Overall 7.2 Graphics 3 Sound 3 Addictive 10 Story 1 Depth 2 Difficulty 5
7
The secret that is Dragon Crystal! awesomerob
Dragon Crystal. If you have never played it, it's best described like this. Imagine if you could eat all things fantasy, and then throw up in a games console, and hey presto, you have made Dragon Crystal.
The game has all the elements of any generic fantasy RPG. Let's see, we have a main character in a dodgy helmet with a sword and shield picking up a variety of scrolls, potions, staffs, weapons and armour. Alas, this is where the general thought process of the game designers ends. I would love to go into the intricate story, regale you of the tears and laughter this game will bring. Unfortunately, I am yet to discover a story, at least not whilst playing the game. Yes there does indeed appear to be a storyline but you will have to go on Wikipedia or the likes to find it because non of it is even hinted at during the game. Without arming yourself with prior knowledge, you are some dude walking around a strange landscape with chess pieces or flowers around you making walls in front of you all the time whilst fighting off an array of totally random monsters ranging from frogs, snot balls, ninjas (if you can call them that), floating eyeballs and some things that I have trouble explaining let alone give a name to. All of the time this is going on you are constantly being followed by a dragon egg, that over time and experience hatches and grows into a fully fledged dragon, which, you guessed it, does nothing and adds nothing to the actual story or game play.
Moving on from the gripping storyline I am forced to take a look at the physical quality of the game. The graphics are not the worse I've seen in a master system, and are slightly better on its sister console the game gear, but are still pretty awful. Some things bear no resemblance to what they are apparently supposed to be, and by far the most enjoyable aspect is the ridiculous typos. Read a certain scroll and you will be helped by a message that reads "my weapon became!" Most handy. The sound is a lot worse, the music is annoyingly happy and repeats itself throughout. Mind you, get to the 5th floor and you will be rewarded with a new soundtrack which is slightly less annoying, but good luck with that. The game play is by far the redeeming feature of this game. I have yet to find a quicker and simpler RPG to play. you simply walk into things to attack. That's it, walk into enemies, you will either hit them or miss them, there is literally no skill involved. There is some added excitement by the addition of scrolls which cast random spells, normally changing your inventory and staffs which normally do some sort of damage spell.
In terms of game difficulty, this is a hard one to judge. It is either very easy or literally impossible, depending on how the game feels at the time. As I mentioned before, you can leave your skills at the door as this game is almost entirely luck based. Will you start off in a room full of monsters or a room full of treasures? Will you ever pick up anything useful or just a load of tat? only the game can know for sure. Oh, and did I mention that you have no idea what anything does when you pick it up untill you acctually use it. They are all colour coded, and the colours change everytime you start again meaning you have no idea if the staff in your hand is going to destroy your enemies or send you hurtling through time, whether your scroll will cause all your potions to become healing potions or make your armour disappear. Many a time you will find yourself facing many foes and decided to pop of a quick flame spell only to find you mistakenly made yourself blind instead. Also, you will need to find food fairly regularly. I don't know what they are playing at giving you absolutely no plausible storyline yet still trying to get you to believe its more realistic by forcing you to become ravenously hungry enough to eat a loaf of bread or leg of beef every few minutes.
Generally speaking there are 2 ways to play. Run through avoiding everything trying to find the portal to the next level as quickly as possible, or be more slow and methodical and pick up as much gear as possible. Woe befall all who attempt the second way for you will realise your folly a bit later in the game. The monsters will become impossible regardless of how hard you become. With every strike they will steal your stats, levels and equipment leaving you snivelling in the corner after having to spawn as a robe wearing dagger wielding level one amongst hoards of....whatever they are supposed to be. On a personal note, I have never completed this game. Ever. I must have played it over a thousand times and I have only ever come close once (I think seeming as there is no indication of how far you need to go).
In conclusion, this game is utterly amazing. Surprised? You should be. I still am. This game is utterly terrible and yet still after 20 years of playing it I find hours of my life are lost to it because it has an easy pace to it that just feels so natural and a sense of always being so close yet so far to completing it that you feel that one more go couldn't harm you right? I love this game and I think for all its flaws, it deserves to be up there with the Final Fantasies and Phantasy Stars, if a little trailing behind them, like a pointless dragon egg.
I give this game 3 Robs out of 5
Graphics 3 Sound 3 Addictive 10 Story 1 Depth 2 Difficulty 5
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 01-30-12
Updated: 02-01-12
Review Replies: 5
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