Genre: Role Playing Game CDs: 4 (422, 501, 486, 651  Megs) Players: 1 ESRB: Teen
 Animated Blood
Animated Violence
Publisher: Sony Retail Barcode: 7 11719 44912 6 Memory: 1 Block (Per Save)
Developer: Sony Sony ID: SCUS-94491, 584, 585, 586 Accessories: Analog, Vibration
Released: June 11, 2000 PSRM: 016890, 018310, 018320, 018340


Box Copy
A peaceful beginning. The legend was born 10,000 years ago. A violent uprising. A civilization of flying creatures enslave the human race. A bloody war. In a bid for freedom, the humans harness the spiritual forces of Dragons and triumph. Tranquility and harmony exist between all. But the past and the future are about to collide...

Discussion
As odd as it sounds, Role Playing games on the PlayStation system are a dime a dozen. Like racing and sports games, you’d have to try pretty hard pressed to not trip over one. This makes their existence a rather precarious one: despite being one of the most revered genres in the Western culture, just the smallest mistake could bring a shining example to its knees. Final Fantasy VII suffered terrible min-games and translation issues; Vandal Hearts II’s dual movement system ruined any strategy, and Final Fantasy IX’s anti-climactic end battle are all examples. Legend of Dragoon is a beautifully crafted work that carries all of the above issues yet still shines through out the entire experience.

The game’s first few hours will drag you through every cliché in the book, from character stereotypes to over-used mission set-ups. However, how the game handles the clichéd characters is what separates them from the rest of the RPG world. Dart is not the silent Cloud type, nor is he a perfect knight. He is flawed, yet hopeful in a pig headed way. His desire to do the right thing is not always the most pleasant choice, and there are times in the later half of the game where you really feel for him and his companions. Like Dart, they are all clichés (strong man, karate man, brooding female, adorable and fragile love interest, etc), but it’s how Sony has woven them together that make you pay attention. Rather than the happy-go-lucky approach most games use to allow several strangers to work together, Dragoon brings 11,000 years of in-game history to form bonds among several of the crew. Within these bonds lay family trees that have crossed paths, and branches that will end without ever seeing the outcome of their quest. Unlike Final Fantasy 7’s dramatic and famous ‘death sequence’, Legend of Dragoon is not afraid of removing key characters without second thought. Heroes are meant to suffer, and you’ll discover around Disc 3 that one of your crew has suffered for much longer than need be.

What really makes Dragoon stand out is its battle system. Essentially, it is a ‘turn-based’ RPG via choices, but the characters do not have simple attack methods. Rather than focus on a heavy magic or attribute tables, Sony requires the gamer to learn move sets unique to each character. Essentially ‘quick time’ events, an Attack will need to be performed 100% correctly by pressing the X button at specific points in the animation. If any part of the sequence is missed, the move ends with what damage you already dished out. This could have gone horribly wrong had it been executed poorly, but the designers figured out an excellent reward system. As you level your attack up by perfect executions, you’ll be granted new ones. The new set will not be as strong as the previous one’s highest and perfectly executed version, so you don’t need to rely on the new set if you can’t master it just yet. More importantly, it means you need to actually pay attention; simply mashing X while you’re doing something else merits insanely poor single hits and only insures a swift ass kicking by the enemy. When your characters morph into their Dragoon forms (those spiffy winged looking outfits from the cover), things get changed up slightly. In this form, your attack is now roulette based, rather than timed. You’ll also have access to powerful and insanely gorgeous looking Dragoon Spells, which if used correctly provide some devastating results. Speaking of Magic, Attack Items are also interactive – you essentially must jam on the X Button as fast as possible to build a higher Hit Percentage.
My only complaint with the combat is a minor nitpick. When performing the Attack motions, the enemy can create a Counter Attack, which changes the pace of your Attack for a single button press. Here, you must press O at the proper time to correct yourself, and then finish off the attack. My concern is that this counterattack is only available to the enemy; you have no way to counterattack when it’s their offensive turn. It would have REALLY helped in some of the later dungeon areas, where damage ratios were a bit too high for my taste.

