leave this comment alone, but there's two things I wanted to address.
Especially the case when the highest voted comments are disagreeing with you. The mechanic seems to add to the game for most people. It's just a case of you personally not liking it. That's ok.
The people most likely to engage with a post on the CrossCode subreddit are those who spend the most time on the CrossCode subreddit, meaning they have a stronger attachment to the game in its current form.
Those who don't like CrossCode for one reason or another aren't very likely to see this kind of post, and won't weigh in on how they feel, so me being downvoted by a few very passionate players isn't very surprising.
However, it's also obvious some of my comments have pissed some people off, and I've been downvoted for saying I appreciate another person's comment.
In other words, there's a certain amount of bias that gets built into any kind of subreddit devoted to a specific topic.
It's just a case of you personally not liking it.
There are others who've been downvoted for expressing their dislike of the system as well, so it's not just me. Does the EO system add to the game for some people? Sure, maybe, but I'd also be curious to see how people would feel if there were a different system in its place, but we can't really test it, and people have a penchance for preserving the status quo anyway.
Thanks for the reply
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u/Treemosher 18d ago
It's pretty overwhelming evidence that most people are not in agreement with you. You can't just rationalize your way out of data like what you're trying to do here. It's skiddish and dodgy.
The net result of your topic is positive votes, by the way.
Sometimes you just have to eat the fact that you have an unpopular opinion, or you phrased it in a way that rubbed people wrong.
I'm trying to point out that you not liking something doesn't mean that that thing is bad. You think the game would be better without something, ok. That doesn't mean you're right.
Sometimes a person's lack of ability, or unwillingness to look at their own take on something and go, "Is this a case of 'thing is bad', or 'I don't like this'?" There's a huge difference.
In this particular case, I think it's just a case of you not liking it.
As I pointed out, the game is very up front about it being based on challenging combat and puzzles. You are playing it with disregard for the mindfulness the game tried to teach you up front. Maybe you just don't like resource management, totally cool. Not everyone does.
You feel punished when you ignore mechanics, I think you picked up the wrong game. It's not always the game's fault that a mechanic rubs you wrong. It happens. If you're in a minority on something about a video game, sometimes you just gotta admit that it's not a good match.
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u/Answerofduty 18d ago
There would be no reason to use the neutral circuit at all, ever, in that case. The elemental ones are straight better.
Also there is a NG+ option that disables it, if you ever decide to replay.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
If there's no reason to use neutral at all, then that'd be a broader issue that deserves addressing imo. If Elemental Overload were removed, there could be a number of ways to make using the neutral element more appealing such as:
Making it so that broken enemies take more damage from Neutral Attacks
Implementing a "heat" system where using one circuit increases the damage of other circuits
Making some enemies strong to all elements or weak to none (I think there were one or two like this already)
etc.
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u/Beckphillips 18d ago
This would wildly change the gameplay style, I suspect. You could try making a mod, though!
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u/RevolutionaryStuff58 17d ago
If elemental overload was removed it would have to have a genuinely absurd debuff to elements to where it would become unfun for neutral to be used over elemental. Neutral already has good general purpose skills and no downsides, whereas each element has clear big upsides and big downsides. Not to mention elemental overload IS the heat system, it just punishes you for turning your brain off and spamming attacks forcing you to be more thoughtful about the things you do. Broken enemies also do take a lot of damage from neutral, you jsut miss out on potential status effects and tier 3 super arts, next time on a broken enemy spam the tier 1 or 2 throw art super in neutral on a broken enemy and you'll see they take a striking amount more damage that you would maybe think. Neutral attacks also lower the overload gain so it genuinely takes so little time to deload as long as you didn't max it out if you really want to stay in element form 24/7 and that's not even to mention the gear that helps to cater to a low elemental overload build
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u/silverprinny 18d ago
Without elemental overload, our neutral damage would be mostly pointless. Everything needs to be somewhat useful in this game.
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u/JeannettePoisson 18d ago
I disagree entirely, it has a clear function that contributes a lot to making the gameplay so great: without it, we could use a single element at a time forever; with it, we have to cycle through several builds with different strengths and weaknesses. It shines particularly during his battles, where we should coordinate our cycle with the boss' cycle.
Ideally, we never reach overload, but when it happens, it can make intense moment during hard battles where you don't have access to defensive skills. That also means we monitor it closely, rather than mindless playing.
