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Dragon Slayer Review

Dragon Slayer, Satisfactory

(Dragon Slayer left me wondering, that's certain. I wish there would be another one!)

Overview: Dragon Slayer is a short, well developed roleplaying adventure. You start in a small village, a little way from the last remaining dragon. Your task is simple, kill him. Over the course of the game, your father's spirit pitches in a few lines and it really helps develop what sort of relationship Valeran and his father, Alexander, had. Overall, Dragon Slayer is well worth playing.

(Based on a scale of 1-5, 1 being worst ~ 5 being best.)

Story: 3/5 The game is short, lasting only about 10 to 15 minutes. However, the time spent is ruled by a fairly good story. Cut-scenes and well developed dialogue and situations really bring the player into the story, offering them a good amount of detail about the game's world. On top of this, cut-scenes with your father's spirit help demonstrate the sort of relationship Valeran and Alexander, his father, had.

Graphics: 3/5 Dragon Slayer uses a set of custom tiles, which blend together nicely to improve the theme of the game. Using Inquisitor's medieval tilesets, the exteriors and interiors are well designed. Not too empty, but not too crowded. A perfect balance between both, and it shows.

Music: 2/5 I'm pretty sure the music used in Dragon Slayer is entirely RPG. The title screen without music doesn't add any anticipation or emotion about the game what so ever, which is disappointing. One of the easiest things you can do is add music to a game, even if it's RTP.

Other: 2.5/5 There were other other things that bothered me. For example, using the RTP window skin. Although, it's not as bad as the one in VX, it didn't fit the game's theme, I think. A brownish, perhaps wooden looking one would've been better. Any other than RTP. The other issue was the gaps in the story. People, places, or things were often mentioned but I had no reference to them. I didn't have a clue what, who, or where they were.

(In general, you should given Dragon Slayer a try!)

Final Worlds: Dragon Slayer, although very short, has a good start. If the game was expanded on, perhaps past what happens to Valeran after his confrontation with Balaan, it would prove more enjoyable. As of right now, it is something that is fun to play, but really doesn't spark anything to really launch it off the ground.

Posts

Pages: 1
Pokemaniac
3559
11/29/2010 06:46 AM
Once again, not even a mention to gameplay! Please, add something to do with battles/balance/puzzles etc. It's a game and this is pretty much the layout for a movie review!
Carvonica
1023
11/29/2010 12:32 PM
Gah, sorry again. It sort of slips my mind when I get to graphics. I'll begin a Balance portion in my next review!
mk2net
373
11/30/2010 03:37 PM
Nice review Carvonica (I agree with Pokemaniac, would have been nice to have had a little blurb on gameplay, but it's not a big deal for my game due to the gameplay-lite approach I used). For a game of this length, I'm very happy with the 3-star reviews you and Emirpoen gave me.

For graphics, I did only use the RTP, even when other options would probably have suited better. The only custom graphics in the game were the Inquisitor tilesets, which I had happened across a while back before I started this project (I used them because I prefer a certain style of mapping for forests - I am not a fan of having huge blocks of identical trees...I prefer the "background tree" approach), and the title screen (if that can really be counted as a "custom" graphic). I used only the RTP (excepting the two Inq tilesets) to intentionally decrease the amount of development time.

As for music - with the darker tone taken throughout the story, there were only a handful (two, and the town one I didn't really like but I didn't want to use one of the other tracks) that fit the game's mood. That left nothing available for the title screen, so I figured that having no sound was better than a track that really didn't capture the feel of the game.

So, this is not to say that I disagree with your criticisms (I don't). I am just laying out my design philosophy which led to those valid criticisms in the first place.

Now, for the one piece of your review that did puzzle me a little, the story portion - of the conversations that compose the main plot, what confused you, exactly? I can think only of Neritha and Ashtara as being relatively vague references (although both are basically described within the conversations so that you have a very good idea of who both are). Were there any others?
Carvonica
1023
11/30/2010 08:28 PM
Ah, well I meant Neritha and Ashtara. To me, they just seemed to come out of no where and I didn't have a clue what they were. However, when I played through it again and read a little closer, as you said, they were lightly described. It was fine, that didn't reduce your score at all.
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