Entering the thrilling Ghibli-esque world of Ni No Kuni: Cross Worlds, you’ll find numerous changes in this title that you wouldn’t understand or recognize if you haven’t played the previous installments. With a total of six different titles – but only two considered main items and the rest of mobile games, many were shocked to find that the latest game would be mobile first, PC and console second. And not only that, but being run by a new developer.
Despite that, however, the world of Ni No Kuni is still largely intact. Some differences are due to the world changing, while others are due to the general structure of the game. While it’s normal for a series to adapt and change over time for a new market, Cross Worlds has by far the most in the entire series.
10 Welcome Back Evermore
After the attempted murder at the start of Ni No Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom, Evan decides he’s going to build a new kingdom. As the game progresses, Evan learns about the cruelties of Goldpaw, his neighbor, and how to become a true king.
Only fans of the original series will know that Evermore was founded this way and wasn’t originally a hub for everyone to travel to, like in Cross Worlds. It seems that Evan’s desire to have Evermore as a unifying front for everyone around the world has been fulfilled, as Evermore is open to everyone equally.
9 Well-known hack and slash
One of the most important aspects of Ni No Kuni is its combat system, which has caused controversy in the past due to its shift from one title to another. The original game had some sort of Pokemon style where you would use familiars to fight for you. In Ni No Kuni 2, a more in-depth combat system replaced the familiars.
On the other hand, Cross Worlds takes a different approach and uses both systems. Some of you will enjoy using acquaintances again, while attacking with an exciting combat system.
8 Descendant of a king
When you start Cross Worlds, you have to kill some monsters in the sewers of the Evermore kingdom. In these sewers you will meet the main enemies of the game, a cloaked bunch of evil criminals who kidnap Lucilion Pettiwhisker Tildrum – the current King of Evermore.
This name should spark some interest if you’ve played the previous game. After you rescue Lucilion, he tells you that he is the current King of Evermore, even though he is young and inexperienced. Based on his name, you can infer that he is a direct descendant of Evan Pittiwhisker Tildrum, the first king of Evermore.
7 Competitive Higgles
If you played Ni No Kuni 2, you would probably remember the Higgledies. These little creatures were a replacement for the familiars in the previous game. They work in a similar way, except you can unlock new Higgledies by finding them around the world. You can switch them in and out of battle to perform various tasks such as heal, regenerate MP, and shield your party.
In Cross Worlds, however, Higgledies plays a backseat role. They are used later in the story as plot elements, when talking to the fairies, and as a target to collect when playing competitive team battles.
6 Ghibli art style
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As many fans of the series will know, the Japanese studio Level-5 were the original developers Ni No Kuni. For Cross Worlds, however, Level-5 decided to let South Korean mobile specialist Netmarble take over.
But to impress Netmarble, they had to try and replicate the Ghibli art style that the games series had held for years. While Cross Worlds replicates the art style well, you may not realize that it is Ghibli-inspired because of its mobile-focused 3D art style.
5 Quick Solutions Messages
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Swift Solutions is back again with more side missions, and if you’ve played the previous games, you’ll remember this store chain was in every city. It offered exciting high quality rewards that would make the game easier and more fun to play. Unfortunately, in Cross Worlds, Swift Solutions has been stripped of many of the things that made it great.
Initially, Swift Solutions offered you errands and bounties to complete, in return she earned Merit Rewards. While groceries are still available in Cross Worlds, bounties are left to another NPC, which exclusively offers mini boss hunts. The messages are mostly kill requests that provide XP and basic necessities, leaving Swift Solutions pretty useless unless you get a gacha-rare message.
4 New automatic battles
In Ni No Kuni: Cross Worlds, one of the major changes is the move to mobile-centric gameplay. As a result, many of the things you liked in the previous games have been removed or adapted to suit a mobile audience. One is manually fighting monsters.
While the option to manually fight still exists, doing so by disabling the auto-battle feature is pointless if you want to realistically progress through the game. Everything is automated from you and your monsters attacking to having an AI idle mode to craft EXP and loot for you while offline.
3 New puzzles
One of the more interesting things you’ll probably notice is the absence of challenging puzzles. In Ni No Kuni 2, there were parts of the game where you had to face trials, and to beat them you had to complete some challenging puzzles to prove that you were ready to become the king.
To replace the puzzling trials, they brought in Tetro puzzles. To complete these you’ll need to level up your character to unlock them, grind for resources to pull gacha puzzle pieces and then put them together like a jigsaw puzzle. While these may not be as shocking as in the previous title, they are a way to make your character more powerful.
2 Open world exploration
The most important and most noticeable change is the open world. In the previous entries, you could roam freely and fight monsters in encounter-like situations. There were even boats that you could use to cross the ocean and visit new areas.
However, the open world formula is severely limited in Cross Worlds. There are open areas on the map, but they limit you in terms of where you can go and what you can find. Most you will find are chests and monuments to get power and items.
1 Magic Story Formula
Due to the video game’s Ghibli-esque feel and fantasy-like setting, tons of magic is explored in the stories from the previous entry. It is a parallel world that you are transported to, like a Japanese isekai. Many of you loved this concept and it became extremely popular.
On the other hand, Cross Worlds has taken a different path, with virtual reality. The story follows characters who dive deep into virtual reality, and the parallel world is just a game where you get stuck or are transported to. The magical world with hundreds of years of history was suddenly turned upside down.
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