Dragon Fantasy Book 1: For PS Vita

     Over the years I've come to the conclusion that I don't really enjoy RPGs.  Mostly due to the mass amounts of grinding to up levels and gear just to handle the absurd difficulty spikes- then repeat the cycle in the next area or part of story.  I gave Dragon Fantasy a go after my brother, who is an RPG-aholic, told me I would actually like this one.

     Well, he was correct, I did like this one.  Firstly, because while there was tedious grinding, it was much less than the games of the 8 bit era it is emulating.  Secondly, the game has a great sense of humor.  Sure it gets highly repetitive, but the game is short enough, overall, to overlook the flaws.

     Though I must say I wish there was more exploring and less wading through enemies.  In the first of 3 story parts (and 1 "intermission") it is super annoying that as retired hero Ogden has to grind for an immense amount of time.  Even the smallest enemies hit for a quarter of your life and they appear at a rate of every 2nd step.  If the first chapter was a little bit longer it would be a massive problem.
     There is also an insane amount of missing when attacking.  I counted at one point 17 misses in a row on my party of 4.  That is an unacceptable occurrence. 

     What kept me going is the humor.  There are tons of small references and nods to things in the game.  The first one I found was an enemy early on is a fly called a "Goldblum."  Nice.  It's hard to go wrong with a Jeff Goldblum joke.  There are wolves called "Blitzer," "Steely" Dan desert nomads, and man-eating flowers named Audrey.

     But my personal favorite is in a dungeon, I came across a Troy and Abed from NBC's Community reference- more specifically an Inspector Space-Time and Constable Reggie reference.  Very nice. 

Troy and Abed in 8 Bits!

     If they keep up the humor and tone down the grinding the part 2 could be a much better installment.  And fix the rate of missing for attacks.  A 25% chance of missing is ridiculous.