2013-07-25
Dragon's Crown is a modern four-player weapons-based medieval fantasy brawler for the PS3 and PS Vita. It has a unique surreal oil painting visual style that the developer Vanillaware is known for. It plays like an updated version of Capcom's D&D brawlers but with a far stronger emphasis on RPG elements, namely equipment management. It features six distinct fighters with large, diverse movesets that can be upgraded with experience. It also has a cursor that lets you click on the background to find treasure.
Vanillaware also made an action platformer called Odin Sphere that has brawler-esque elements but 2D gameplay. You can grow a fruit and then eat it to level up your maximum hit points. There's also Muramasa: The Demon Blade on Wii and Princess Crown on Dreamcast. George Kamitani, the main man behind Vanillaware, worked on Capcom's Dungeons and Dragons arcade games, thus the similarity in gameplay and setting.
Having played and beaten Dragon's Crown, I can honestly say I hate it. The combat severely lacks a sense of impact and the dodge mechanic ruins the depth. The item management grinds the action to a halt constantly. The graphical style is good but it's depicting extremely tired genre cliches. The limp music is throwaway atmospheric orchestral garbage.
