The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon PS3 Review

The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon

PS3 Review
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Etranges Libellules

There was a time when the Spyro franchise was one of the elites in gaming, right up there with big characters such as Crash Bandicoot, Mario, and others.  In an attempt to revitalize the franchise, we have been handed The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon, a flashy game which does its best to light some fire under that dragon’s tail.

The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon kicks off with Spyro and his pal Cynder waking up after being asleep for years.

The game is unique in that the story ends up having Spyro and Cynder tied together at the neck, meaning that a lot of the gameplay in the game will revolve around this.

You will be going back and forth throughout the game as you have to control each dragon at different times to get things completed.  This can actually be quite fun at times and is actually innovative in many ways.

I’ll get into the grit of the game though, which has to do with how it all plays out.  The game is not a bad game at all, but the issue with it is that it really does not have all that much variety.

Some of the fun on the PS3 version of Dawn of the Dragon has to do with the flying mechanic, as it does support SIXAXIS flight control.  This is not implemented all that well, but it shows the developer definitely put some effort in improving the PS3 version.

You are going to get thrown into these 3D environments, which are nicely detailed and actually have a lot of flash to them.  The issue though is that you will soon find the game to be extremely repetitive.  Over time, you are going to be button-mashing your way through the same sets of enemies time and time again.

This goes as well for the boss battles in the game, which are tedious and not planned out very well.  Some of the puzzles and such can be innovative though at times, but the difficulty is not consistent enough.

One bonus to the game though is the ability to play two-player co-op offline, meaning you can have two people playing together with two dragons going at once.  This makes the combat and completing all the various tasks much more enjoyable.

If you play the game with two players in co-op, there is definitely some fun to be had here.  Playing on your own will aggravate you though as that second dragon can be a bit of a pain.

The Legend of Spyro Dawn of the Dragon is unfortunately not all that fun of a game, unless you have two young kids who will enjoy playing it via co-op together.  That would be the only way I could recommend this one.  It seems Spyro is once again going to fail in jumping back into the limelight as a premiere gaming franchise.

Graphics: 7.0 Some of the areas and details are respectable, but the game has a lot of bugs and slow-down!

Audio:7.5 Very bland audio in respect to the repetitive sound effects.

Gameplay: 6.0 A repetitive game with a lot of button-mashing. Controlling the two dragons can be a bit of a pain.

Replay Value: 6.0 The co-op mode can be enjoyable, but single-player will not last long.

Final Score: 6.0

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