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PSP | RPG | Dragoneer's Aria

Boxart for Dragoneer's Aria
Dragoneer's Aria 50 screen shots
  • GRAPHICS: 4.75
  • SOUND: 3.50
  • CONTROL: 4.00
  • FUN FACTOR 2.00
  • AVG USER SCORE n/a
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 2.0

Review: Dragoneer's Aria

Review by T3hPanda | 09/18/2007 | 15:57:50 PM PST

Honestly, how many times will the PSP's Great Flaw have to rear its head before developers get it right? Once again, for all that Dragoneer's Aria wins in the graphics department, the gameplay just doesn't have me singing its praises.

Dragoneer's Aria can't even stand on a wistful claim of "at least it was promising" as the story sticks to save the world JRPG conventions, right down to the ambiguously gendered lead character (who is male, in case you were wondering). In fact, all of the characters are mediocre at best, further hindered by the subpar voice acting found in both the English and Japanese tracks.

Beauty is Only Skin Deep
I kid you not; Valen is a guy.

I kid you not; Valen is a guy.

For all that Dragoneer's Aria boasts some of the most beautiful and detailed graphics for the PSP, it fails miserably at conveying the intense action that gamers expect from their sword-swinging, magic-slinging RPGs. It is games like these that make one realize just how dated turn-based RPGs are; every excruciatingly longwinded action and reaction animation is played over and over again, and performed so slowly that it looks like they're all underwater. All told, you could play the game for thirty minutes and only have actually been in control of the game for ten. It got so bad that I found myself punching in a string of commands, leaving to do something else, then coming back two minutes later to watch my last character cast his last magic spell before I input the next string of attacks. That's never a good sign.

Salvage Mission

The game isn't a complete wreck, thanks to some interesting ideas that went into the gameplay direction, especially concerning the balance of attacking, casting and guarding. You'll do more substantially more damage if you cast magic-based attacks, but all of your characters share the same energy bar that is limited to ten mana charges.

While most spells start off costing one mana, as spells level up with use, you will have the option to use more mana to cast stronger versions of the spells. It's up to you to weigh the benefits and costs of using up the precious charges, or replenishing your mana by attacking or guarding. The scarcity of mana strongly affects the choices you make during battles, pushing the game up a notch from simple turn based hack-and-slash.

That's why it's such a shame that throughout the game, the one line that kept running through my head was, "Is it over yet?" as I waited for each unimpressive attack animation to finish. Despite the game having a robust crafting system, as well as quick and steady leveling that's capped at 500 exp for every level, I found myself entirely underwhelmed by the "set it and forget it" gameplay that made even the simplest battles last for ten minutes or more. I can only recommend it to those who have hours upon hours of their life to waste watching the same mediocre spells being used to save the same mediocre world, for the same mediocre reasons.

PROS: Leveling is quick, graphics are great, good balance between offensive and defensive commands.
CONS: Repetitive to the point of brain damaging; and a few giant leaps in enemy difficulty will have you cursing the fact that save points are at the beginning of each area.


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