This game starts out weird, gameplay is rough, story is kinda confusing, super useless tutorials ("change crests with the crest change button" oh gee thanks!!), and the game has some moments of frustration involving some regenerators but at the same time i couldn't help but keep playing due to the super bizarre premise while also being the type of game that will reward you for sticking with it. Yes this game has a steep learning curve but once you get used to it, you start upgrading your character and learn what legion is best for the stage it's all smooth sailing from there. One thing consistent about this game is the phenomenal soundtrack composed by the great Hideyuki Fukasawa, from moody to quite epic tracks, it really sets the mood for this medieval-apocalyptic-gone-to-hell setting. All in all, if you have the patience then go for it and most importantly don't go expecting a DMC-like game.

contrary to its presentation and initial gameplay, chaos legion is nothing like devil may cry

the exaggerated, emo, anime stylings are all there, as is the production of the music (which is fucking awesome) but what starts off as a mindless hack n slash quickly becomes a painfully unforgiving strategy game that's more about bringing the right tools to a fight rather than technical combat or flashy combos

equipping the wrong legions for a boss can be the difference between a 2 minute washout and a 10 minute chipfest, and unfortunately the tutorials do a pretty terrible job of telling you that - they're poorly translated, brief, and barely even helpful in the first place. the actual manual doesn't fare much better, so i strongly recommend checking a player-made beginners guide on gamefaqs unless you get off on trial and error - cause you're gonna be doing a lot of it

highly recommended despite the steep learning curve!

Selten war ich so froh, dass ein Spiel endlich endlich vorbei ist..
Auf der einen Seite hat das Spiel eine wahnsinns Grafik, auf der anderen Seite gibt es außer den Charakteren nichts, was auch nur ansatzweise gut aussieht.

Das Gameplay ist eine Frechheit.
Man bekommt anfangs gesagt, dass man mit L3 rennen kann.
ja.. an ein paar Stellen mag das sein. Die meiste Zeit, laufen einem die Kumpanen im Weg rum, wird das Tempo auf schlendern gedrosselt oder muss man sich durch eine 4 Meter breite Lücke quetschen, damit es ja länger dauert, bis man die Credits sieht.
Grundsätzlich wird auf die Lebenszeit geschissen.
Eine Kiste schlagen? Dauert 2 Sekunden, eine nicht getroffen? wieder 2 Sekunden weg.
Rasten? 15 Sekunden.
Eine Tür anklicken, die verschlossen ist? 5 Sekunden, Cloud muss ja den Kopf schütteln.
Ins Menü gehen um Waffenpunkte auszugeben? Eine Ewigkeit.
In FFX habe ich das Sphärobrett für 7 Mann schneller abgehakt als auch nur eine Waffe bei FFVII. Und da gibts wirklich nichts zu überlegen.

Das Kampfsystem ist stupide, Viereck drücken, bis man eine Fähigkeit einsetzen kann.. fertig.
Es gibt nichts zu überlegen oder anders zu machen.
Und das nicht mal auf einem leichten Schwierigkeitsgrad.
Wozu gibt es die dann?
Die Nebenquests waren alle unspannend, jeder NPC hat einem anderen NPC dazwischen gequasselt, sodass man am Ende doch nur durch die Menschenmenge gerannt ist ohne irgendwas mitzubekommen.

Der Soundtrack war abseits von 4 Liedern die Hölle.

Die Dungeons waren eine Sauerei.. miese Musik, schlauchig, ohne irgendwelche Dinge zu entdecken und ständiges Tempogebremse.
Ich kann hier irgendein Bild eines beliebigen Dungeons zeigen und kein Mensch könnte sagen, wann und warum man da war, weil einfach alles gleich aussieht.

Schrottplatz, Kanalisation, Tunnel, Labor, wieder Tunnel und noch mehr Labor. Das sind die Dungeons in diesem "Meisterwerk".

Und Kämpfe bringen in der Tat rein gar nichts.
Das eigene Level ist an keiner Stelle spürbar gewesen, Geld bringt nichts, Mogrymünzen bringen nichts, FP sind auch wurscht. Es ist also auch hier eine Zeitverschwendung.

Leider quält man sich hier durch, weil die Cutscenes und Gespräche der Protagonisten es wirklich wert sind.
Die Güte in Aeriths und Tifas Gesichtern ist wahnsinn.
Cloud wirkte endlich mal nicht wie ein Lappen.
Und auch Biggs und Jessi sind wirklich gut geworden.

Aber rückblickend betrachtet hätte ich wirklich lieber einen Youtube zusammenschnitt der Story gesehen, als den Walkingsimulator durchzustehen.

