Overview- Critic & User
Reviews - Videos &
Screenshots
News- Codes
& FAQs - Gameplay
Controls - Similar
Games
Answers
Bundles
Critic & User Reviews
IGN Review of Legend of the Dragon
It seems to be a common marketing plan to release a PSP, PS2, and Wii version of games now. After all, with one sub-par design you can hit a strong portable market, a huge install base of PS2 systems, and a booming Wii crowd, all for the price of an astonishingly low game development cycle. Legend of the Dragon is one of these games, as we're seeing an exact port of all three titles across each of the aforementioned systems. We've now put serious time into all three versions of the game, and our final word shouldn't come as a big surprise to anyone: Yuck.
Legend of the Dragon finds its niche by following the main story of the children's cartoon by the same name. With his sister turning to the evil Shadow Dragon, young martial artist Ang Lueng accepts his role as Golden Dragon of the Dragon Dojo, and joins in the epic battle of light vs. darkness. The animated show isn't incredibly deep, and neither is the game, using 18 of the show's most notable characters as fighters for a cookie-cutter experience similar to Bloody Roar or Naruto: Clash of Ninja. The entire game hinges around a transformation mechanic, as players will use basic hand-to-hand combat in order to power themselves up for morphing abilities. Each fighter goes from mortal to mythical warrior, which then gives them the power to unleash huge attacks on their opponent.
When it comes to the overall diversity of characters though, there aren't too many notable attributes that really stand out between the fighters themselves. Your main all-around fighters include the stock characters Ang, Ling, and Beingal, as well as the smaller and more nimble Ming or the ogre-like Shoong. And though the obvious traits are there - Shoong is slow but powerful, whereas Ming relies on quick combos at the expense of attack effectiveness - that's about as deep as it goes. You'll pick your player, punch and kick until they are ready to transform, and then pull off supers to take out opponents at an alarming rate.
As an extremely annoying aspect of the game, the players themselves all feel nearly identical. Transformation happens at the same rate between characters, and once transformed the three available supers are the same from character to character. Holding L and R powers up the fighters, with the same button combination (this time combined with any of the four face buttons) initiating the supers as well. Once the attacks are engaged, it's as simple as button mashing on square and X, or pressing the four face buttons to make on-the-fly combos in a DDR-like mini-game. Each one is essentially a mini-game between fighters, but with only three available in the entire game they become entirely lackluster after only a few fights. How many times do we need to mash buttons in a "test of strength", or block fireballs or melee attacks with a mini-game ripped straight from countless dance games? Apparently quite a few, as everyone uses the same stockpile of round-ending maneuvers.
Along those same lines, Legend of the Dragon is entirely basic in its world design, as each arena and mode plays nearly identically. When going from area to area the only major change includes a few destructible in-level items and varying backdrops. As expected there's a dojo level, outside rain area, lava backdrop, and temple. Basically any generic backdrop imaginable makes an appearance, and the locales do nothing to change up the experience. Also included in the game are multiple single and multiplayer modes, including the classic quickplay, time trial, and survival bouts. If you've got the players and remotes, classic vs. mode is included, as is a team battle and two-on-two tag battle for four players. The added effort to include multiplayer is appreciated, but the game's overall depth is so shallow the game will grow tiresome after only a few rounds, making this a tough one to suggest even for a last-minute rental. As the more "in-depth" portion of the game, players can embark on Quest Mode, which includes situational battles and an extremely basic overworld map to slide your character across to get from area to area. Much like the rest of the game, however, the quest is littler more than a few shallow battles between lackluster combatants.
The final nail in the coffin comes with the overall audio/visual portion of the game, as Legend of the Dragon looks and sounds just as generic as it plays. The game's menu system is about as simple as it gets, with the different options hovering in the middle of the screen atop a two-tone scrolling backdrop of light and symbols. There's a small amount of character portrait art sprinkled throughout the game, whether it's in prepping for a battle or waiting at brief load screens, but it really comes down to a few pieces of art topping an otherwise boring backdrop. What few graphical effects there are come almost exclusively during super attacks, with the rest of the battle looking nearly unfinished in its visual offerings. The music, sound effects, and character VO is also extremely one-dimensional, with each character having only a few grunts and shouts to accompany the expected thump-n-bump audio of a budget fighter. Nothing amazing to see here.
