Unintended Experiment
In 2020, a game from the Chinese studio miHoYo (also known as HoYoverse) called Genshin Impact was released. It caused a sensation in the gacha game market, spawning a huge number of imitators copying everything possible: style, game mechanics, monetization, and even the interface.
But what if you completely remove all the service parts from such a product? Remove the online connection, get rid of gacha elements, disable monetization, and release the game as a single-player project?
The South Korean studio Hound13 with the game DragonSword: Awakening unwittingly took on this question. Initially, it was supposed to be another clone of the popular miHoYo project, but the developers had a falling out with the publisher — Wepson company — bought back the rights to their brainchild, and switched the game to single-player rails, which was a pleasant surprise.
DragonSword: Awakening very closely replicates the miHoYo game. If you've played "Genshin," you'll recognize its features at first glance: the interface, design, color palette, leveling system, and many other elements. And the Kingdom of Orbis is a spitting image of Mondstadt. There's even a snowy mountain in the background!
Initially looking like a cheap Genshin Impact copy, had it been released as originally intended by the publisher, it would not have withstood the competition with the genre giant and other clones. But Hound13 managed to stand out and save itself from instant oblivion, as confirmed by the numbers on Steam: at the time of writing, the game has 90% positive reviews.
Dragons, Eighth Graders, and an Unfinished Plot
DragonSword: Awakening is a light fantasy adventure created according to the genre's patterns. Playing as a small group of aspiring mercenary adventurers, we arrive in the Kingdom of Orbis. There, the main characters get involved in a confrontation with the Primal Dragons, who seek revenge on humans for the defeat they suffered 60 years ago and want to reclaim the continent. After all, those who defeated the strongest of them then — six great heroes — can no longer stop them.
The story here is simple, but presented with taste. Lots of humor and silliness that makes you want to palm your face. Johnny, the captain of our gang, stands out especially, as he "suffers" from eighth-grader syndrome: he behaves too loudly and provocatively, which results in a mountain of absurd moments.
The beginning of the plot is chaotic, but later the story picks up and becomes interesting: the lore is revealed, an intrigue with one of the main characters appears, and some characters captivate with their charisma or unusual decisions. Although there is no depth or tragedy here, sometimes the game makes you wonder: are humans really right in this conflict?
Some side quests are also good. I was particularly amused by the quest with the guard who asked me to find the tastiest mushroom for him. This resulted in a hilariously absurd story where the protagonists messed up a lot, tried to fix it somehow, and ultimately created something that couldn't have been imagined at the beginning. I laughed until I cried!
The text is excellently written: there are slang phrases, meme expressions, and so on. All of this perfectly characterizes the characters, like Johnny. But the main thing is that there isn't too much "water" here: the dialogues are not boring, and you don't want to skip them.
However, the plot in the game is not finished: only the first act of the story is completed, which leaves many questions. And how the developers will further develop the project is an open question. I see three options:
- the continuation will be released as free updates;
- new parts will be paid DLCs;
- a sequel will be released (although this is unlikely).
Familiar, but Beautiful Gameplay
The player assembles a squad of three characters and can switch between them in battle, combining skills. Battles look spectacular, as the heroes unleash hell on the battlefield.
For example, you can combine an ice typhoon, a fire explosion, and a whirlwind of sword strikes into one attack that deals massive damage to both monsters and bosses. And this is done simply: you don't need to jump between characters yourself, pressing buttons at the right time and correctly — the game itself will tell you when and what to press. The main thing is to fill the enemy's scales with various negative effects.
And all of this is excellently animated: the hero can impale a monster on a sword and throw it if it's small, or if it's large, climb on it and beat it painfully for a few seconds. If you perform combos by quickly switching between characters, they can remain on the battlefield, and you won't feel like you're fighting alone.
Also, in battle, you can slide, dealing damage, and you need to keep an eye on your stamina to dodge enemy attacks in time — yes, there are dodges with invincibility frames. This is especially important against bosses, as they hit very hard and can sometimes even deplete a hero's health bar in a couple of quick hits.
It was especially "sweaty" to fight the final opponent of the release version — he has several phases, a large health pool, and strong attacks. This battle is noticeably more difficult than the previous ones, so I had to level up: increase my level, learn skills, level up karma, and collect equipment.
Regarding characters: some are given during the story progression, and some can be pulled from the exchange menu, which was originally intended as an in-game store. From there, you can also get many resources, stones for awakening heroes, and Karma — the local type of weapon. And resources for this can be obtained from chests by exploring the world, by completing dungeons or quests, and by helping NPCs.
Exploration is addictive: we travel through locations, find chests, solve simple puzzles, obtain equipment with random characteristics from dungeons or craft it at the blacksmith, complete boss raids, and so on. I always liked the gameplay of Genshin Impact, and without unnecessary service overlays, it looks even better!
I liked the movement system. Heroes themselves cannot fly or climb walls, but they can use a familiar: a summoned mount that glides, climbs, and even dives. Moreover, there is a standard familiar for everyone, and there are special ones that still need to be obtained — they have innate unique skills and look beautiful.
