WARNING: "CRYSTAL CLEAR" IS GLITCHED

[SpaceCoresDad]

I know practically nobody is playing this game anymore, and the last post on these forums was years ago, but for future generations on PSNP: please hear my words and don't get forced to play the whole thing over again.

If you're following a normal collectible guide, you should have gotten all of the crystals up to chapter 6.5. You'll find your last two crystals in their cages right next to a dragon skeleton and an obelisk. You'll know you're in the right place because the main characters will talk about chanting while they slide through the wall. 

 

DO NOT COLLECT THESE LAST TWO CRYSTALS YET.

As far as I can tell, the PS3 version differs from the Xbox version in that you actually need all 132 crystals to get the trophy, where as in the Xbox version you only needed to collect the 71 in the cages. The rest of them are made up of the shards of crystals that are dropped by enemies, or hidden inside the small blue vases. These are random. From what I can gather, the game checks how many crystals you have, then allows the shards to drop up to a certain point depending on the chapter. The intention of this is to make it so you aren't incredibly overpowered by the time you get just a couple chapters in from being lucky with enemy drops, but it's also the same mechanic that causes this glitch.

Once all of the crystals in the cages are collected, no more shards will drop, ever. This means you MUST have 130 crystals (you can check by pressing select and scrolling over to your stats) before you collect these final two in 6.5. Otherwise, you will not be able to get enough and you will be completely screwed. You can still get the death stone, but just walk straight past the crystals and go forward to complete the game. You might get the last few shards to bring you up to 130 in the next room anyway, but just play it safe and go through the last bit of the game. Once you've beaten it, and you are ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN you have 130 crystals, use chapter select to go back to 6.5 and collect your final two crystals. This should safely get you the trophy.

IF YOU ARE GLITCHED the only option is to completely delete your save and game data, re-install the game all over again, and complete it all over again. Don't despair too much! Just complete everything else first so you don't have to collect the gold, death stones, or prisoners again, then delete your data and speedrun it while only collecting the crystals this time. The game is a lot shorter when you already know the solutions to all the puzzles and how to play the game effectively. Just remember to complete the game first, then come back to get these last two crystals.

If you can't get to 130 but you aren't finding any more shards, that means you missed some of the caged crystals somewhere. I recommend marking these off somehow on a guide to make sure you've gotten everything, because the game doesn't tell you where you've missed anything.

I hope this helps. I was just about crushed when this happened to me, and I didn't see anything about it on these forums. Please heed my words: it'll make your runthrough much less stressful.

[balu2424]

Thank you for this information. I still have to play this game and I will pay attention to your advice. 

By the way, which guide is useful or which one have you used?

[shadowhood1111]

Shit I never completed this game cause I never came across a good guide. This was over 4 years ago so who knows if one got made.

[SpaceCoresDad]

@balu2424 @shadowhood1111

As with most older games, playstationtrophies is generally the place to go. There's a really good collectible guide linked there that I used. Didn't miss a single thing except when I got glitched, but if you follow what I've said here, you should be fine.

[balu2424]

On 6/6/2020 at 9:06 AM, SpaceCoresDad said:

@balu2424 @shadowhood1111

As with most older games, playstationtrophies is generally the place to go. There's a really good collectible guide linked there that I used. Didn't miss a single thing except when I got glitched, but if you follow what I've said here, you should be fine.

Ok. I will try it. Thanks. 

[dieselmanchild]

Hi Space! ?

 

I remember seeing you playing this game awhile back. Since I just picked up a copy myself recently, I’ve been doing some research and reading up on the trophy information. So thank you so much for posting this mate.

 

I’m very grateful to people like you who go out of their way to post updates and findings for these really old/dead games. A lot of times the guides for obscure games like this are outdated, or unaware of crucial information like this, and warnings like this have saved me quite a few times!

 

Appreciate it man. How was the game anyhow?

[SpaceCoresDad]

9 hours ago, dieselmanchild said:

I’m very grateful to people like you who go out of their way to post updates and findings for these really old/dead games. A lot of times the guides for obscure games like this are outdated, or unaware of crucial information like this, and warnings like this have saved me quite a few times!

 

Appreciate it man. How was the game anyhow?

Glad I could help! This info is on the .org forums, but I know a lot of people don't go there these days so I wanted to spread the word. To answer your question, the game is very average. It's certainly not bad, but it's kinda generic and leaves a lot to be desired in lots of areas. I wouldn't say I recommend it, but I wouldn't say to stay away either. Decent platinum too if you can avoid the glitch.

[Kratos276]

Currently stuck at 128 crystals and no shards are dropping. I left the final 2 crystals alone and followed a guide for the others and I'm fairly sure I didn't miss any others. Really don't want to play the game again.

[SpaceCoresDad]

4 hours ago, Kratos276 said:

Currently stuck at 128 crystals and no shards are dropping. I left the final 2 crystals alone and followed a guide for the others and I'm fairly sure I didn't miss any others. Really don't want to play the game again.

 

It's more than likely you missed a couple shards in the cages, because the shards only stop dropping at 130. I believe if you check level select it tells you if they're there? If not I don't really have a clue. 

[Kratos276]

9 hours ago, SpaceCoresDad said:

 

It's more than likely you missed a couple shards in the cages, because the shards only stop dropping at 130. I believe if you check level select it tells you if they're there? If not I don't really have a clue. 

Sadly it doesn't on level select. I'll just do a quick run through each level I suppose. Thanks for the help! I think my biggest concern now is going to be getting all the gold for the crucible stuff since the servers are down.

[SpaceCoresDad]

15 hours ago, Kratos276 said:

I think my biggest concern now is going to be getting all the gold for the crucible stuff since the servers are down.

Best of luck! This game is really annoying with its collectibles, but thankfully it's also not very long. I've heard a lot of people miss the first one when you enter the town in chapter 1? And potentially something in the prologue? Just places to look. The gold is barely an issue though, there's setups you can find on youtube that make it trivial to get in about an hour.

[dieselmanchild]

@SpaceCoresDad Thanks again for this thread homie. I just popped ‘Crystal Clear’ and avoided the glitch thanks to you.

 

There are enough combat sequences in the game that you should have almost 130 crystals by the time you reach 6.5, but since the nature of the crystal drops from enemies and vases seem to be completely random, there’s a moderate chance this glitch could happen to anybody if they’re not paying attention to how many crystals they have collected up until that point. You could be short merely 2 or 3 crystal pieces and have to do a whole other playthrough if you are unfortunate enough to get the glitch.