Dragonhold

is it a bit janky? Yes. Is the combat a tad simple? Also yes? can you be a stealth archer? Not really. But is it fun? OH YES. Why? Well, first: Dragon. Second: the combat means you can wade through hordes of enemies. Third: it's basically a bit of a roguelike, with multiple open world explorations. The map environments change, and you power up and up as you kill more enemies. Your dragon can be summoned after a little and lets you absolutely blast your way around the map. You go from arial dog fights with monsters, to hero-landing into enemies and slice them apart. The sense of being a horrifying BEAST in combat is pretty good. The combat has some good animations, there's a sense of impact and low level enemies don't do the TES thing of getting more HP - you can absolutely dominate. bosses are a bit simple, being mostly dodge / strike HP sinks, but you unlock abilities and gear as you upgrade your home base. it's slow, but rewarding. The extraction is also pretty good as you can pay to have the rare materials you salvage saved, if you pay a fee to a trader. lots of anti frustration features. So far, no crashes. Only one quest glitch in a rescue mission but overall since the quests can be repeated, it isn't an issue. The music is relaxing, there are some Unreal engine basic enemy types (One of the big monsters looks like a State of Decay monster scaled up) and i've seen some terrain tearing but considering the size of the map and how fast you're moving through the world, it's pretty basic. The start of each run can be fairly slow as you have to grind to unlock the dragon, but one you have it, the maps become much easier to navigate. I've only had mild frustration with one enemy type which can stun lock you and be aware some classes can't block (I'm using the rogue as a starter). It's a fun pick up and play game, I can imagine it's insane with co-op! The story is simple but fun - reminds me a bit of Divinity: Dragon Commander with the magi tech and dragon riders. Definitely worth the asking price. As i progress I may adjust the review but I would say this is a recommended, fun time sink if you want a "pick up and play" game.

This is pretty bad. The UX and UI are aweful. The combat is floaty and lacks any impactl. I cant in good concious reccomend it in its current state. And they removed micro transactions. "From early access" Which i take as, they will ruin the game eventually. Hopefully i get my refund.

-------------- TL;DR: Great concept, stale/lackluster execution, lacking true soul. Could be great given several years and plenty of funding. I truly wish Dragonhold good luck, but I ended up regretting my purchase. ------------- I've purchased plenty of early access games, many quite rough around the edges, and there's usually *something* about the games which secures my confidence in what their updates will bring to the game in the next few years. This one I've actually gone ahead and requested a refund for. It's difficult to put exactly into words why Dragonhold didn't secure my confidence. There's truly a great concept at its heart, but it feels even more like a prototype than an early access product. Some amount of soul seems to be missing. I'm guessing the voice over is done with A.I.? That may be part of why the game feels so "off". The music and SFX felt a bit generic, sorcerer in particular suffered from that one as combat ended up feeling thoroughly unengaging. The tutorial was pretty heavily expository, oddly leaving me feeling more disconnected than drawn into the game world. It rather gave me the impression that there may be passion for the gameplay, but there's just a randomly generated batch of fantasy names wrapped around it. That may be far from the truth, but I'm just trying to get at how odd the results of the tutorial story experience felt. The gameplay itself is pretty simple - "easy to play, difficult to master" is a great game design philosophy so no complaints there. That could be a strength in the long run. But, as mentioned previously the current VFX/SFX particularly for the sorcerer did not leave me eager for more gameplay. The ability to join a friend through steam or invite a specific friend to play together is not currently in the game - it looks like that's part of the roadmap for the future. That is particularly unfortunate in my case as I bought this specifically to play with somebody who has always wanted to play a dragon rider type game. We weren't interested in buying a private server for a game we're just trying for the first time and our experience using the public realm didn't inspire much interest in continuing. There really is a great concept at heart, but it feels more like something that's meant to be presented to bigger studios for heavy development. I would 3-6 years more before this game approaches its potential. True, the game's price is decent but if you are particularly mindful of what you spend your game budget on I would pass on this one. Wait for a demo, if possible. The screenshots and video looked great, but the in game experience ultimately felt like a big ol' sip of flat soda.

I love the concept of this game so much!! It was very thrilling to play while it worked for me. However now when I try to play this game the inventory does not work and I can not figure out who to equip any of my loot that I received after running a few of the quests. I closed the game thinking it was a glitch and went to reopen it, it told me that this game had to update and that my disc, which is basically clear and has tons of space, had no room for my game and it uninstalled. I tried to redownload it and it has given me the same issue. I'll play for a while and then the game has to update and then there is no room for this game. I will try again, but its frustrating lol.

fun

this is a good game the combat can be a lil wonky but over all i like it

Cool concept, fun mechanics, just needs polishing. Also hopeful for controller support down the line. Looking forward to following this games journey/

Enjoyable and looking forward to further polishing