Blue Dragon

RivaOni · Full English! Age: 41 Gender: Joined: 24 Sep 2002

Anyone else bought this?

I decided not to get Bioshock as no one nearby has any of the special editions with the figure in, so I'm gonna wait till the hypes died down a bit and its a bit cheaper.

Plus I was in need of some RPG-ness, especially with a few people I know waffling on about Persona 3 (it sounds sooo good).

Anyway. to the point. Once again this is a game where the XBox Live demo was god awful in comparisson to the finished product. The demo's problem is that it throws you in at the deepend and expects you to just be able to pick up the slight differences this has over other RPG's. Pus the battle system, as usual with J-RPG's only works based on your own personal way of customising what your characters do.

So the finished product actually works, admittedly, storywise I'm only 2 and a half hours in, but the fact I've spent another 2 and a half hours just going round battlling various creatures speaks volume of the quality of the games battle system!

Gekko · I lurk therefore, I am. Gender: Joined: 02 Apr 2003

I liked the battle system, I didn't like the fact that you couldn't skip thru the summons. Having to watch that shit over and over again could make me hate the game. Plus it just looks very cookie cutter clone-ish of DBZ. We'll see I'll gamefly it, but I dont think it's purchase worthy.

RuneLateralus · Otaku Knight Gender: Joined: 27 Sep 2002

The demo did not impress me that much. I was really looking forward to this game...but after that demo, I decided that there are more important titles I had to pick up first (namely Bioshock and Metroid Prime 3).

RivaOni · Full English! Age: 41 Gender: Joined: 24 Sep 2002

As said, the demo is god awful compared to the full game.

It took the opposite direction to Eternal Sonata in that it seemed to throw you into the game pretty late on rather than near the start and only giving you what the peoplle in the room with you when the demo starts say as a tutorial, not a good move.

As for skipping through the summons, thats the case with all J RPG's.

Alot of people are criticising the game based on 1 the demo, or for those that have played it 2 that it doesn't do anything new in terms of being a JRPG, but quite frankly, this takes the best elements of pretty much all the top RPG's and puts them into one game, and it works.

Gekko, I'm not a fan of Toriyama's visualistic stylings, never liked Dragon Ball Z, neither for its art direction or its overblown characters. So its one of the games negative points, but its so well animated it really begins to work!

Based on my experiences of JRPG's it mixes the battle system of FFX with the Shadows baring a mixture of elements from old skool FF (see FFIII as the best example) where you assign job classes and the ability learning of IX (although instead of learning from weapons and keeping the abilities, your Shadow learns from its job class which you can swap around but it keeps those abilities). With elements of Grandia (seeing enemies on battlefield etc) and Vagrant Story (the attack circle).

Shino · Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 8:42 am Post subject:

RivaOni · Full English! Age: 41 Gender: Joined: 24 Sep 2002

Yeah I wanted Eternal Sonata more, but I wanted a RPG to play through while I wait, and my PS2's scarts just given up so I have no means to play the large amount I have on there.

Ultrawolf · Mr. Roarke Gender: Joined: 04 Jul 2003

My Blue Dragon should be here in the mail any day now. (Probably even later today). I'm glad you think the finished product is more impressive, because i have to admit the demo was "alright" for me.

RivaOni · Full English! Age: 41 Gender: Joined: 24 Sep 2002

Aslong as you don't approach it expecting it to rival the big guns, and understand its pretty much by the numbers, then you'll enjoy it. I haven;t played it today, but I usually give up at the 10 hour mark on JRPG's, not through lack of interest, but due to lack of will power on my own part, but I'm well past that now with Blue Dragon.