Cyber Crush 2069 is a Match-Three type game set in a high tech dystopian future. We play as a cybernetics expert that finds himself embroiled with all types of dangerous situations running his underground workshop. The plot kicks off with a new police officer actually enforcing the law against a powerful street gang and soon getting a taste as to how things truly work in this city. This is where we are introduced to a tutorial to get acquainted with the gameplay before being left to our own devices. Unlike most match-three titles, you can move a piece anywhere as long as it is either directly horizontal or vertical of its original position. Think of a 2D Rubix Cube and you’ll get a good idea of how it functions.
Whatever the situation you find yourself in, you will always only have 20 moves to meet the required score or end up failing the match. It has multiple difficulty modes, but for the life of me, I can not find any difference between them. This will be a moderately difficult title to get through. Even the “Fap” difficulty will have you contemplating each move. You can unlock all of the hentai CGs and ambitions at any time, though if you want to get them the legit way, be prepared to work for them. Ideally, you do not want to be matching just three similar icons together. That will net you a negligible amount of points. Learning how to set up the board to be able to match four or more is borderline required unless you get lucky on what icon spawns and their location.
There are five girls scattered throughout the city that you will meet and eventually try to charm. Each have their own stories to experience, as well as likes and preferences. The icons on the board represent different emotions, such as yellow being Ferocious and green being Romantic. Learning which they prefer is key to raking in the big points to win, and just matching any icons at random is unlikely to end well. One thing all girls have in common is their dislike of the black hole looking Error icon. Matching those together will massively drain from your gathered score, making it very important to think before randomly moving pieces. If you are unlucky, the board will start off with a ton of them. In those cases, it is best to prioritize matching the capsule looking icon to gain Energy. You’ll need at least six Energy points before being able to use your starting Item to clear the board of all Errors.
Aside from the Errors and Energy capsules, there is one other icon that doesn’t represent an emotion that gains you points. That is the heart-shaped Harmony icons. These work more like multipliers to increase your score any time you match other symbols. Getting a high Harmony level earlier on can be just as vital as pure luck or skill. I briefly mentioned Items. The first one is on the house and incredibly useful the entire game. To get more of these you will have to work odd jobs in exchange for resources and have to craft them yourself. Investing time in doing this and exploring your options can easily turn an unavoidable loss into a victory. As an example, one craftable item gives you an extra move for every two Errors on the board. That can be quite the combo when matched with your starter item that clears the board of all Errors. Using any item costs Energy, however. You will need to match the capsules to be able to use them and gauge the best times to activate items.
Each item can only be used once a match, but will return to your inventory afterward and be ready to use again on the next. It is a pretty interesting system that adds another layer of strategy. The matches you will find yourself in for odd jobs are significantly different than the main story ones. First off is the lack of any Error Icons. Your objective for these is not necessarily to match things, it is to get special icons to reach the bottom of the board. Matching icons is a means to an end here, and you will have to get all the unique pieces to the bottom of the board to win. There is still a 20 move limit and you can not use Items in these missions. Nothing comes easy in Cyber Crush 2069. I came into this title for the memes and left with a significantly higher IQ.
All joking aside, this is surprisingly not a meme filled game, or does it even possess much in the way of humor. It is quite serious most of the time and can get really dark. From someone trying to force you into making a snuff film, to a gang trying to get their hands on kids for sexual reasons, the game goes into pretty grim subjects. It shows near none of that, however. Most of the story is told via text, and occasionally has sound effects to set the atmosphere of what is occurring. All of the CGs are dedicated solely to the lewd aspects of Cyber Crush 2069. Most of what you will be seeing throughout is two character portraits and differing backgrounds from time to time.
There is quite a bit of text to go through, especially in the early parts of the story. It darn near feels like a visual novel given that you will be spending as much time reading as you will playing. On several occasions, you will be given multiple dialogue choices. This is not the type of game where your decisions matter. Picking the wrong one will simply lead to a game over and have you start again. I found that pretty annoying since even seemingly minor choices like being a douche with the current girl can lead to this. Do not try to role-play as anything other than the nicest man on the planet. It felt like a pretty pointless addition that will force you to skip all the text until you get back to where you were if you pick the wrong choice accidentally. At the very least it doesn’t toss you back into the hub-world like losing via gameplay does.
