Lunar: Dragon Song was the only reason I picked up my DS in the first
place. I didn't read anything about the game prior to purchasing it, I
wanted a free view and a new RPG. This was the first RPG for the DS, so
I went to Wal-Mart and throw down $40 + tax for this game and went home
to play it. I eventually found out that when you run you lose HP, you
can't gain items or experience at the same time, and the map is just
like the map on the Lunar remake for the GBA except inside the towns
are dot-to-dot maps aswell, so no free-roaming in towns until you enter
a building. The battle system was also a bad idea because you can't
choose which enemy you want to attack, it was completely random.
Another thing that annoyed me about the game was Jian was the only
strong character in the game strong enough to kill the small random
encounter monsters. He could attack multipal times within a round, but
about a third within the game his 'powers' are sucked away from him and
he can then only attack once, so he is then just as weak as everyone
else. So yeah, I would of bought this game no matter what anyways, but
I wasn't cushioned for this blow. Other than all of that, I eventually
forced myself to finish the game and started to enjoy it towards the
end.
----------Battle System----------
Lunar: Dragon Song
is a turn-based RPG that uses a round system. You can only use 3
characters per-battle and have you set their moves the round is over
and you then watch it unfold. You can choose between Fight or Auto.
Auto will pick all your moves, which is ideal for quick random battles.
In Fight you get to use Attack, Items, Cards and Special. Your main
character can't use special attacks, but he can attack multipal times
making him the only useful character in the game with any physical
strength. The biggest problem with the battle system in this game is
the fact that you can't pick or choose which enemy you want to attack.
The computer takes over from there removing that small element of
tactical battling, but giving you another burden also. It's mostly
annoying because you want the person with the bow to attack the flying
mosts and you want Jian to attack the big monsters, or you just want to
eliminate the small monsters first and leave the big ones for last.
Either way, it makes it a little bit more challenging but also annoying.
The monsters in the game are always visible before you fight them, but
they usually generic representations of what you may fight when you run
into them, similar to a Grandia II. Once you get into a field or
dungeon you can choose between Virtue mode or Combat mode. If you fight
a monster in Virtue mode, you then gain experience after the battle,
and if you fight a monster in Combat mode you then gain items after
battle which are required to do jobs, and to gain any money. So gaining
experience and items is boring. I have no idea what they're thinking
when they decided to separate the items from the experience after
defeating a monster. It just doesn't make sense.
One of the
better things about the game is the Battle Cards. You gain cards by
defeating enemies in Combat mode, you can use these within battle
similar to Items or Magic. These cards summon monsters that you
defeated into battle (although not sure on screen) and either attack or
heal your party. Each card has a point system though, and each time you
use them points will be subtracted.
----------Characters / Story----------
You basically play as Jian, a delivery boy, that takes a delivery job
to another town and gets sucked into a quest to save the world. The
story isn't terrible but I don't remember a significant bad guy in the
game until towards the end and that's about the only time the story got
interesting. As I mentioned in the graphics part, the dialog box is
terrible and ruins a bit of the game.
----------Graphics----------
The battle system is slightly better looking than the Golden Sun games.
The bosses and character models usually look great, but the random
enemies don't but everything can get pretty pixelated. The dungeons and
fields look pretty good though. I like the anime drawings of the
characters, but HATE the dialog box, it looks like a chat room and
ruins most of the stories experience just reading each line after line
without seeing the characters show any emotion or thought.
----------Sound----------
I don't remember anything bad about the music or sound effects, but
there's nothing about the music that I remember. So take that for what
you will.
----------World Map----------
The map is a
standard dot-to-dot map that I hate, but for a dot-to-dot map they
still make it interesting and still give you a sense of "adventure" out
of the game. You can't just warp to any dot on the map, you can only go
to the nearest dot that's connected to your line, and once you picked
which location you want to go to, you then have to walk through a field
to that town or dungeon you picked. Each town and dungeon is separated
by some sort of field you have to walk through, so I'm not even sure
why they needed the dots in the first place. Oh wait, now I remember.
You can't walk into the towns like a normal RPG, the town maps are
another dot-to-dot map where you use the stylus to pick which house in
the town you want to go in. Once you're in a house you can walk freely,
but inside a town you're trapped inside a map which sucks!
----------Time to Complete Game----------
37:33
This was a pretty long RPG for the DS, but most of that time was
wasting by traveling back and forth and trying to get money and
experience. Anyways, after you beat it nothing really unlocks or
anything and you are warped back to your last save spot.
