Character design at its finest
The basic fighting of the game is at its core like a kids version of Virtua Fighter. It seems pretty clear that the game was designed around a standard control scheme and slapped onto the Wii, but it works ok given its simple design. There is a punch button, a kick button, a side step button, and a block button. Basic fighting consists of comboing variations of the directional control with punch and kick. Each character has a dozen or so canned combos in this fashion, but you can juggle by varying the orders. There's also a meter that when full allows you to change into a super form of your character who has extra power and also has access to three Dragonball style super moves, which unfortunately are the same for every character. The first is a series of fireballs which the opposing player must avoid by shaking the controller at the right time. The second is a large power shot, which initiates a waggle competition between the two players, where whoever shakes the Wii Remote and Nunchuck fastest wins out in the 'beam war'. The next allows the initiating player to create a pattern of controller motions which the recipient must copy to not get hurt. The idea of adding minigames to a fighter works ok, but with only three in the entire game it grows old quickly, both in single and multiplayer.
While Legend of the Dragon still works ok as a fighter, it's not even as deep as the earliest 3D fighters out there, and is sloppily put together. Overall, the fighting system is about as advanced as a mid-generation PS1 or Saturn fighter. Pretty much every character feels the same, with a few slight exceptions (the big guy is slightly slower but more powerful – gasp!). And while not exactly glitchy, the game can be slow to react to orientation changes, and handles collision detection poorly, so it can often look awkward. The generally poor animation doesn't help this either – while some animations can look decent in isolation, the transitions between them can be quite jarring. But with all these problems, the game's aping of the classics means it is still somewhat playable, and it can be marginally fun to get out a few of the better combos.
Fighters fighters everywhere, but they all play (and often look) the same
Legend of the Dragon is pretty much as bare bones a fighter as you could release. As well as the obvious Versus, Tournament and Survival modes, there's a single player story mode where you can only play as Ang or Ling, and must move around a 3D world map (incidentally the nicest looking part of the game), defeating enemies that challenge you, much like Soul Caliburs quest mode. For each of the henchmen that challenge you, you are given a condition for the fight, such as a limited time frame, or finishing with a certain move. Unfortunately, it's both boring and annoying, as if you accidentally kill the enemy by any other means you lose and must repeat the challenge. It's like the designers just slapped the ideas in there without testing them, as you may have to try 20 times to just have the guy in the right spot. And there are many other glitches. All the plot of the game is contained in the story mode, but it's boring, terribly written and certainly not worth trudging through.
Graphically, the game is like a budget version of the many Anime tie-in games like the Naruto and Dragonball Z fighters on the Gamecube. It features cell-shaded main characters placed on non cell-shaded 3D arenas. It's not horrible to look at, but technically it's pretty low end - about on par with a 1st generation Dreamcast game. The arenas are bland and uninspired, and while the characters are decently modeled, their limited animation makes most movement look cheap. It's not really the fault of the game since it's a licensed property, but the character designs are pretty generic and ugly. No characters came across as anything near 'cool' looking to us, there seems to be little logic as to what characters turn into - some become animal-like (loosely following a Zodiac theme), others just limp superhero clones. And some characters are just downright ugly, especially in their transformed states. On top of all this, there is almost no voice acting in the game, which is bizarre for a licensed property, and with the game's generic and generally sparse soundtrack, sometimes the sound feels so empty that it's like it's not even there. Presentation is as simple as you can get, with the bare minimum of non-in-game content possible to get by.
The animation can be breathtaking
Games for kids don't have to be awful. Much like great kids movies, the best kids games are also great for adults – just look at Pokemon, the ultimate kids game of the last ten years. Legend of the Dragon underestimates its audience, and while not the worst game ever, is another level down the licensed shovelware ladder, even from your regular Disney tie-ins. Based on what's shown here, the source material doesn't look like it's much chop either, but kids, and gamers, deserve better.
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