©2007, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Legend of the Dragon finds its niche by following the main story of the children's cartoon by the same name. With his sister turning to the evil Shadow Dragon, young martial artist Ang Lueng accepts his role as Golden Dragon of the Dragon Dojo, and joins in the epic battle of light vs. darkness. The animated show isn't incredibly deep, and neither is the game, using 18 of the show's most notable characters as fighters for a cookie-cutter experience similar to Bloody Roar or Naruto: Clash of Ninja. The entire game hinges around a transformation mechanic, as players will use basic hand-to-hand combat in order to power themselves up for morphing abilities. Each fighter goes from mortal to mythical warrior, which then gives them the power to unleash huge attacks on their opponent.
When it comes to the overall diversity of characters though, there aren't too many notable attributes that really stand out between the fighters themselves. Your main all-around fighters include the stock characters Ang, Ling, and Beingal, as well as the smaller and more nimble Ming or the ogre-like Shoong. And though the obvious traits are there - Shoong is slow but powerful, whereas Ming relies on quick combos at the expense of attack effectiveness - that's about as deep as it goes. You'll pick your player, punch and kick until they are ready to transform, and then pull off supers to take out opponents at an alarming rate.
As an extremely annoying aspect of the game, the players themselves all feel nearly identical. Transformation happens at the same rate between characters, and once transformed the three available supers are the same from character to character. Holding L and R powers up the fighters, with the same button combination (this time combined with any of the four face buttons) initiating the supers as well. Once the attacks are engaged, it's as simple as button mashing on square and X, or pressing the four face buttons to make on-the-fly combos in a DDR-like mini-game. Each one is essentially a mini-game between fighters, but with only three available in the entire game they become entirely lackluster after only a few fights. How many times do we need to mash buttons in a "test of strength", or block fireballs or melee attacks with a mini-game ripped straight from countless dance games? Apparently quite a few, as everyone uses the same stockpile of round-ending maneuvers.
Along those same lines, Legend of the Dragon is entirely basic in its world design, as each arena and mode plays nearly identically. When going from area to area the only major change includes a few destructible in-level items and varying backdrops. As expected there's a dojo level, outside rain area, lava backdrop, and temple. Basically any generic backdrop imaginable makes an appearance, and the locales do nothing to change up the experience. Also included in the game are multiple single and multiplayer modes, including the classic quickplay, time trial, and survival bouts. If you've got the players and remotes, classic vs. mode is included, as is a team battle and two-on-two tag battle for four players. The added effort to include multiplayer is appreciated, but the game's overall depth is so shallow the game will grow tiresome after only a few rounds, making this a tough one to suggest even for a last-minute rental. As the more "in-depth" portion of the game, players can embark on Quest Mode, which includes situational battles and an extremely basic overworld map to slide your character across to get from area to area. Much like the rest of the game, however, the quest is littler more than a few shallow battles between lackluster combatants.
The final nail in the coffin comes with the overall audio/visual portion of the game, as Legend of the Dragon looks and sounds just as generic as it plays. The game's menu system is about as simple as it gets, with the different options hovering in the middle of the screen atop a two-tone scrolling backdrop of light and symbols. There's a small amount of character portrait art sprinkled throughout the game, whether it's in prepping for a battle or waiting at brief load screens, but it really comes down to a few pieces of art topping an otherwise boring backdrop. What few graphical effects there are come almost exclusively during super attacks, with the rest of the battle looking nearly unfinished in its visual offerings. The music, sound effects, and character VO is also extremely one-dimensional, with each character having only a few grunts and shouts to accompany the expected thump-n-bump audio of a budget fighter. Nothing amazing to see here.
©2007, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved