Poll of the Day > So I decided to play The Legend of Dragoon again.

(+) Yeah! (+)

At the age of 10, this game had a profound impact on my life when I watched someone play it and eventually got my own copy of the game a year later. The last time I played it was 10 years ago and now I'm nearing the Black Castle (end of Disc 1) and holy crap this game was pretty shallow even compared to games of the time.

But somehow I have spent over 10 hours just on disc 1. I think it's partly due to the slow load times.

Anyways blogfaqs over.

I had that game but I don't think I ever finished it and I remember almost nothing about it.

I remember being awed by the demo and then getting stuck on some grass in the tutorial at the beginning of the bloody game and never really ever picking it back up before I lost my library over a decade ago.

I never finished it. I rented it from my local library, and I hated the timed hits aspect of it, so once my rental period was up I never bothered renting it again to finish it.

I forget how far into the story I actually was... the only parts I can remember is fighting Lloyd and the Green Dragoon dying and getting replaced by the king, but I can't remember how much farther past those parts I got before I stopped.

I feel like it probably didn't help that everyone kept praising it as being so awesome and a "Final Fantasy killer", when I didn't think it was anywhere near as good as Final Fantasy... and the real Final Fantasy killer for me at that point was Suikoden (which was shamefully overlooked in spite of being fantastic).

Harpooooon!

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I forget how far into the story I actually was...

Most people get burned out a little further than this (I am actually right after the second scene you are talking about). I'm probably going to go through it because I have nothing better to do right now just for nostalgia's sake, but I can only play for 1-2 hours at a time because the combat is a bit jarring by today's standards (I'm also playing with a patch that has an increased random encounter rate).

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I feel like it probably didn't help that everyone kept praising it as being so awesome and a "Final Fantasy killer", when I didn't think it was anywhere near as good as Final Fantasy... and the real Final Fantasy killer for me at that point was Suikoden (which was shamefully overlooked in spite of being fantastic).

It's nowhere close to this. The real irony is that I learned about this game 1-2 years before I learned about Final Fantasy (Final Fantasy: Chronicles actually introduced me to Final Fantasy).

Harpooooon!

https://youtu.be/uCpVXJote6s

I loved it, though the first time I played it, I got halfway thru disc 4, had to stop playing for a month, and by the time I got back to it, had forgotten the (now very complicated end game) additions timings and just...dropped it.
Took over adecade, but eventually decided to play to completion and started a new game on my PS3. It held up just fine, IMO.
Additions were fun, graphics were amazing for the time (and hold up way better than FF7...), plot is underrated with a great plot twist scene and gets credit for doing stuff other stories seldom do (like definitively resolving the "will they / won't they?" romance pretty early on and Dart having a rather mature moment forgiving the object of his years-long quest for vengeance), music at the time I thought was subpar but looking back the OST was amazing just sadly a bit skim on tracks.
Really solid game.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I feel like it probably didn't help that everyone kept praising it as being so awesome and a "Final Fantasy killer", when I didn't think it was anywhere near as good as Final Fantasy...

It was FAR better than FF7. FF6 was probably still superior to it, though.
It's funny, b/c I actually played FF6 after FF7 and I couldn't get over the entire time, "this is so much better than the sequel everyone went gaga over!" (basically just like ALttP and OoT)

and the real Final Fantasy killer for me at that point was Suikoden (which was shamefully overlooked in spite of being fantastic).

Suikoden is my favorite series of all time, and indeed it's a shame it didn't get much recognition.
Konami is releasing a HD remake of 1 and 2 next year, btw. So we have that and Eiyuden to look forward to!

I really liked it, but I've only played through the whole thing once.

And yeah, the game is slow. Load times and generally slow gameplay pacing are the main things keeping me from replaying it.

I usually play it every couple of years But Ill have to get my PS3 out if I want to play again soon

Anyway, I love this game, and love the battle mechanics One of my favorites

streamofthesky posted...

It was FAR better than FF7. FF6 was probably still superior to it, though.

Not even close, IMO. I know it's at least somewhat a question of what you're actually looking for in a game plus nostalgia/experience and a bunch of other factors, but I can't even conceive of a scenario where I would ever rate any aspect of LoD better than FFVII. And I'm not even as big an FFVII fanboy as a lot of people are. LoD just felt generic and lame to me.

I'd be willing to concede that it's better than FFVIII, but that's only because my opinion of FFVIII is that it's utter irredeemable garbage. So watching paint dry or getting a root canal is better than FFVIII.



streamofthesky posted...

It's funny, b/c I actually played FF6 after FF7 and I couldn't get over the entire time, "this is so much better than the sequel everyone went gaga over!" (basically just like ALttP and OoT)

I can't really argue with this, though... since I also prefer FFVI and FFIV over FFVII.

And also love ALttP but hate OoT.

streamofthesky posted...

I loved it, though the first time I played it, I got halfway thru disc 4, had to stop playing for a month, and by the time I got back to it, had forgotten the (now very complicated end game) additions timings and just...dropped it.
Took over adecade, but eventually decided to play to completion and started a new game on my PS3. It held up just fine, IMO.
Additions were fun, graphics were amazing for the time (and hold up way better than FF7...), plot is underrated with a great plot twist scene and gets credit for doing stuff other stories seldom do (like definitively resolving the "will they / won't they?" romance pretty early on and Dart having a rather mature moment forgiving the object of his years-long quest for vengeance), music at the time I thought was subpar but looking back the OST was amazing just sadly a bit skim on tracks.
Really solid game.

It was FAR better than FF7. FF6 was probably still superior to it, though.
It's funny, b/c I actually played FF6 after FF7 and I couldn't get over the entire time, "this is so much better than the sequel everyone went gaga over!" (basically just like ALttP and OoT)

Suikoden is my favorite series of all time, and indeed it's a shame it didn't get much recognition.
Konami is releasing a HD remake of 1 and 2 next year, btw. So we have that and Eiyuden to look forward to!

Going to be a day 1 buy for me if I have the money at the time and no shitty DRM. I backed Eiyuden and beat Rising already. Just waiting to see exactly what will transfer to the main game and will farm materials before release date.