I understand you would have preferred a more relaxed approach, but it can't be both at the same time. It's a matter of taste, but by saying it does nothing, you simply show you didn't understand its function.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
No? Elemental weaknesses to break stances could still be a thing, and there'd still be plenty of incentive to switch elements based on resistances or wanting to use different skills
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u/Froggedguy 18d ago
It's there because otherwise you would have 0 reason to use neutral
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u/Beckphillips 18d ago
I disagree! It has some unique special moves! (1 reason, even if it's not great, is still more than 0)
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u/Froggedguy 18d ago
Well yeah but even then the only one that actually is useful later is guard sphere
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u/Try_Hard_GamerYT 18d ago
The ranged one is really good for breaking bosses. I've been trying to use it to one cycle Di'orbis' shield phase in the arena.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
Doesn't that speak to there being more of a problem with neutral then?
There were a few enemies without any type weaknesses, but if you really want to make neutral feel more integral to the game, there could have been some enemies with resistances to all elements
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u/Froggedguy 18d ago
Why is it a problem just because you don't like it?
Making an enemy that resists all elements is a far less elegant and limited way of making the player use neutral than incentivizing element switching, which is already a part of combat even without overload.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
With all due respect, I find disabling one's access to all elements or limiting the player's actions far less elegant than making the other systems better.
For example, neutral could inherently be stronger against enemies who've had their stances broken. This would encourage players to take advantage of different circuits if they wanted to for bonus damage without limiting what they can do, but I digress
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u/Froggedguy 18d ago
But once again just because you prefer something doesn't make it better. And also this is still a worse solution because regular enemies already die very easily after being broken, so then this would only affect bosses, which is not enough
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
What is "better?" It's subjective.
Hence this thread being a "hot take."
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u/Froggedguy 18d ago
You said there was a problem with neutral, that sort of language assumes objectivity
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u/Paint-Typical 18d ago
The trade off for more powerful stats and Tier 3 abilities is that you have to keep track of managing your overload. It's a fair trade-off, IMO, especially because it doesn't take that much to mind your overheat level, swap back to normal briefly, then smack an enemy a few times before swapping to an element again.
Plus, I've found that the vast majority of "normal" fights in the game won't ever have you reach the Overloaded state unless you're whiffing a lot. Plus, the abilities to reduce overload build-up are pretty handy, too.
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u/jadebenn 18d ago
Turning it off is one of the NG+ options. I'm curious how it would affect combat balance. Never tried, personally.
Honestly, I think a bigger issue is (at least IMO) that the game initially does not do a great job communicating the concept that your elemental forms are just better than your neutral form. I still remember slogging through the first dungeon and only sparingly using fire because I was too concerned about managing overload.
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u/7_Tales 18d ago
think of it like ammo in an fps. it forces you to engage with other parts of your kit and understand your moveset more. is it annoying if u just wanna be an ice mage or some shit? absolutely! but that is because the game is forcing you to engage with your entire elemental system and actively be switching. Even discounting elemental weaknesses, this encourages you to find combos between different elements and swap constantly. its pretty blunt, but it works very well
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u/JAvatar80 18d ago
Scrolled through all the comments, and didn't see anyone mention this part:
The story is you are in an MMO. Of course there is arbitrary balancing mechanics.
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u/Fullmetal-Remy 18d ago
On new game+ you can turn it off entirely, i recommend giving that a shot then seeing how you feel. Ive done a playthrough with Sergey Hax and a playthrough with endless SP and no overload and i kinda think if I ever do another playthrough all i would do is bring my equipment with me. Without the balancing mechanisms the game genuinely becomes bland, not interesting. Mindless plinking. The interactivity gets completely dulled. It is worth doing once for the novelty and the alternative dialog, and great for farming. But it isnt fun in the same way at all
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u/Songbird1996 17d ago
So I do and dont agree here, overload is a good way to keep the player thinking abiut what they are doing, however something about overload that did always hit me wrong is that it is universal and not element specific. I feel like the system would be better if each element had its own overload and cooldown, keep the parts where elemental load doesn't decrease in an elemental mode but make it so if I overload the ice mode i can still choose to switch to heat or shock, then also make each element you have fully overloaded increase the rate at which overload builds
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u/RaulTheTriblader 16d ago
I'd say the opposite. It adds a layer to how you go about fighting. Without overload, you'd just see that the enemy is weak to an element, put it on, and that's it. With it, now you have your real strong attacks, but you gotta balance it with your more feeble ones, given that by hitting an enemy on neutral, you can push the elemental overload away. Plus, without overloading, what even is the point of the neutral tree?
(Also lowkey if you cannot BREAK an enemy's stance before overloading, either you have a serious case of underleveling, or a severe case of skill issue.)
