[quote]Follow my Curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41363546-Fruit-N-Doggie-Reviews/]Fruit N Doggie Reviews,[/url] so you can be updated whenever I post a new review.[/quote]
[h1]Overall Rating - Seriously Flawed ★★☆☆☆[/h1]
[h1]First Impressions[/h1]
Wanting to find a game to play, I started looking through my categories with the most titles in them. One of those were my RPGs, and from there I picked ones with smaller download sizes. Dragon Fantasy: The Volumes of Westeria (DF) didn't use much space, so I went for it. It's a compilation of four small RPGs, functioning more as a set of mini-adventures. Despite the brevity, I didn't bother completing a playthrough of it.
[h1]Gameplay[/h1]
Nostalgia is a powerful thing, as people still fondly remember older RPGs, even when they didn't necessarily function or play that well. I can't think of better examples than the NES Final Fantasy games, considering spells either didn't work as written, or didn't work at all. Such a masterpiece, when they didn't even code all the attacks properly. My reason for bringing that up is that DF is inspired by those old school titles, and I wasn't that fond of it.
Looking at how this title plays, you'll go from one town to the next, speaking to all of the locals in case one of them advances the storyline, as it's not necessarily clear what needs to be done to progress the plot. There's no quest markers or clues to focus on. While in battle, you only have a few options: attack, use an item or spell, defend, or try to run away. It's a perfectly functional system, yet it also lacks creativity or novelty. More often than not, I just spam regular attacks, which works in all but a few scenarios.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3139474803
[h1]Controls[/h1]
Sometimes, when playing an older indie title, it's a surprise when it works with your controller, and that's thankfully the case here. Not only that, it has a few quality of life features I wouldn't have necessarily expected. As I was trying out the controls, I realized there was a run button. It doesn't work in the overworld, but it lets you run in towns and dungeons, which is where you'd spend most of your time anyways. Another benefit is that you don't have to mash through fights when you're constantly attacking. Instead, you can just hold the button down. It could be a bit faster though.
[h1]Story[/h1]
Each adventure focuses on a different individual: Ogden, Anders, Jerald, and Woodsy. From what I've read, Ogden's is the most developed, as his content takes about four hours to play through. Everyone else lasts about an hour, which is no time at all for an RPG. As somewhat expected of an indie title, there's plenty of references and humor in the writing. However, with one of the chapters explicitly being a MineCraft reference, I think it goes overboard.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3139474672
[h1]Visuals[/h1]
DF looks about what you'd expect for a developer inspired by older titles, but to me I don't find it that charming. To me the towns look flat, as you peer down from an overhead perspective, with almost everything being made of single tiles. For example, trees are the same size as flowers, with all of them being perfect replicas of each other. It lacks depth and feels artificial. To be fair though, if you go into the options and turn the advanced graphics off, everything looks much worse, so I guess I can't complain too much. I found the enemy designs to be the game's highlight, as those images are presumably hand-drawn. My first enemy encounter was against a derpy rock, and I enjoyed its goofiness.
[h1]Sound Design[/h1]
Unfortunately, even though it had potential, the music has some serious flaws that'd get old over time. One positive is that the music has a classic medieval style to it, with tones that suit the environment well. What I mean by this is that while exploring dungeons, a sinister air comes through with the tune, while the overworld music is lighter and more upbeat, as if you're just heading out on a grand adventure.
Something that's very harmful for the songs is how quickly they loop upon themselves, and the battle music is especially bad. With the way I hear the song, it's made up of two parts, each lasting only a few seconds. While you're fighting, it constantly bounces back and forth between these two sections, which aren't that distinct from one another. You don't really want something so repetitive coming up as frequently as it does in this game, so it acts as a real detriment to the experience. During my time with DF, I didn't notice any irksome sound effects, but the combat sound effects are lacking in oomph.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3139642848
[h1]Pros[/h1]
🌟 While in dungeons, you see the monsters and decide if you want to fight them or not. Unfortunately, in the overworld, battles occur randomly.
🌟 The controls have features I'd hope for from an RPG, but isn't necessarily always included. That's a nice perk from an indie developer.
🌟 You can save and exit whenever you need to, outside of battles.
[h1]Cons[/h1]
❌ Even though enemies whiff a fair amount of attacks, I hate how often you'll miss yours. It doesn't necessarily come up in every battle, but it happens often enough to be a nuisance.
❌ There's a small margin for error with how low your HP is and how much damage enemies do. Also, if you want any amount of gold to keep up with things, you'll have to grind for it.
[h1]Tips[/h1]
🔍 The healing spell is great, but having herbs and antidotes as a back-up is crucial.
🔍 You can dip in and out of a dungeon to immediately respawn all the monsters.
[h1]Final Thoughts[/h1]
Early into the game, I thought it had some potential, but before long I was getting bored. It wouldn't be hard to beat and earn all the achievements for it, but the experience isn't interesting enough to hold my attention. The combat is uninspired and repetitive, which is a large component of the gameplay. Maybe if the writing and characters were top-notch it'd lull me further in, but bald jokes and overplayed game references aren't that compelling to me. Short indie RPGs need some pizzazz to carry you through to the end, but DF just doesn't have it. I wouldn't recommend this game because it lacks a compelling hook.
[table]
[tr]
[th]PC Specs[/th]
[th]Performance[/th]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Ryzen 2700
RTX 2070
16GB RAM
ADATA SSD
1920x1080
[/td]
[td]The game ran without incident on default settings.
💖 - DF is healthy
[/td]
[/tr]
[/table]