This game is peak in so many regards but also fumbles in so many ways when it comes to combat, quest design and level design. This is probably the highest I’ve rated a game that i have so many complaints with that’s how good the peaks of this game are.

Combat is restrictive, barebones and often plain unfun. 4 hit combo and that’s it? Really? Launcher tied to another character? 6 ability slots while having 30+ abilities and they have cooldowns? Large enemies that don’t reach to you, can’t be juggled and are just wet noodle sponges slap fests to fight? Why would you make an action game like this?

Any time your abilities are on cooldown vs a larger enemy with a stamina bar you can only mash square and do the same 4 attacks over and over. Or weave in some bad feeling magic follow ups to increase it to an samey 8 hit combo. Enemies have too much HP for how boring they are to fight and how little variety they have.

I understand the game can’t be at an 11 of hype at all times or else it would lose its impact but the rise actions of its structure are so BORING. Gotta get margret her 7 shit potatoes for 3 hours before we can actually move the plot forward. There are these little arcs when you get to a new town that has a roadblock preventing you from getting to a bosses’ palace that you must get around and they get so fucking old after the 2nd time they do this. The game could have easily 15 hours shorter with all these boring repetitive shit cut out

85% of the side quest are the shit quests from FF14 you ignore and walk past unless you are an absolute fiend that should be locked in a cage and need something left to do after playing it for 7000 hours. They sprinkle you with some good ones every once in a while and it isn’t until the literal final hour do you get all the good side quests with your friends.

The open world is barren and has zero reason to traverse. The game is an assortment of hallways they tried to obfuscate by putting them in empty warehouses. I’d rather it just have Stranger of Paradise’s level structure because that was too the point.

The music to this game is incredible. People finally getting a taste of some of the best FF music now that it isn’t locked behind 300+ hours into an mmo. The performances are great and the sound design for the main villain is really cool. I wished they stuck speaking gibberish like they did at the start.

I was really engaged with the story even if it blue balls you a bit too much in areas and there is one character that may as well be a talking map because all they do is show up to give the game of thrones opening styled map cutscenes of the world.

The scale of boss fights and set pieces are insane. Normies got baited thinking they were buying game of thrones only to find out square secretly made the sequel to asura’s wrath and the hypest kaiju/toku game on the market. Holy fuck those behomet and titan fights. I’ll be thinking about those for a while

Drakengard is one of the most interesting games I have ever played. At its first glance and in its opening hours, it seems like the standard RPG affair, and it's not until after the first of the games 5 endings did the gears start turning in my head. Drakengard’s thesis statement might as well be to subvert the players expectations at every turn after that first ending, and it's honestly one of the most ethereal gaming experiences I have ever witnessed. To be honest, I’m having trouble even formulating all of my thoughts in an even slightly coherent manner, because this game is so fucking good. I think it is inevitable that in a few months I will find anything I say in this review somewhat shallow but that's the beauty of interpretive art like this. I didn't truly understand Evangelion after I first watched it at 15 and I think my Metal Gear Solid 2 review is extremely surface level now but I leave it up as a digital time capsule. Can you tell this review is going to be a lot of yapping?

