Traditional…

With Hironobu Sakaguchi behind the helm, Blue Dragon caught the eye of the media early on. The fact that Microsoft made boastful claims about the greatness of the game didn’t hurt either. In any case, Blue Dragon has been a long awaited title, promising to deliver a fantastic journey in a fantasy land. But while Microsoft tried to make the game look like a revolution, careful observers noticed that the game was going to be anything but revolutionary. In fact, Blue Dragon is quite possibly the most traditional jRPG released in the last 10 years or so.

People that were expecting a step forward in the genre will undoubtedly be disappointed. The story for example is quite shallow. It follows the adventure of youngsters Shu, Jiro and Kluke as they try to put an end to the devastation an evil purple old man called Nene is laying on the land. One might expect that Nene has a good reason for all his wrongdoings, but as it turns out the guy is just evil. That’s right, the society didn’t wrong him and he is not trying to avenge his master. He is simply trying to take over the world because that’s what bad guys are supposed to do. The 5 protagonists (the aforementioned three plus Marumaro, an annoying little animal thing and Zola, a mercenary in service of the king) have a bit more backstory to them, but in the end they are just as flat as Nene is. Shu’s “I won’t give up!” phrase gets tiring pretty soon, especially as the game gives us no real reason for his determination. Surprisingly enough I developed a certain fondness for the characters after a while, often smiling at their outbursts and sympathizing with their problems.

Speaking of the story, now would be a good time to discuss the length of the game. You probably know already that the game comes on 3 dual-layer DVDs, so going by that the game should be considerably long. Even though the majority of the space is filled up with HD cinematics the game does indeed manage to deliver about 40 hours of gameplay time, so it is by no account short. The pacing is a bit off overall, as the story only picks up towards the end of the first DVD (after roughly 15 or so hours of playing). Until then you will find yourself yawning at most of the story, but at least you’ll have plenty of opportunities to watch the action filled videos, which are more of than not unbelievably good looking.

…with a hint of originality

Hand in hand with how traditional the story is goes the turn based combat. And when I say turn based I mean that literally. The action turn based dynamic of Final Fantasy 7 is nowhere to be found, so you have all the time in the world before you select an action. The actions (and interface in general) are exact replicas of the actions found in older Final Fantasy titles, right down to the 3 power levels of spells (Flare, Flara, Flarus). There are some minor changes to the whole dynamic though. While you can’t move your party members around freely, you can change their formation position. The choice boils down to who will stand at the front and who in the back, but putting everybody up front won’t end well for the weaker characters in your party. Likewise putting a fighter towards the back will help with his defense, but will severely hinder his melee attacks. Putting together a good formation isn’t hard, but you’ll often find yourself rearranging the positions based on the current class of your characters.

The turn based combat may sound limiting on paper, but the way Blue Dragon implements actions makes it a lot more dynamic. Almost all actions (spells, special attacks) requires you to hold down the A button in order to charge the attack/spell. The longer you hold it down, the greater the effect will be. The catch is that the meter you are trying to fill is actually the turn meter, so filling the meter up will give the enemies more chances to act against you. On the other hand performing an action immediately (by not charging it) will result in diminished effects. With me so far? Every charged action also has a sweet spot. The sweet spot is a part of the charge meter where (if the button is released at the right time) actions cost less magic points or get pushed to the front of the turn queue. Hitting the spot with low levels spells isn’t hard, but trying to release the button in the red zone with one of the high level spells is all but impossible. Not only does the meter fill up incredibly fast then, some of the spells actually mess with you by changing how fast the gauge charges up.

Oddly enough the protagonists almost never actually fight. Instead, they leave up all of the work to their shadows. These gigantic blue creatures act as some kind of magic proxy for the people who control them, offering them both increased power and defenses. All of this is just fancy talk however – the shadow system is nothing more than a standard class system. Each shadow can learn all of the available classes (Warrior, Black Magic, White Magic, Assassin, etc.), but can have only one selected at any given time. To help customize your characters/shadows the skills you unlock as the shadow levels up in the various classes can be used regardless of the current class, making way for interesting combinations such as warriors that can heal or assassins that can throw fireballs.

