Review: Blue Dragon (Xbox 360)
There really hasn't been a solid RPG on the Xbox 360 yet (yes, yes besides Oblivion I know ok I know) and Blue Dragon seemed like it would be some sort of oasis in a sea of first person shooters. It sounds so good on paper: Mistwalker studios features Hironobu Sakaguchi (Final Fantasy, anyone?), Nobuo Uematsu on music duty (Final Fantasy, anyone?) and Akira Toriyama on art (Chrono Trigger, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Quest 8, etc etc etc). While I could do without Toriyama's art, the other stuff seemed a solid lock for a great game. Blue Dragon is formulated perfectly to sell Xbox 360s to Japan. It's a classic Japanese RPG which does very little to change the formula. Is this a good or a bad thing?
It's a bad thing. A very very bad thing.
Look, I am a huge RPG fan. I love the Final Fantasy series and I would mark Chrono Trigger as one of my top 5 games of all time. For whatever reason, Blue Dragon just doesn't work for me. No, wait, I know the reason. It's because it's awful. I had asked Microsoft for a review copy a couple of weeks ago, and even a week after the release date, they still hadn't sent review copies to anyone. There was very little marketing buzz in the States, there wasn't even a huge press release. Why? Hiding your shame, are we, Microsoft? Let's launch into normal Weekly Geek review mode to address each issue with this horrible abomination one by one.
Shininess: We will get shininess out of the way first because this is an Xbox 360 game that runs in HD and blah blah blah. There are some gorgeous elements to this game. The menu system is very well executed, everything is really easy to find and pretty to look at. The cinematics are nice and the presentation is solid. There are some gorgeous depth of field effects at play here. Unfortunately the art is driven by Akira Toriyama's hack style, leaving the landscapes devoid of, well, stuff and the characters all looking alike. Look! It's Goku from Dragon Ball Z with spikier hair. And a girl who looks like every other girl Toriyama has drawn. Seriously, I am of the opinion that the guy doesn't even draw anymore, he just hires 14 year old anime freaks from Deviant Art to draw the same shit over and over again. His character design is so generic and uninteresting, not only can you not discern any sort of personality, they all fall to default anime personality archetypes. There's the plucky young hero. There's the reluctant young sidekick. There's the spunky female friend. There's the hyper-annoying goblin... thing. All horribly drawn, horribly animated and with even worse voice acting. Take every single voice actor from every single horrible anime and put them all in one game. Then have them all deliver their lines with very little emotion and stock anime reactions. It's cringe-worthy.
The writing is the most ham-fisted melodramatic anime bullshit I have ever had the displeasure to experience. Every single line is delivered with the most unbelievable amount of gravitas it makes you want to stab the screen. Lines like "I just want to avenge my family!" abound, and are constant. There's little humor to break up all the overwrought tension, and what they tried to inject as humor falls flat. The poo jokes. The poo jokes are EVERYWHERE. Not only do you fight monsters who look like poo, are made of poo, or fight you with poo, said monsters also then poo and you have to search through their poo to find gold and items. What. The. Fuck.
The music is quite nice for the most part. Uematsu is a master of RPG orchestrations, and many of the themes are noteworthy. That is, until you get into a battle. For some odd reason Uematsu thinks that since he is in a rock band (The Black Mages. Who are awesome.) he needs to do 80's power metal for all battle sequences. It's cheesy and it breaks up the mood. There's even a Final Fantasy-esque fanfare when you defeat monsters. He tried really hard to make this just like a Final Fantasy title, and he succeeded for the most part.
Funness: Now here is where the rant really starts. This game is not fun. It is the antithesis of fun. Not only is the writing and story just plain awful, the adherence to old-school RPG combat and exploration really falls flat. It's full of RPG clichés - getting into a battle with an overpowered boss you have to lose, simple turn based battle system, potions and antidotes, black and white magic. It comes so close to just blatantly copying Final Fantasy it's ridiculous. Instead of Phoenix Down, they have Phoenix Talons. Need I say more?
You fight a battle, then move on to a new area. Then you fight another boss battle and move onto another area. Each area is filled with rocks and trees you can inspect and get 10 gold or some exp or something. The only issue with this is that you can check everything, which turns the game into the worst kind of obsessive collection-fest. It's just too much and it ends up being overwhelming. You enter a new area and just sigh because you see all these rocks and trees you are going to have to inspect. It's a hassle.
Also, seriously? The female character's name is Kluke? Really? That has to be a racial slur somewhere.
Worthiness: You know, if you are a fan of Dragon Ball Z or Naruto or any other really really stupid poorly written anime, go for it. You'll love Blue Dragon. It takes itself just as seriously as any Hot Topic goth out there. Do you take photos of yourself in a black trenchcoat with eyeliner on, and then put that photo on MySpace? Just so people can see how deep and sad you are? Then you will probably love Blue Dragon. Do you listen to Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance or Panic at the Disco because all your friends do? Then you will get a kick out of Blue Dragon.
Look, I love my fellow geeks, but sometimes there are little things that just annoy the fuck out of me. One of these things is taking yourself too seriously. It's an immature way to express yourself. Everyone did it, don't get me wrong. Heck I used to write poetry and Lord of the Rings fanfics and post them on my Geocities website back in high school. But there's a key phrase there: back in high school. There's no reason that the first purported solid RPG for the Xbox 360 should pander to the lowest, most immature kinds of anime fans. Except to sell systems to Japan. So for that, congrats to Microsoft. I am trading in this game and buying Eternal Sonata when it comes out. At least it has some style and is trying to do something different.
Score: 2/5 Skip it!
