Un juego que siempre quise jugar por el amor que le tengo a la secuela.
Un RPG que se mantiene atrapante gracias a la mezcla de dungeon crawling y construccion, 6 personajes jugables y un sistema de mejoras de armas curioso.
Aunque suena como un muy buen juego, al final se queda corto en varios aspectos.
Los 6 personajes jugables que aparecen conforme avanza la historia, mayormente son utiles en la seccion del juego donde se unen para luego ser relegados a herramientas para abrir puertas y matar uno que otro monstruo que necesita ese personaje en específico.
El sistema de mejora de armas toma su tiempo y es muy dependiente de la suerte que tengas con los drops de enemigos y cofres (tambien te puedes aprovechar de este facilmente).
La historia es sencilla y un poco babosa pero tampoco es algo que afecte mucho al juego en general.
En general el juego es divertido aun con sus problemas y tiene contenido para largo.

Stellenweise netter Soundtrack und das aufleveln der Waffen macht tatsächlich Spaß.

Alles andere wird entweder nicht zeitgemäß oder einfach schlecht.

Das Spiel ist leider deutlich zu leicht um das Leveln zu rechtfertigen, in den meisten Dungeons gibt es 4-5 Gegner und dennoch kann man seine Waffen auf 6 Elemente und 10 (?) Gegnertypen skillen.

Und wenn man es nicht tut, ist es dennoch kein Problem.

Das Spiel ist alles in allem seeeehr langsam. Die Kämpfe sind langsam und ohne Nutzung eines Verbrauchgegenstands, kann man nicht rennen.. und diesen kann man in Städten nicht nutzen.

Dazu noch das letzte Dungeon, das wirklich unverschämt lang war.

Stummer Hauptcharakter, miese Story und dennoch hat es irgendwie Spaß gemacht.

Die Abwechslung von Städtebau (simpel gehalten) und Deungeoncrawling funktioniert und im 2. Teil wurde wirklich vieles besser gemacht.
Wer beide nicht gespielt hat, kann sich hier getrost auf den 2. Teil stürzen.

US version

this game is pretty okay the dungeons parts can get boring because they are mostly palette swaps with new enemy's the whole game and the town building can be fun you get a choice between 6 characters that you can switch from at any time only in dungeons witch are toan,xiao,goro,ruby,ungaga and osmand but why bother choosing when xiao is literally the most overpowered character in the game with long range and a early 30+ damage weapon and by the end is like a literal god i give this game a 7/10

Dark Cloud was notable for its blend of action-rpg, dungeon crawling, and light city-building. Far from merely jumbling those elements together, this game elegantly weaves parts of each that interact with one another from mode to mode, creating this addictive loop. Apart from the RPG aspects encouraging creativity and customization, the additional characters also enable strategic depth beyond their gimmick, not only providing a different combat style but also opening up new avenues to handle resource management, enemy interactions, and general dungeon crawling. The setting, characters, and graphics are for the most part uninspired, although especially Zelda-like are the enemies, delightfully irritating to fight with individual combat details that only add to the gameplay flow.

Not all of it works, unfortunately. Each unique dungeon disappointingly feels like a slight variation on the same theme with reskinned enemies, the Limited Zones mechanic makes certain floors way more tedious than it should, and the uneven boss bottles are either too easy or too frustrating. Even so, Dark Cloud remains an overall effective and sprawling work. It's impressive how Level-5 managed to fuse several styles into such a cohesive, calculated, engrossing whole.

I really loved this game (and its sequel moreso) in the PS2 days. I replayed it fairly recently though, and really don't think that it has held up all that well.

Basically it's half town building sim/half dungeon crawl, with some light RPG elements. Act Raiser is the only other game that I've played that has taken these completely disparate genres and put them together.

It's super interesting and this game does have some good ideas. Finding new town components in the dungeons and subsequently placing them in town always yields a gratifying feeling.

However, for every interesting or fun idea, there exists another to detract from the experience. Breakable weapons don't add challenge to the game, it simply makes it unfun, as you constantly have to stop playing the game to fiddle with inventory minutiae. This is also the only game that I've played that has a 'thirst' meter, and probably for good reason. There's nothing fun, or even fair, about getting thirsty in a dungeon that doesn't even have a water pool (the dungeons are randomly generated, so this happens somewhat often). It just feels like playing an RPG where your character is poisoned from beginning to end.

Overall, there's enough here to make me reallllllly want a Dark Cloud 3, which we will unfortunately never see.

Going into Dark Cloud, I was expecting an RPG adventure akin to Grandia, and what I ended up getting was a rogue-like experience attached to a city building simulator. What's perhaps weirdest of all though, I played through a rogue-like I could not only tolerate, but kinda like.

To say my love for rogue-likes is minimum is an overstatement. I love a lot of genres in games, but rogue-likes always put me on edge and boost any anxiety I have up to the max. There is just something inherently I don't like about Rogue-likes and that's being punished for trying to explore more, and getting set back to square one. While I wouldn't say Dark Cloud is that bad when it comes to dying consequences, it still feeds into the loop of safety vs. risk, and punishing you with more grinding if you die by taking your current weapon.