However, there is a small problem with the controls: sometimes they are too sensitive. In platforming dungeons, this can lead to frequent falls, which is annoying — especially considering that in some places you need to hit pixel-perfectly to avoid falling. And when playing with a gamepad, it's not always convenient to use menus, so I combined the mouse with the controller.
The game has a small amount of interactivity. You can break various boxes and even wooden towers where monsters are located, enter many houses, or grab explosive barrels and throw them at enemies.
Item carrying is a separate mechanic. You'll have to do this often, especially if you want to restore all broken statues or solve all puzzles.
It's noticeable that the project was redesigned from multiplayer to single-player: there's an analogue of a battle pass, in-game achievements (and not just those displayed on Steam), cooperative boss raids, and many other things. There's even special trial content with good rewards. However, this doesn't hinder the game in any way, as everything is well-balanced.
As an example, the game's difficulty. It's not chosen in the settings, but depends on your mercenary corps' rank: the higher it is, the higher you can raise your heroes' level, the stronger enemies become, and the more significant the rewards. At first, you might think: "Why raise the level if the game becomes harder? It will be like in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, where leveling up only complicates the playthrough."
However, I repeat, closer to the end of the plot, the difficulty sharply increases, as dungeons, including story ones, are fixed in level. Therefore, it's better to level up in time so as not to get into trouble, which would require spending a whole day to raise several ranks in a row.
Fortunately, the game has no analogue of "Resin," which accumulates in real time and without which nothing can be done. In service gacha games, this is necessary so that the player cannot quickly complete all content and returns every day. But in DragonSword: Awakening, you can spend hours in dungeons trying to get equipment with the best characteristics, instead of waiting for energy to replenish.
Technical Aspects and More
The project was created on Unreal Engine 5, but there are no major optimization problems: the FPS counter is consistently high, and in over 30 hours of gameplay, it only dropped a couple of times. I played on an RTX 5060 paired with a Ryzen 7 5700X, which is above the recommended requirements, but knowing how capricious this engine can be, credit must be given to the developers.
However, there were bugs, though not critical ones: sound would freeze, scripts wouldn't trigger, and puzzles in the world wouldn't work. But almost all of this was fixed by restarting the save, which is done automatically almost every second.
There was only one serious bug: it was related to DLC character skins. After the day one patch, alternative appearances for some heroes suddenly became available to me, although previously, attempting to equip them would redirect me to the game's Steam page, suggesting I buy them. I decided to take advantage of this, thinking the project's creators had become generous.
But after that, the game started displaying the message "Suspicious game activity detected. The game will close" and crashing to the desktop. At that time, I didn't understand the reason, so I completely reinstalled it, which helped. It's good that the project "weighs" little — only 20 GB.
The graphics in the game are anime-styled and look beautiful. The striking character designs are especially pleasing: I recognize the Korean style! Although some heroes are too reminiscent of characters from other games: Lyut is a copy of Yanqing from Honkai: Star Rail, and Seris resembles Eula from Genshin Impact.
I want to criticize the developers for the low variety of animations: characters repeat the same poses over and over again. Lyut, for example, is constantly surprised and waves his arms in the same way. After 10-15 hours of gameplay, this becomes tiresome, and by the end of the playthrough, it's downright annoying.
The music reminded me of a mix of compositions from Final Fantasy (especially in the menu), Dragon Quest, and something unique. However, the OST in Orbis Royal Castle is too monumental and quickly gets boring: you want to finish all your business as quickly as possible to leave there.
A few words about the translation. The game is translated into many languages, including Russian, but it seems to have been done by a neural network: there are many errors with cases, character genders, tenses, names, and titles.
This most strongly affected a girl named Rin. She is constantly called either Rin or Lin. Moreover, in the same dialogue, which looks strange. The thing is that in Asian languages there is no "L" sound, and "R" is used instead, but the names of heroes with this letter are always translated differently. The neural network, apparently, did not decide on the choice.
All of this is not critical — you will understand everything anyway. However, it affects the perception, creating an impression of cheapness of the project. Nevertheless, it's better this way than without translation at all.
Verdict
DragonSword: Awakening is a forced experiment. The developers took the well-known formula of service gacha games and turned it into a single-player adventure.
And it turned out well: a decent — though unfinished — plot, charismatic characters, a good exploration system that is closely linked to progression. Exploring this world is very easy, pleasant, and interesting. You can easily get lost and find yourself on the other side of the map after several hours of exploration.
The combat system is a significant advantage of the project: battles are spectacular and well-balanced. Boss fights are especially enjoyable and challenging: you'll have to level up well, choose a squad and equipment, and study the habits of your adversaries.
Among the problems, minor bugs can be noted, but they occur infrequently and are fixed by restarting the save. However, the optimization is quite good, despite Unreal Engine 5.
The main thing is that this game can be bought once and played whenever you want and for as long as you want, instead of being a "slave" to the project. I am sure that there will be enough players who don't mind immersing themselves in an analogue of Genshin Impact that doesn't obligate them to anything, unlike the original. And the price is acceptable: 1590 rubles on Steam.
However, the fact that the plot remains unfinished could become a problem if the developers decide to sell the continuation as DLC — this would definitely raise the overall price significantly.