Chrono Odyssey's character creation is its strongest foot forward

Earlier this month, I got to sample a slice of Chrono Odyssey, Kakao Games' upcoming action MMORPG with a Souls-like flavor. It laid out the welcoming carpet with its biggest flex feature: the character creation system.

Now, those familiar with the average Korean MMO will read it as a Captain Obvious signaling — they are always a bit ahead of the western counterparts in the hero-sculpting department.

But Chrono Odyssey pushes the envelope even further than its contemporaries in character creation. Although I wasn't really excited about the rest of the game (bear in mind this is a very early playtest product), this real opening act has positively wowed me.

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Chrono Odyssey character creation mixes Oblivion's freedom of range with Dragon's Dogma details

I spent exactly as long as I should have with this (Image via Kakao Games)

Chrono Odyssey character creation has it all: two sliders on lateral cheekbones, three sliders that determine the shape of nostrils, and a dedicated nasolabial angle meter for your mouth. Every specific facial part has multiple categories, and then multiple sliders and morph graphs to fine-tune it.

Frankly, it's probably too many morph graphs. I spent over an hour, almost a quarter of my total time with the playtest, just playing around with how things shake out.

It still has to be emphasized: detailed character creations have always been a strong suit with Korean MMOs. It's usually a meter from fabulous to foxy, with some little coterie tattoos and battle-marks thrown into the mix. With Chrono Odyssey, it's the agency to make an abomination instead of someone conventionally attractive.

For those wondering: no, there are no genitalia sliders, unfortunately. Every other usual suspect is there, though. It reminded me most of Dragon's Dogma, wherein you can make your character inhabit any plane of existence from a mountain dwarf to a Slender Man lookalike. That's just as well, because there are no races — neither merfolk nor lizard-people.

There seems to be no functional differences, either. Your character's hitbox probably doesn't get any smaller. Not that it needs to, because your battle stance is so hunched-over that a lot of monster swipes go over your head.

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My (very brief) hands-on experience with Chrono Odyssey

It's pretty obvious what Kakao Games is trying to achieve (Image via Kakao Games)

How was the rest of the game, beyond this curtain? My feelings are mixed. I tried the ye olde greatsword-wielding archetype. The melee combat feels punchy in the actual moment-to-moment gameplay, but very perplexing in general encounter design.

The developers have drawn clear inspirations from the Souls-like genre, and while a well-intentioned direction in an MMO, it felt poorly executed. Namely, ganky, aggressive enemies and poor tuning on attack timing and telegraphing. In hindsight, I might have enjoyed it more on a ranged class (although you can supposedly use any of its weapon types on any class).

There's a parry system, but it's highly unclear where the parry window is. The melee skills feel so-so, and not very playstyle-altering — I'd rather go with the one-two swing with my big hunk of iron. Worst of all, there's an open world that feels ambitiously grand, but it guided me into dereliction and boredom.

In my 4-hour attempt at the first few "Epic" quests in Chrono Odyssey, I see the foundations of a solid, fun real-time combat game shine through. But these occasions were very brief islands in a sea of jank.

I'll also have to admit I couldn't sample a lot of its New World-esque life skills and a seemingly bountiful gathering/crafting system, because after I beat out its first solo-mini-dungeon boss encounter, my game started stuttering to the point of becoming unplayable.

Between this and the grainy FSR Upscaling I was locked into, I chose to call it a day. With the certain intent to return another day, that is, the game certainly has some potential gated behind a few months of polish. After all, I wouldn't want to see such a laboriously detailed character creator go to waste.

For those interested, Chrono Odyssey is about to have another playtest starting June 20.

Meanwhile, stay tuned for more MMO news and updates on Sportskeeda.