Perkunas' Dragon Episode 1: the digested review

Made2Game Perkunas’ Dragon Episode 1 Review Score: 5/10
Formats: Xbox 360 (XBLA), PS3 (PSN)
Format Reviewed: Xbox 360
Publisher/Developer: Middle Land Studios
Price: 240 MS Points

Indie games, by their definition, can be a real pain to effectively review. Sometimes you’ll find yourself playing a game that screams innovation and bleeds originality, that you – as a modern gamer – instinctively mark down for having amateur graphics or annoying sound effects. At other times you might find a game that looks so lip-smackingly beautiful that you barely believe it was created on a shoestring budget – but which is then let down by horrible design.

And then you get games like Perkunas’ Dragon Episode 1, which really does sit in a very special place all on its own. Now don’t get us wrong, any game that comes with its own rap song is an almost immediate winner here at Made2Game, but when the developers of said title market their creation as “the ultimate fantasy adventure game… Realistic, exciting and challenging”, one expects, as well one should, something amazing. Which, in absolute fairness to Middle Lands Studios, Perkunas’ Dragon most certainly is not.

Perkunas' Dragon isn't the ugliest indie game around by far, but it doesn't try very hard to be unique.

You take control of the aforementioned dragon, sent by the god Perkunas to help the common people who have prayed for an end to war and plague. To begin with, this mostly involves setting fire to hundreds of starlings. Seriously – starlings, which seem capable of summoning up little globs of blue plasma to spit at you. Controlling the dragon is not unlike the top-down shooters of yesteryear, but it’s not particularly responsive, and the dragon’s fiery breath is not particularly accurate.

There are minor RPG elements involved, with various powers available to unlock such as a spinning flame fountain manoeuvre and a strange energy cage that can be dropped anywhere on the screen, but none of it is given a great deal of context and the slightly clumsy tutorial makes it difficult to understand exactly what you’re doing or what’s going on even in the earlier stages.

Perkunas’ Dragon is certainly fun for the first few minutes, but it doesn’t take long to become very repetitive and, while the graphics aren’t completely terrible, they lack anything unique or quirky. Mix all the elements into one big pot, and what you’re left with is a fairly ugly game that feels outdated rather than retro and irritating rather than kitsch. Overall, there are worse things to spend two quid on, but not very many.

Digested-Digested-Review: Dragons are big business at the moment, but apart from that awesome rap song there’s very little to attract anyone to Perkunas’ Dragon Episode 1

Words by Mick Fraser (Twitter: @Jedi_Beats_Tank)

Note: The digested review format: Games come in so many sizes, flavours and colours that it’s impossible – not to say a little dull – to review all of them in the same way. iOS, Android and other mobile games, for example, usually feature low prices and simple game mechanics. So for these we don’t want to waste too much of your time: you mostly want to know whether it’s worth the price and move on. So for most of these we offer special ‘digested reviews’, plus a 140 character or less digested-digested review.

Let us know what you think.

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