Old dragon games ftw: Drakan - TOotF

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Hi there ma dearies :hug: ,

I hope most of you enjoy the summertime.
Last evening, while drawing on one of the last gifts I want to submit soon, I had this weird idea of presenting you some of my old games. No, don’t worry, I’m not planning of doing a Let’s play, or something like this ^^. I just want to present you some of my old favourite games, I used to play (or still play from time to time). Some of them are good, some bad, some hilarious but all of them have a few things in common: They’re all for PC, contain dragons and are in rather old fashioned graphics. If you don’t mind that, I hope you enjoy my little summer special and maybe you’ll try one of them out someday too, they’re really worth it.

Soo let’s start with one of my absolute favourites: Drakan – The Order of the Flame

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                                                                                                                          Arokh and Rynn by Aarok

BG Story: This actionadventure was released in the year 1999 by Psygnosis (sadly, this company doesn’t exist anymore...). The gamer jumps into the role of the warrior Rynn, who tries to save her younger brother Delon, that was captured during a raid of her village. Her fosterfather(?) Atimar sends her out to find the red dragon Arokh, a legendary creature, who had saved the world of Drakan alongside his rider Heron before. After Heron’s death, Arokh turned to stone and Rynn had to search for a certain crystal to ‘revive’ him. He is not really amused about joining her on her quest, but has no real choice anyway. Both form a bond, in which their souls melt together and after that, they start their epic journey. ... Ah I’m no good storyteller...


                                                                                                    Rynn and the Iceblade by Aarok I bring u fire by Aarok      

Gameplay: I always enjoyed the fluid gameplay of Drakan. You are able to control Rynn and Arokh, both on the ground and in the air. The game itself has many different settings, like mines, tropical islands, lavacaves... and bridges made out of light. Some of the areas are only passable for Rynn, like small caves, but most are a mixture of flying and groundlevel and it is most time possible, to fly or land at will. I loved this freedom and the fact, that sometimes, you can only reach certain secrets in the air. So it’s always good to mount your dragon and fly around.

Like in most adventure games there are tons of hostile creatures, who want to be defeated. Rynn fights either with several swords, maces, hammers or with the bow, while Arokh is able to attack with fire, ice, poison and lava. At first, he only is able to use fire, but later on you can unlock new powers, by defeating strong bosses. But for some reasons, I always had the feeling, that the firebreath is more useful than all of them... Oh ,Rynn and her scaly companion share one ‘life’, since their lives are connected so they both die, when their health runs out.  

Enemies range from the typical fantasystuff like orcs, ghosts and knights over to more exotical things like succubi, lizardmen and even other dragons. I never was sure, if I should pity them, or not ;). This game is not only a hack n’ slay game but also has some smaller riddles and jumping passages in it. Nothing too difficult though.
                                                                                                     Werokh by Aarok
Waterfall by Aarok

Sound: The soundtrack is lovely and gives the whole game such a dark and mysterious touch, I’m not sure why, but I especially adore the music of the titlescreen... All characters in the game are fully voiced and the story is told in small cutscenes. From time to time, Rynn and Arokh also give some little amusing quotes, but not too often.

 

Positive: It’s really one of these rare games, where you can play a dragon and a rider. The graphics are nice for the time and it has a wide variety of enemies, zones weapons and missions. You can finish the game in +- 20 hours, depends on how skilled you are and how long you look for secrets, but you always see something new. Airbattles on Arokh :3 and the sound of the Wartoks. Buuuargh! xD

Negative: Rynn’s inventory is way too small and I hated it, that also quest items took space away! Some passages were quite unfair, especially at the end of the game.


Last but not least: There even was a sequel of this on the PS2 but I didn't really like it, the graphics were better but the whole game plot and such felt weird. Plus the endling was unsatisfying...

Drakan in motion / from YT


... and next time, I present you a rather questionable game about a dragonfarm... see ya ;)



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Atlas231's avatar
I think I heard of this game somewhere else before. Not really my style, but cool non the less.

Also, I like your review format! Mind if I use it as an inspiration should I feel like writing some reviews myself?