The most original battle idea Blue Dragon pushes to the screen doesn’t come into play on the combat screen. Unlike most representatives of the genre Blue Dragon doesn’t have random battles. All of the creatures you fight can be plainly seen in the world, so you can avoid most of them if you want. You will probably end up a bit weak to finish of some of the boss battles, but at least you have the choice. But that’s not what the great new idea is about. When traveling around the world you can press the right trigger button at any time, pausing the game and displaying a big circle around you. At this point you can initiate combat with any creature that is currently located within the circle. If you wish you can also start combat with several creatures, fighting them “one” at a time (each creature in the world is usually a pack of different creatures when on the battle screen). Why would you want to engage several creatures at the same time? The extra experience, the stat boosts you receive between the individual battles and most importantly, creature fights. Certain creatures can’t stand each other, so they will sooner kill each other than attack you. Sometimes certain predators will prefer to eat their pray instead of killing you while other times elemental creatures will simply end up canceling each other out. The system is hardly revolutionary, but it does speed up the battles and can make some of the more challenging creatures rather easy to dispose of.

Akira Toriyama and Nobuo Uematsu join forces

Looking at the screenshots the game  may not look like much. But believe me, in movement the game is one of the prettiest games Xbox360 titles out there. All of the characters look almost like real-life dolls and the creatures you’ll be fighting have more character that a typical game protagonist. It doesn’t end there however. The game uses depth-of-field blur to great effect, and not just in the cinematics. During battles the camera will shift focus between your party and the foes, making the whole thing a lot more dramatic that it actually is. That said, the blur the game uses is often overused, blurring things that are only 20 or so meters away from you.

The spell effects are also very pretty to look at, though they at times feel like simple remakes of FF7 effects. And the typical summons that the FF series is famous for also look amazing here. You only gain access to them towards the end of the game and each character only has one, but watching the shadow take corporal form and charging at the enemy is quite awe inspiring. There is nothing inspiring about the framerate drops you’ll experience during these sequences (and some other) however. When fighting several furry enemies the game starts to lag a bit, and when you add a full screen blur effect to the picture the framerates plummet into the red zone. It doesn’t disrupt the gameplay, but you’ll definitely notice these massive drops.

With Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball designer) behind the character designs it was only appropriate that the music in the game had an equally big name working on it. Nobuo Uematsu is the guy we have to thank for the fabulous tunes we all loved in Final Fantasy games, so it is no surprise that his name appeared in the credits for Blue Dragon as well. The tunes he wrote range from classical piano pieces to industrial techno beats, but they all fit the game exceptionally well. All but the boss battle music. This heavy metal piece sounds good and helps get the adrenaline flowing, but listening to it in every boss battle (there is one roughly every 40 minutes) sure makes it annoying.

The voice acting in the game isn’t bad by any means, but just like with the voiceovers of anime characters, the actors simply don’t seem to connect with the characters. Not to mention the screeching voice of Marumaru, which will make you want to strange the little dude the moment he opens his mouth. I found myself switching to the Japanese voiceovers (also on the DVD) where the actors did a better job, though unfortunately Marumaro was just as annoying there as well.

Conclusion

Revolutionary games are few and far inbetween, but they help move the genre forward. But traditional games can help move the genre forward as well.  Blue Dragon brings little to the table in terms of new features, but the refined system it uses could hardly be possible if the game was pushing the envelope. Hironobu Sakaguchi left the Final Fantasy series behind, but the spirit lives on in Blue Dragon. At times this very spirit is what makes the game so great, but occasionally you’ll probably find yourself wanting something new and just a tiny bit original. Keep playing all the same, in the end you won’t regret it.

Gameplay 84/100 A traditional jRPG that doesn’t invent the wheel, but delivers a solid and well tried system. The same goes for the story. Graphics 88/100 The game looks amazing, pushing the Xbox360 to its limits. The framerate drops are proof enough. Sound 87/100 A musical masterpiece. If only the voiceovers and boss battle music weren’t as annoying. Value 92/100 With 40+ hours or play time the game is definitely worth the paying price. Multiplayer N/A Live achievements, though most are reserved for perfectionists. Overall (not an average) 85/100 Blue Dragon is Final Fantasy without the chocobos. Good riddance I say!