FINALLY, a good and fair review! I can't wait for this game. :)
System: Microsoft Xbox 360
Genre: Role Playing Game
Developer: Mistwalker/Artoon
Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
Players: 1
Version: Japan
Reviewed: Aug 2007
Writer: Matt Ingrey
Pros:
- Fun to be had, if you can take it for what it is
- Scat fans rejoice
- Marumaro
Cons:
- Tears more than a Yellow Pages at a heat of the Worlds Strongest Man
- Slooooowdown, isn't this the next-gen?
- You've played it before, 100 times
Console ****RPGs on Microsoft hardware are like buses. You wait ages for one and then, well, one comes along. Then you have to wait forever for the next! To say that the genre is rare on Xbox consoles is an understatement, but it is something that Microsoft are seeking to put right on the 360, and that's where Mistwalker come in.
No pressure! It must feel like the entire future of the Xbox 360 in Japan is resting on their shoulders. Luckily, these are some pretty impressive shoulders: the company was formed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, you know, him from Final Fantasy. For Blue Dragon, he's roped in Nobuo Uematsu, again of Final Fantasy fame, and also Akira Toriyama, known primarily for his work on Dragon Ball and later the Dragon Quest series (rumours that he only draws for things with 'dragon' in the title are entirely made up).
As spiky-haired Shu wakes up from his nap, and you wander around looking at the scenery, light shining beautifully off the surface of a small pool of water, birds singing, the camera pans out to reveal a beautiful sun drenched village but the peace doesn't last long. Seconds later, idyll shattered, the Land Shark arrives. Every year the violet clouds roll in, and the Land Shark attacks, only this time Shu and his friends decide to take it on. Naturally, our children's adventure doesn't end here, and they're soon on the trail of a bad guy, literally all over the world.
Yes, they're using that cliché.
You'll visit villages you've visited in every RPG you've ever played (a nice summery one, a cold wintry one, a ruinous one...), each one of them cursed in some way. You'll overcome adversity, you'll rescue villagers, there'll be rejoicing, you'll move on to the next - stop me if you've heard this one before. The entire plot is revealed in the first hour or so, and goes nowhere in the remainder of the game.
With Sakaguchi seemingly unwilling to cover new ground in regards to storytelling, it falls to Uematsu and Toriyama to offer something new - which they don't. Musically, the game is forgettable. There are no memorable tunes that will remind you of a place in the game if you heard them outside of it, in contrast to Uematsus best work on the Final Fantasy series, and the boss battle music is a less-than-welcome departure from the rest of the soundtrack. The character design is typical of Toriyama and is unremarkable as a result. The lack of thick black outlines on the characters only serves to make them look plain, such is his Worst of all, the villain of the piece doesn't look remotely threatening.
Fighting said villain is at least kept interesting though, by the battle system, which represents the only apparent change in Blue Dragon. On the field map, pulling the right trigger will open the encounter circle around the player, and any monsters that appear in that circle can be battled separately, or consecutively. By choosing to fight a number of battles one after another, extra rewards are earned. Unfortunately, rather than being an excellent risk/reward system, by offering a stacking bonus (HP restored, speed up, attack up, etc) between every separate battle, it often makes fights later in the chain far too easy and there's rarely any risk. Occasionally, choosing to fight two battles together will initiate a monster fight, where the enemies will take a disliking to each other and do your dirty work by fighting amongst themselves, which is always fun to watch.
Aside from these, battles play out much as would be expected. A row of monsters faces a row of player characters, who take turns to choose between fight/defend/magic/item/flee until one side dies. Charged attacks offer a much needed strategic element, by enabling you to perform much more powerful attacks that are slower to use. Precisely charging a heal spell to be used between two massive boss attacks can save lives. Extra skills can be learned by earning SP from battles and levelling up s (essentially jobs). s can be switched at any time to learn new skills, and skills already learnt in other s can be put to use in the current one. The system will be familiar to anyone that's played Final Fantasy V, being as it is, exactly the same.
It's the little things that keep the enjoyment of Blue Dragon going, long after interest in the story and characters has waned. The game provides one of the most interactive worlds seen in an RPG. Almost every item of scenery or furniture in the game can be examined by the player, revealing hidden items, gold, or stat increases - but funnily enough, the only place where gold can't be found in the game is stuffed down the backs of sofas! If an item is searched and nothing's there, a 'nothing' will be counted. Collect enough of these and they can be traded for useful accessories later. An item logbook that tracks what's been found will appeal to the collector, and the associated achievement for completing the logbook will appeal to those who are more Gamerscore obsessed.
With achievements being the main difference between the game and any other RPG from the early nineties, it's essential that they add to the experience, and while most do, others verge on the impossible. The item logbook achievement and another for completing the bestiary are two of these. Certain items and monsters appear in the game just once, under very specific conditions, with very tight timescales. Fail to get them when they're available and the achievement is lost, but for another 60 hour playthrough. So the odds of stumbling across them all without a guide are a million to one. Getting characters maxed to level 99, 50 times, is a big ask, and achievements only for the absolute completist. Much more fun are achievements for perfecting minigames, perfecting small flight sim-esque sequences, or initiating monster fights.
With games like Final Fantasy XII pushing the genre forward, it's disappointing to see a game with so much talent behind it not attempt to try anything new. As an entry-point to the genre it provides an adequate enough experience, but for anyone who's played an RPG in the last five years it's a step backwards. In the end, the fun in chasing achievements and the fact that it's one of only two English language console ****RPGs on the Xbox 360 provide reason enough to recommend Blue Dragon..
http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/launchreview.asp?reviewid=799315
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