Graphically, the game is laid out with static rendered backgrounds and polygon characters a la every Final Fantasy and standard Resident Evil PSX version ever made. While the backgrounds are standard issue, it’s the in-battle animations that get high kudos points. Even in HDMI, which can reduce most PSX games to Lego bricks, Dart and crew look amazingly detailed, right down to the jewels in the Dragoon headbands. Many of the game’s cinematic sequences happen in battle with a lot of care put into the actual body movement and animation. Characters don’t just stand there – they will leap; get thrown back a few feet, fly across the screen with wings open, and more. One of my favorite moments is during the strong man Kongol’s boss fight. The enemy will create a giant pillar, launch his nun-chuck axes to tie you to it, then run, kick you, then pull you AND the pillar our of the ground and heave you across the screen. Oddly enough, the usually hardest thing to animate looks the best; water. In-game oceans, an animated river, and a water dragon attack (essentially a nod to Leviathan) all push the PlayStation’s graphic chip to the fullest. The Computer Graphic FMV sequences show their age slightly, but they do not detract from the experience.

Which brings us to the rough spots of the game. Like Final Fantasy VII, the game’s American translation got lost in the 4 Disc shuffle. Many of the game’s paragraphs are translated too literally; contractions are not used, same phrases are repeated too often in the same conversation, and near the end of the game, typos run rampant. I’m still not sure of what happened with several key aspects of the overall story, but the necessary ones pull themselves through. At times it seemed like there should have been more to character soliloquies, and near the end they shove a LOT of information down your throat.

There’s also the map / world system, which absolutely, positively blows. You cannot move around the world map – essentially stuck on a track between each location. Since you cannot break free of this rail, you are forced to trudge through some visited areas in order to get back to others for story purpose. Sony also failed slightly in the pacing department. There are three areas in the game where you will fight 2 major boss battles in a row, with no option to save, re-equip, or even heal yourself before battle. Patience will be pushed to the test in those situations.

Don't even get me started on some of the voices.

Overall, despite these setbacks, Legend of Dragoon provides a hearty adventure (roughly 32 to 60 hours depending on your grinding preferences), a very personal and intertwining tale, and a few interesting dungeon concepts. Totally worth the admission price and your gaming time.
 

 Trivia
  • A Variant? Of a PSX RPG?! See below...
     
  • Not so much trivia, but personal commentary. As a graphic designer, Legend of Dragoon presents one of the prettiest released games ever. Everything, including the manual, is in full color. The disc arts feature the four main characters in their Dragoon armor, the manual if chock full of stand alone CG, some small snippets of cinematic screen caps, and the manual cover isn't just the case cover. Gorgeous stuff, I tell you.
     
  • There has been some reports that Legend of Dragoon suffers some problems on the PlayStation 2 hardware. I played this all the way through on a 60 Gig PlayStation 3, with no issues.
     
  • Rose, the dragoon featured in the banner up top, is one of my all-time favorite game characters. Not only is she insanely cool looking, her story arc makes for one of the more interesting aspects of the game.
     
  • Speaking of Rose, her animation sets have this weird...vibe to them. In one Magic Act, it appears that she literally poops out a healing beam from her butt. In another, it looks like black tar (or darkness matter in this case) is dripping out of her butt, forming the spell's shape. I raised an eye-brow or two the first time I saw it. Either someone on the design team has a weird fetish, or they totally didn't get the camera angles right.
     
  • Each character's Dragoon Spirit must be acquired. Kongol, the giant in your party, can actually get his way early in the game. Normally you would not get it until Disc 4, but if you re-visit the merchant with the Water Bottle on Disc 2, you can buy it from him.
     
  • If you are using a PS2 or PS3 with the Smoothing option turned on, the timing of the X Button presses might be thrown off. This is due to a thin line of the Timing Square being slightly blurred out.
     
  • Perhaps merely coincidence, but the final Dragoon Suit you acquire for Dart, in-game, actually looks a little like the mech you pilot in the Sony game Omega Boost. No so much the face, but the body architecture.
     
  • Donna Mae Wong, who voiced Shana, has also done work on Dead or Alive and Bloody Roar.
     
  • David Babich, who voiced Albert, has also worked the above games.
     
  • Awele Makeba, who voices Rose, was actually a supervisor on the movie Milk.
     
  • Through out the game, you'll randomly find Stardust particles by clicking on parts of the CG Backgrounds in town. You will eventually have the option to give these to a woman in order to save her dying child. There are 50 total, spread across all 4 discs. You do not need all 50 to save the child.
     
  • There's a neat trick you can do to save some Heal Potions. When you Guard in a fight, you regain HP during your non-attack. Simply wait till you take on a weak enemy, and just guard every move until you reach the health level you want.
Variants / Misprints
There is a single Greatest Hits variant for the game. Standard stuff this time around.  		Legend of Dragoon: Greatest Hits Edition
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