The game is a deconstruction of RPG and general fantasy tropes in such a brilliant way, at first seeming to give into them. However, as you go on and dig under the surface of these characters and realize their complexities you start to understand and appreciate Drakengard that much more. Caim at first looks the part of your standard pure of heart RPG protagonist, even going mute at the very beginning of the game to mimic this. However, you very quickly realize that Caim is an absolutely bloodthirsty maniac. He is purely fueled by blind rage and bloodlust, yet will still protect his sister because he knows he's supposed to care for her. The game calls you out on this constantly but you must continue the bloodshed in order to press on with the game…
His sister Furiae seems to be your standard pure and innocent “damsel in distress” character, but this presentation of her character early on is almost like a red herring of sorts. Her lack of development is a critique of that archetype in and of itself. She purposefully keeps the less savory parts of her locked away, and it's not until the end that it's revealed more. Her feelings for Caim are just subtly incestuous which serve to drive home the point that despite her surface level appearance as your standard pure damsel in distress, that's really not what she is. Every character is like this really, Verdelet constantly accosts Caim for his bloodshed yet he is the one that drives him to action most often and routinely benefits from it. Inuart seems like the standard best friend character but gets consumed by jealousy and a pursuit of power to protect his lover, almost acting like the protagonist of a story that's not his. The greatest thing about the complexities of these characters is that it's never too particularly in your face about it either. I absolutely love how this game urges you to dig deeper into its themes. Other than the deconstructive elements of the plot, I feel like Drakengard is a story about hatred, revenge, the things we lose, the importance of love and what a lack of love can do, and the inherent faults of humans. In endings A B and C, Caim loses those closest to him due to his endless conquest of bloodshed. He ends with less things than he started. Ending A he not only loses Furiae and Inuart, but Angelus as well. Ending B he loses not just the three mentioned but the world is doomed and it seems like whatever battle that comes next won't be one Caim survives. Ending B in particular really brings things full circle for Furiae to me as well. After an entire game where she gets minimal screen time or development, the world is filled with grotesque clones of her that doom the world. She no longer has any love for Inuart or even Caim, after Inuart obsesses over protecting her. In Ending C Caim is forced to kill Angelus with his own two hands, the final price of his senseless killing is killing one who he holds the most dear. In each of these first three endings Caim is explicitly punished for his bloodshed. None of these endings are happy, and when I was playing I thought that surely endings B and C would be happier endings than ending A. However, Drakengard does not feel compelled to do this and each ending gets even more bleak than the last. You could take this as the game just being edgy, but I think to do so would be to blindly deny the game of its narrative qualities. Ending D sees the world caught in a permanently frozen state, but not before Caim dies in the end. It's so bleak and just so ethereal. Ending E is the most out of left field one. Caim and Angelus end up in fucking Shinjuku where they play a rhythm game to beat the final boss before being shot down by two missles from the Japanese defense force. The atmosphere is just so chilling and the imagery of Angelus being impaled on top of Tokyo Tower is one of the coolest things ever. The point I'm really trying to make here though is that every ending ends in varying degrees of misfortune for Caim as a result of his blind rage. Even in D and E where he tries to save the world and do a good deed he is punished with death. In attempting to save the world he also dooms it. Another core theme I find with this game is love. You see this a lot with Manah, who is seemingly manipulated by The Watchers/The Gods into thinking she is loved by them, as she received no love from her own mother and was abused by her. This sends her on a path to creating the apocalyptic scenarios that appear in basically every ending. In the end of ending A, she begs for death from Caim yet neither of them think she deserves such a release. She ends with no one left to give her love, not even The Gods. Inuart constantly tries to look for love from Furiae, completely misunderstanding her at every turn, eventually blaming Caim for his own infidelity and seeking revenge on him. These two themes come together to show that the world is this way because of the faults of mankind. Caim is only a coldblooded killer because of his parents death during the war and the attempted reconstruction of the world is due to the easily manipulated nature of humans especially those that are young and not cared for. In the more abstract, things are this way because of the genre that this story is. There is war, there is untold amounts of bloodshed because this is a fantasy RPG. Caim kills because he needs to level up and continue with the story. Which brings me to the gameplay.

The way people talk about the combat of this game makes it seem like the biggest piece of dogshit ever crafted, but really it's not that bad. The systems present in this game are fine enough and far from what I would call bad. However, the combat in Drakengard IS monotonous, but I think this serves a thematic purpose. You’re not meant to enjoy all the senseless killing, and as I said earlier Caim is punished for the indiscriminate bloodshed. However, this is a video game and you must do what the game says to keep going. You must kill even when you don't want to, to continue the game. It's a commentary on the genre in the sense that in RPGs and most video games in general you are rewarded for bloodshed. You are rewarded for killing senselessly and are never called out on it simply because it's a video game. Drakengard breaks this mold and goes as far to try and make the killing itself unenjoyable. I think it’s a really cool aspect of the game that gets overlooked by some because they simply write the combat off as bad and don't interact with it in a ludonarrative sense. The flying missions are awesome though I cant lie. They do also get a bit grueling at times so the ludonarrative cohesion remains intact but they’re definitely more fun than the ground missions.

The last thing I really want to talk about is the music in this game. Drakengard has the most interesting soundtracks in any game I've ever played. It has the sound of what you would expect from a high fantasy game, except it doesn't. Every song in the game uses samples from famous composers in really interesting ways. From Mozart to Tchaikovsky to Holst, you're bound to recognize some of these composers when you see them in the credits but it's doubtful that you'll actually recognize the songs as they appear in game. The game will often loop the same very short sample over and over to create songs that sound traditionally orchestrated but still have a distinct electronic feel to them. I’ve never heard anything like it— I wouldn't necessarily say that the songs are good in a traditional sense but as far as experimental music goes it's really unique and fun to listen to. The best of these songs is the ending B credits theme, “Growing Wings”. Give it a listen if you'd like to see an example of what I'm talking about.

I think that's about all I have to say about the game at this time. This is a serious contender for one of my favorite games of all time and I implore you to play it if you haven't. This probably isn't the case if you read this spoiler tagged review but the point still stands. This game is a masterpiece