A tiny little purple dragon with the heart and heroism of a hobbit (literally). A smart-aleck wise cracking dragon fly with the quips of a salesman (literally). And an old, well respected red dragon to lead the way through fantasy (literally). Sierra Entertainment pulled out all the stops to get big name actors to portray the voices in this animated adventure and attempt to get Spyro on top of the gaming market for kids. With the look and feel of an animated movie, The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning has its positives in the visual and audio aspects, but the negatives in the overall game play. Truly at a crossroad, this game plays like it is lost at which direction it wants to go.To begin with the positives, the cast of ALL the characters do a good job in bringing each of the characters to life during the cut-scene storylines. Though the characters don’t sound as if they were with one another when taping took place, each gives out a great deal of lines where they do a good job in trying to emphasize the important feelings in the lines. Elijah Wood does a good job as Spyro, not stretching from his days as Frodo, a unlikely small hero who has to take on enormous mythical beings. David Spade finds his usual role as a sidekick dragonfly, spouting off humorous jokes about the many situations him and Spryo find themselves in. Though he is good, many of the lines just don’t come off with enough emotion to keep an adult entertained. Ignitus (great dragon name) is played by Gary Oldman, who continues to play his characters straight and does an excellent job as mentor to Spyro. Why discuss this? Well, besides the outstanding musical score and talented supporting characters, this is a big part of the game. Part DVD, part video game, the story wraps itself around a quest to get the world back from the evil clutches of Cynder, the evil dragon. If the graphics were as good as the music, many people would be playing The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning, but the motions and movements were a little blocky on the regular Xbox version. I do see a future for these types of games on the Xbox 360, as the graphics will make these mini-playable movies enjoyable for the whole family.
Unfortunately where Spyro excels in one area of gaming, it regresses in another part of gaming. As the storyline progresses into more and more challenges for Spyro, the kingdom itself does not seem to get very creative. The story follows many games in its genre, give a little storyline, fight, practice new moves that the character can use, fight in a different location, practice some more new moves or powers, continue to fight (though never remembering key moves you learned) until this process exhausts itself and you slay the dragon (literally or metaphorically, you be the judge). The controls are extremely easy to use, and very basic. This is good since it is a game rated E for everyone. Attacks can be extremely basic, or more advanced, depending on how many buttons you can remember to press in a particular order. Fighting your enemies is intriguing, with many cool and interesting fantasy creatures. But, it becomes a little monotonous going through the same types of levels, fighting different versions of previous characters. What is good about the game if you are a child is that as you fight and if you die, you do come back to life in the same place you left off in. Why is this important? Because your enemy does not regain their power in most situations, giving you a greater chance of getting through a level without having to revisit the level 20 times before you get past it. This should ease a child’s frustration level, (considering it made me play stress free.) The game does not have many alternative games or levels, and can get boring trying to plow through evil enemy after evil enemy.
I do think that this once popular game played better a few years back. The idea and star power was there, the game just didn’t follow through on the fun Spyro games of the past had. Though this is a better attempt at bringing back a popular series than others I've reviewed, I just don’t feel that the game is worth purchasing, especially since a gamer can probably finish it within a weekend (not that it’s a bad thing, I don’t get to do that very often). I did find some positives about the game. I was able to sit and play with my young daughter for awhile. Since the game had lengthy cut-scenes, she was able to sit and watch them with me. She enjoyed the different dragons that played out on screen and though she didn’t watch me battle through many of the levels, she was interested at the movie-like plot that played out on screen. I had fun at the beginning of the game, but just became bored as the levels didn’t have enough games to play inside them to change up the atmosphere. Spyro was easy to control and mastering his moves was not that difficult, but overall, the gameplay just became too predictable. As I stated before, Spryo is at a cross road, which direction will it take in its next installment to claim the hearts and fingers of children throughout the world?
I played my first video game in 1976 which was a pong game plugged into our black and white TV to keep me busy while my mom took my brothers and sisters to school. I was 4. I played games growing up in the arcade and at friend’s consistently after school, many times missing dinner. I became completely addicted during a long night stretch of Kung Fu on Nintendo. I had to get one and get one I did. I love the old school games, never forgetting my roots. Many a memory I have growing up and conquering games with friends, sacrificing sleep for the thrill of victory. I can play with anyone in Nintendo or Sega games, and yes, I was one of those Sega Hockey freaks who did very well. When game systems changed to the types you see now, I did not immediately jump on the gaming scene. The internet was more important and computer gaming was large. Now, home gaming systems have caught up and you can do all the online gaming you want. I am a big sports game fanatic, love baseball, hockey and now enjoy playing the football games. Though I played different types of shooter/strategy games, the FPS games are now of interest to me (even though my skills are no where near the typical high school gamer). It is fun to get together and play with people who are out having a good time. Though time is a bit tight these days, sacrificing sleep for playing is all part of the game. I enjoy the outdoors, but competition keeps bringing me back to games, and now that they are smarter, makes it even more challenging
