Publisher: Ignition Entertainment
Developers: Feel Plus, Brownie Brown
Genre: Strategy/RPG
Release date: Available now

The original Blue Dragon released back in 2007, exclusively for the Xbox 360, and was met with a somewhat bland response. At the time I remember being a little excited because I thought it was going to be an ongoing RPG series exclusive to the 360 and because the art style was done by Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama. However, after a short time playing the 360 version I just could not get sucked into the game due to its story and gameplay. Now, we have a new entry into the series with Blue Dragon Plus. This time it’s on a different platform and is in a new genre. Can it fulfill the promises that it’s bigger brother couldn’t?

Blue Dragon Plus carries on the story presented in the first game, and is essentially a sequel in its plot and characters. This is immediately a fault with the game. If you have not played the first one then you will have no idea what is going on, as the game does little to catch you up on the events of the first and just assumes that you know the back story. I love to feel immersed in the story of a game. That is usually what keeps me playing through to the end, but in this case, I just felt like I was lost the whole time and didn’t really understand why the characters had these powers and who their enemies really were. I had to go in search of these answers myself on the Internet. I understand the idea of wanting to carry on your story but I think since this was on a different platform, that they needed to truly bring everyone up to speed.

The story follows the main character Shu and his partners through countless battles against the enemy from the first game. The characters have the ability to control phantom shadows, and these shadows are where the game derives its title from. Each character’s shadow is unique to and has certain abilities that unlock as the character levels up. Like any other RPG you are constantly shuffling equipment, items, and weapons. The game gets to a point where you can have many characters under your control and setting each character up often becomes a task in itself. It’s one thing to have an RPG with item management, because it is often crucial in core gameplay, but to be doing this with so many characters often gets tedious and somewhat frustrating. You also gain the ability to control robot mechs that you unlock throughout the story. These are just more allies on screen to control but they do add to the strategy as you pick and choose which mechs to use.

The core gameplay element of Blue Dragon Plus is strategy. The game requires that you pick your units and tell them where to go and which enemies to attack. You do this using the stylus. You have the ability to choose one character or draw a circle around multiple characters to select them. This actually works very well on the DS. If you tap on a character it gives you the actions that they can currently do including attack and heal. Like the item management this can get somewhat stressful when attempting to direct many characters on screen at once. The game does allow you to pause the real-time battles, however, and make your strategic decisions. You also have the ability to rotate the camera with L and R and pan the camera with the D-pad which helps in character management. The strategy is further added between each battle with the main “map” being a cube (that somehow fits in to the story but had me lost) that your characters move through and ultimately open up new battles and progress the story. Your party will split up at times and you will choose which characters to send together into each battle and equip them as you see appropriate.

In terms of visuals, Blue Dragon Plus does a great job of capturing the art style of the original. The characters all have their own unique look and the graphics are pretty good for a DS title. The view is very similar to other strategy RPG’s on the DS with that almost overhead-side view that looks great with the 3D environments and 2D characters. The game throws in some pre-rendered cut scenes that look good as well. I just wish I knew what was going on because I probably would have enjoyed them more.

The bottom line is that it really isn’t a bad game. It has plenty of RPG elements to keep the hardcore fans happy but I just don’t think that it has the broad appeal that it strived to have. The confusing story is what will keep players away from this niche title. I think that only those who went along for the first Blue Dragon ride on the Xbox 360 can really appreciate this game. Even hardcore strategy RPG fans may find themselves bored with the 25+ hours that this title delivers. In the end Blue Dragon Plus delivers a lot but I find it too much for your average DS player.

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