You see, once you finish the tutorial, your character can freely move around the hub-world and go where he pleases. Whether that be to visit one of the five girls or simply do some odd jobs, each time you perform something, the time of day will change. It goes from Morning, Afternoon, Evening, and Night. The girls will move around the hub-world and be asleep at times. It is an interesting system that goes underutilized. This mostly serves as an annoying hindrance since losing a match during a main mission with a girl will toss you back to the Hub, force you to leave, and then immediately come back again. Afterward, you have to skip all the text and answer the correct questions again for another try. That adds nothing to the experience. A simple option to replay the board would have been far preferred, in my opinion.
The only time Cyber Crush makes use of the day/night system is on the fifth and final date (mission) with a girl. Even then it is kind of confusing. It merely states “Day Date” and it progresses like it would should you go on a date at any other time. In this case, it took pure trial and error to discover that “Day Date” is meant to take place in the Evening. The only indication that this is indeed the final mission is that you will be taken to a bedroom setting should you beat the board. You are not in the clear yet. Once in that bedroom, you will have to clear another match in order to impress her. This match will once again tweak the rules. During these, you are on a constantly draining timer. You will have to rapidly match whatever you possibly can to fill that time meter. It is a sort of tug of war to see if you can manage to fill it, or will it be depleted for being unable to find matching icons quick enough. After raising your blood pressure with all that adrenaline, something else will likely be rising with the anime secks you’ve just unlocked.
It is a brief animated sex scene that in all honesty shouldn’t be your main motivation for purchasing this title. Before that point, you get raunchy messages after completing enough dates. First comes a suggestive pic, then comes a full-on video of her masturbating or something, and then comes a nude pic. The latter two felt out of order, but meh, whose complaining? Considering there are five girls, that equates to a fair bit of H content, especially given the two US Dollar price of the game. The artwork is quite decent and it is fully uncensored. There are no mosaics or blur effects here, it will gladly show you the aftermath of intercourse with the trademark insane amounts of semen seen in hentai. You will need to download a free DLC to patch in all of this lewd content, however.
There are two types of currency in this title. The first is simply known as M and is gained by winning matches while on a date. It allows you to buy gifts and food to give to the girls. Based on their personalities, you will need to discover what a girl likes as they won’t accept a gift they don’t. If they accept the gift, you’ll receive a certain amount of Ether, which is a far more valuable component. With it, you can permanently upgrade your skills so that you can get far more points when matching certain icon colors depending on which you invest in. Given that the overall score you need to win steadily rises as the game progresses and the number of moves you have doesn’t, taking part in this dating sim aspect is nearly demanded. Each time you upgrade a skill it will give you a 100% bonus to the score you get when matching that color.
Another easy way to gain Ether is to give a girl a ton of “Unique Gifts”. Doing so will not give you Ether right away, but will increase the amount of it you get every time you talk with her or answer a question she asks correctly. You can get a massive amount of Ether by finding a Unique gift a girl likes and repeatedly coming back to her when the store sells another. It stacks and you may quickly find yourself maxing out your stats, as well as effectively trivializing the game in the process. This system also encourages you to learn about the girl in question and actually listen. You’ll get a ton of Ether if you correctly guess her height down to the centimeter or remember when her birthday is. I find it a neat system, even if it can be a bit overwhelming should you choose to try to date multiple chicks at once. There is no rush though, Cyber Crush has no end-game state nor necessitate grappling with multiple things. You can play for as long as you want to.
Getting all the way with a girl will reward you with her panties. Collecting all five panties will unlock the hard mode. This increases the overall score needed to complete a date to an insane amount, while maintaining its stance on only 20 moves. I found it to be a bit much and there is no way to revert it. You’ll effectively hard-lock yourself from being able to play more as it will either be too difficult or just not fun enough to warrant activating it for no reward. The title auto-saves every time you change location or do an event. There is no manual saving, so make complete sure you want to activate hard mode before committing to it. Ultimately, it took me around 10 hours to complete almost everything there was to do. That is not too shabby given its two dollar price tag, and more importantly, I enjoyed that time. Most of the characters range from acceptable to sub-par, personality-wise, and there is no overarching story, yet it has enough flair to keep one interested. Where it truly gets your attention is in it’s strict and in-depth gameplay that is far from your typical Match-Three title. Cyber Crush 2069 implements a ton of different genres and somehow pulls most off successfully. Don’t let the game’s title or low price tag deceive you, this is a great addition to your library for fans of Match-Three.
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