Dark Cloud thankfully had a neat mechanic of building your towns in each chapter, and rescuing a new character in each new chapter, and honestly I was all for that jam. You can set up the town however you wanted, and even sometimes had to rearrange the town in a certain way to get better rewards from towns people and the like. Each new character you got in Dark Cloud also had their own moveset and personality to look forward to, and it was always a treat to start a new chapter to see them.

Story is still rather minimal in Dark Cloud however, and while you do get to build cities and meet with villagers, it never really goes above and beyond it's story telling of evil genie hurts local people's lives, but this is only a minor complaint.

Really at the end of the day, Dark Cloud is a far more accessible and neat idea for a rogue-like I've seen, and deserves the following it has. I do issues with the weapon= levels, but it thankfully wasn't as big of a hurtle due to playing safely. I recommend anyone to play Dark Cloud if they are looking for a rogue-like that is a bit out there, but has a ton of charm.

In my youth, I played this game on and off again. Years later, I tried to playthrough but never got to the end. Yet now, I have finally played through it after so many years. This... magical and magnificent fairy tale may have set a foundation in the early days of the PlayStation 2. However, age may have worn this game since it shows its time.

Set in a fantasy world, Dark Cloud centers around a young boy named Toan (Although, the Player are able to rename him and his companions) who is sent on a world saving quest to stop the evil Dark Genie from destroying everything. As Toan adventured foward with new companions to help him, the truth behind the Dark Genie's origins are revealed. A mix of a dungeon-crawl RPG, with a touch of rogue-lite, and town building simulation where request can be fulfilled for additional rewards. There is indeed a repetitive nature when it comes to dungeon crawl games where the Player will have to go in out of the dungeon to fix the town and resupply, but with the playstyle of the different characters can keep things more interesting. However, there is no voice acting in the game outside of character grunts and some of the companions that follow Toan don't really show up in cutscenes. Most of them join and that's it. Yet, they do leave an impression enough to use them in the dungeons.

Combat is a major aspect of the game where players have to defeat monsters to progress through. As well as collecting Atla, what holds the pieces of the region's town. Basically, the formula for Dark Cloud is: "Fight monsters, find the key, collect Atla, and find the door to the next floor". Rinse and Repeat for dozens of times. Mainly, for combat, players will press Cross to attack the monster enough times until they fall, as that is basically it. Each character have their own different attack styles from melee to range attacks. From Toan's combos strikes to Goro's slams and from Ruby's charge spells to Osmond's burst range attacks. Each character has their own unique method of fighting that the Player can master and see which monster type said character can excel in fighting against.

Throughout the game, Players will have to explore dungeons to collect the town pieces to rebuild it and rid the region's influence of the Dark Genie. Some of the characters have their own way of unlocking doors that may be required to get through. However, this can be an issue at times. A prime example I can think of is when Ruby has to open doors with a crystal of a chosen element such as fire or ice. If she doesn't have the proper element, then the Player may be forced to leave the dungeon and go back to it in hopes that the crystal as the right element for them. This type of issue is also added when a character has fallen. If there is a door that needs to be unlocked via that character and they're not available then the Player is SOL and JWF. At then end of each dungeon is a boss. Some of them are pretty easy to fight as others are just outright unfair. One being the third area's boss, The Ice Queen, and the final boss itself. The former has the ability to send a homing freeze attack the character in place before sending down an icicle for additional damage, which may two-shot that character; worst of all that is her main attack. The final boss may be worse because they have an attack that is completely unavoidable unless you use Goro's charge ability. Overall, the combat can feel fun at times but the game does shows it age with certain bosses.

The other half of the game is town building. Here, Players can rebuild the towns they are in to restore what was destroyed. As stated before, players can fulfill certain requests from towns people to additional rewards to help them on their journey. You can also fish in these towns to collect points for items to use to help as well. What makes this fun is that, if the Player can wish, they can build the town the way they want to with their own ideas. The story's progression will require players to rebuild certain buildings to in order to continue on. If the player hasn't collect the necessary parts, they may have to revisit the dungeon until they get what they need. Yet, if sticking with the formula as stated above, this may not be too much of an issue.

The one unique thing about Dark Cloud is the weapon evolution. If the Player has collected a new weapon, they can place attachments to it to fulfil the requirements to upgrade it to it's fullest form. However, this may be troublesome since all of the character's weapons are able to evolve, thus leaving certain supplies short. On top of that, if the weapon's HP is depleted, it will be destroyed, thus losing the progress built on it. Another issue is having the best weapons, especially near the end of the game. Because if certain characters, either through RNG, not having enough upgrades, or don't have the best weapons, then fighting enemies and bosses will take a long time than it needs to be.

The music in Dark Cloud helps with its atmosphere of being a whimsical adventure story. From the music to Toan's home village to the each dungeon's OST, there can be a sense of relaxation while playing the game. However, this can be interrupted with the same battle music every time the player fights an enemy. Yet still, it does keep the game still is able to keep its charm.

Overall, Dark Cloud has charm with its premise and gameplay; unpolished and outdated, but enjoyable. As with it being one of the PS2's launch titles, it has its place among the games worth being noticed. The Toan's story has been told and this review is at its end. Something that should've been done a long time ago is finally done. Now it is time to move on.