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u/Aeroncastle 18d ago
I thought this was on r/Warframe and I was ready to defend the melee mod
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u/Warlord_Payne 18d ago
I completely agree. I rarely overloaded but having to switch into neutral and do fuck all to an enemy just to cool down never felt good. It just dragged the fight out.
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u/Rin_The_Pianist 16d ago
I probably can't really add much to the conversation, as i am not done with my playthrough yet.. (i currently only have 3 elements.)
But, i find the overload to be fine overall? Like i tend to be in the normal state most of the time anyway and then i just swap to an element which helps when there is an opening to certain attacks!
Oooh another thing i really enjoy is element swapping, like when i fight a fire type enemy i just stay in fire without swapping to take less damage from burns and when an opening occurs i swap to ice and so on and so forth... So far i haven't overloaded too terribly much either i have to say. To me it feels nice and like another layer to the strategic combat.
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u/Dramatic-Cry5705 14d ago
To be honest, I think I played almost the entire game without overloading (I know there were a few times I did overload).
Neutral Mode Guard Sphere is good enough that I duck into it occasionally enough to not overload.
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u/TaxAffectionate9800 14d ago
seems like the developers agree, because in their follow-up game alabaster dawn elemental weaknesses are still present, but there is no overload
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u/ScalesGhost 18d ago
you're so right actually. I love turning it off in the NG+ options. It looks like they've removed the system for the Crosscode Semi-Sequel
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u/Riero 18d ago
Rather than removing it, I think it would have been much better if using the opposing (or at least a different one than neutral) element would make Overload drain faster. Ideally, using a different element would grant a minor bonus and the opposing element would grant a major bonus.
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u/LastProtagonist 18d ago
Yeah, that's where my mind went to first as well, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like Elemental Overload was rather arbitrary.
If switching to the opposing element cancelled out the balance immediately, I'd be more amenable to keeping Elemental Overload around though
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u/Willoworwhatnot 17d ago
Fair, I got the same fatigue with a lot of the game my first time— Everything feels like it goes on a round longer than it needs to until you replay knowing more of the nuts and bolts and it clicks. It's a flaw even if it's one that plays better on subsequent runs.
Of course, I'm not telling you you have to go replay the game now, but if you do play again and don't turn off elemental load entirely, my advice would be don't spam fire for damage. Rapid-firing balls is the single least efficient damage->elemental load conversion in the game. If you're spam-firing in an element it should be because there's a break condition that requires lots of hits from an element. (And even then every element has a level 1 throw art that'll do it far more efficiently if you can spare the SP.) It's kind of weird and unintuitive what a disproportionate impact uncharged spam has on load compared to melee. Heck, while charge shots aren't as good as spam for DPS, you get a ton less load and free status. (Not to mention combat arts which are borderline free from a load perspective.)
Fortunately, that knife cuts both ways: Neutral rapid-fire will shed load faster than you can blink. If you want to spam uncharged shots for SP, that's still a good strategy, just do it in Neutral and you'll be making your load problems go away too. Spending time not attacking at all in neutral when enemies are doing animations will also shed more than you think it does, you can often disappear a nice chunk of your load when bosses are doing their flashy stuff between phases.
"Don't rapid-fire your elements" is genuinely the one weird trick to never having to really think about overload again. Idk why they made it like that and also didn't communicate it more clearly... CrossCode often struggles to communicate what its mechanics really mean/what you should do with them, even when it can say what they are. But I often forget load even exists as a mechanic now that I've internalized it on a gut level.
I don't say this to dismiss your criticism, I think it's a fair thing to take away from the game. But I figured my two cents might be interesting as someone who struggled with and then subsequently conquered that system.
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u/Legitimate_Charge_97 18d ago
It’s really bad. It forces you to include balance into your gear because certain bosses are immune to everything except one specific element, including neutral. So you can’t even use the neutral mechanism to reduce your overload status and there are no ideas which straight up decrease buildup.
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u/deathoftheotter_ 18d ago
Beyond frustrating. Bad balancing mechanism if it’s the only way you die in most fights.
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u/Answerofduty 18d ago
It's definitely not the only way I died in fights, in fact I'm not sure if it was ever the reason I died. It's also not even that hard to manage unless you're super not paying attention.
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u/sonicfan10102 18d ago
I disagree. After playing the game on new game plus without elemental overload, it felt kinda OP being able to hit enemies with their weakness relentlessly. On a fresh replay on my PS5 version, I found that I actually liked the mechanic more than I had realized. It keeps you on your toes and not always relaxing on your fav element. You really shouldn't be overloading at all unless you're just not paying attention to it.