Dragoneer's Aria

The storyline starts out fairly well, and the graphics are great. The voice acting is a bit on the fake side. However, aside from the nice visuals, the battle system is very unstable. I usually don't die within the first six hours of a video game, but in Dragoneer's Aria, I had already died 12 times within the first three hours. The random battles are just that--random about what you'll actually encounter. During one battle, you may come away without a scratch. The next might be so hard that it wipes out your entire party--and this in dungeons that you've already beaten. All in all, it doesn't make for smooth gameplay when you have to keep reloading old data to try again...and again...and again...e.t.c.

This is really a very good game if you like turn-based strategy RPGs. The graphics are about as good as your likely to find on a portable RPG. I think they look fine. I find nothing wrong with the voice acting, although the lines are (as always) either too cute or too corny. It does bug me when the Empath girl says "This isn't bullying, is it?" when fighting a weaker monster. No, you can't bully monsters, you just exterminate them. This game is a little tough, and a little slow. "Brave Story New Traveler" is a quick and easy (very easy) RPG. This one requires careful character development, and it takes its time. Here are a few tips if you are unfamiliar with this kind of RPG.

You have to use magical skills to develop them - This is a magic users game, don't just rely on your sword.

You get Manna (MP) by using your sword - beat up on weaker enemies with Attacks to build manna to clobber the stronger monsters with magic.

You regain all your HP whenever you go up a level - which will be frequently - exploit this. You do not need to heal so much if you know you will regain your HP at the end of the battle.

The Monsters go up in power rather abruptly - and there can be powerful monsters mixed in with the weaker ones. But your power will go up quickly as well as you level up. Overcome the monsters in each area as you go... don't be in a hurry, you'll just get killed.

If you don't have much patience and you want a fast action-based game, or an easy no-brainer RPG, this game is not for you.

First of all, the graphics and gameplay are not worthy of being on the PSP. All of the dungeons have breaks at the polygon seams with light shining through making the graphics ghetto. The battles are so slow that you will need anti-depressants to get through them.

This game has the worst drop rate for items I have ever seen. I must be a masochist because I played the game over 100 hours hoping to get the ultimate weapons and armor, but only had enough items to open one chest at the end of the game only to get another recipe, not the actual item. What do you do once you have 999,999 money and all characters are at level 99? QUIT!

I suffered through the game to see the ending, which lasted about 2-3 minutes and left tons of unanswered questions. Where are the Full Motion Videos???

This game is an embarassment to the PSP. Don't waste your money - buy Brave Story and Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth.

I have read many reviews for this game, and they are unfair. they say that the battle system is no good, but is highly entertaining, it's true it takes several minutes per battle, but as you can level up each of your skills and if you are like me that I always want to maximize every aspect of my character you will find an entertaining battle system.

With Dragoneer's Aria you will never encounter a battle that is boring like Attack, Attack ... You have to have an strategy for your mana management. The part of the mana in this game is very creative, I liked a lot that touch. The battle system is turn based, and the mana pool is common for all the chars. You fill your mana pool by using an attack or defend yourself. The defend system is great also, is like a minigame and if successful you will block 100% of the damage.

I would like it to have FMV (full motion videos) but the polygonal animation is pretty good by itself. I agree with the reviews that the Dragon's personality is a little plain, but I think that the voice acting is pretty good.

I think that if you like RPGs you need to buy this, is not the best RPG available for PSP but is a good game worth the while.

I'll start by saying that I am a big RPG guy and any promising-looking rpg that is released, i'll buy with my hopes up. Well I had my hopes up for this game and unfortunately my hopes arent stayin too high for PSP rpgs anymore. I was excited about this game but what did we get? another let down for what could be one of the greatest systems out there.

I'll start by stating best. The graphics arent bad. They're not as smooth as 'Brave Story" which was released before Dragoneers aria but they are still good for a portable device. I personally think the graphics could have been better considering the graphics on other PSP titles out there but they're OK. Nothing amazing.

The story isn't the best. It has an OK base but it doesnt pick up well and after an hour or two of gameplay, there's nothing the story has to offer that will keep you going.

... Ok that about wraps up the good. Now to the many problems.

First and foremost is the voice acting and sound. To put it simply, Final Fantasy VII had better voice acting... (and for the few that havent played FFVII, there is no voice acting) The love scenes in this game make the love scenes in "star wars episode II" look golden... Yeah. That bad. The voices don't seem to fit the characters real well but I guess when the voice acting is so terrible, its hard for it to sound good in any way. I thought the voice acting was the real low point, that is until i watched alot of the cutscenes.

To some up the quality of the sound, well... there really isnt any. ALL the cutscenes are completely destroyed as a result of horrible voice acting and NO sound effects. I watched cutscenes which had dragon fights (which sucked), sword fighting and all sorts of movement, ALL with no sound effects. No footsteps, no sword effets, no movement sound at all. As for the actual lines in the game? I seriously think they might have written random words on popsickles sticks, through the popsickle sticks in a hat and what they pulled out made it into the game. No joke...

In most great RPGs, you have great characters... Not in Dragoneers aria. And the one character that should be at least a little cool, the main charcter, you, is a total know-it-all, uncool, girlie lookin guy with long golden blonde hair... I dont know about you but i prefer my video games to NOT be made by crack addicts. The only possible way for the main character to get any worse is if they took Michael jackson and had his dragon power be the "seducing little kids chant of mystery".

I thought the cutscenes were the real low point in the game... that is until i actually played through a good portion of it and saw what the gameplay was really like. Ok, the very first dungeon in the game... i died at least thriteen times... And I only play RPGs so I'm usually pretty good... In the very first dungeon of the game i was matched up againts some bad guys that were way to low a level for me and other guys that had to be at least ten levels higher than me for I would be on a single fight for fifteen minutes, get close to killing the bad guy, then the monster would just fully heal himself with all my guys health almost gone... I shouldnt have to run back and forth for an hour and level up in the easiest fighting zone in the game, just to get past the first dungeon.(which is what I had to do)

The battle system revolves around horrible gameplay features that are not fun and just bring the whole game down. The battles do not flow smoothly at all and I eventually gave up on it and went back to "Brave Story". The level and dungeon design on the game is just as bad as the battle system. Just plain boring and not fun.

Is this what we have to put up with until "Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core" for PSP? I hope not. The PSP is an amazing system that is bad mouthed bacause of crappy games like this that do not take advantage of it. If you're looking for a pretty good RPG for PSP, I would recommend "Brave Story: New traveler". Its the best original PSP RPG at the moment. Just don't waste your money on Dragoneers aria.