Overall 9.6 Graphics 9 Sound 9.3 Addictive 9 Story 7.8 Depth 9 Difficulty 7.1
9.7
Spyro the Dragon review Zircron Swift
Imagine a game where you can play as a dragon, and you got to burn down your enemies and charge into stuff with your horns, while collecting massive amounts of treasure and fighting bosses three times your size to rescue other dragons and the dragon kingdom itself. Sounds pretty awesome, doesn't it? When Spyro the Dragon came out, not many games at the time offered what Spyro did. It was one of those rare games that to me, is nearly perfect in every way. Title screen is amazing, even the parts where there are just words on the screen is stunning. Why is that? Well, I'll be more than happy to show you.
Once an age ago, there were five dragon families living in five realms. There were the Artisans, the Peace Keepers, the Magic Crafters, the Beast Makers and the Dream Weavers. They lived in peace and harmony for many years. One day, however, Gnasty Gnorc (The "G" is silent), was banished to the Junkyard world for being a nuisance. Gnasty Gnorc didn't really like the dragon families that much. He hated their treasure the most. Whenever he looked into those shiny jewels, he would see his own ugly mug in it. So he wanted to sort that out. He toyed around with magic until he found out the spells he wanted to use: To turn all dragons into crystals, and to turn all jewels into his obedient slaves. How he was able to do this, I don't know. So he was tempted to use this spell, but didn't really use it until he saw the dragon families talk about him. They called him ugly and the next thing you know, all the dragons in the kingdom are turned into crystalised statues, all but one, Spyro. Since he was so small, the spell went over him and missed. Now it's up to Spyro to save the entire race of dragons.
After a short cut scene, you get to start playing, and instantly you are thrown into the lush green lands of the Artisan world. The graphics are amazing, even for a PS1. I've seen some games that don't do the graphics of the PS1 justice at all; being very pixelated and making it look very 32-bit at best. However, games like Spyro the Dragon and Crash Banicoot really show what the PSX can handle. The colours are bright and vibrant, the edges are smooth but sharp, things look like what they are supposed to look like and most importantly, it never lags once, not even when you are rescuing a dragon. The entire game is able to process these beautiful graphics without the system overloading and making the frame rate lower. It stays at the constant frames per second all the way through. This means that the game designers didn't focus too much on making over the top effects, and kept things simple, yet they were able to make something that was stunningly eye catching. I look at it even now and wish I was in that world. The animations are smooth, slender and amazing. I also love how the words are all golden and float around. It's so much better than regular black and white text and almost adds an effect of mystery to the world. This game was able to make text interesting, that’s how good this games graphics is.
The music is superb. Every piece of music to each level fits the area perfectly. It can be calm, exciting, eerie, but most importantly, it can be mystical. Since we don’t know much about the dragon kingdom itself very much or its history, each level holds a certain mystery to it. The graphics help give a feel for that, and the music enhances that feeling to the nth degree. That’s what I praise highly in a game, the ability to give more with less, leaving a lot to the imagination. This game did that beautifully. The best part is I don’t want to know the real history behind everything. I love the mystery that each world has, and you really can let your imagination run wild.
The controls are fun, if a little fiddly and hard at first. It takes some time to get used to before you get the hang of things, as landing on certain platforms might be tough and how you move might be a little stiff. But when you do get hold of the controls, the game becomes very enjoyable indeed. The game is fairly challenging, but isn’t all that hard if you think about it. You can collect one-ups which are pretty rare, and pearls that add up to a 1-up, but again, that takes a bit of time.You also have a dragonfly as a best friend, called Sparx. He can take three hits before he gets knocked out or something. When he takes that third hit, you can only take one hit before dying. So a dragonfly can handle three hits before getting knocked out, but a young dragon can only take one hit before dying...I know he's young still, but come on! You can burn sheep down to get butterflies (don't ask...), and Sparx can eat them to regain strength, AKA extra hits. It's a nice and forgiving system. I rarely got any gameovers, except maybe for the Beast Makers world, which I got several thanks to a certain level or two. Now, if you want to collect 100% of everything, then that makes the game more challenging. Not in the aspect of its “hard as nails” hard, but more of “Where didn’t I look?” hard. If you collect half of the treasure in one level, and then come back to it half way though the game, there’s no indication of where you have and haven’t looked. This means you’re probably going to look in areas you already have, and might cause some frustration. I tend to try and look for everything when I can in a level, because there aren’t the aspects of power-ups involved. This means from the very start of the game, it only takes skill and cunning wit to get to that ledge that has been puzzling you.
The level design is well crafted to allow both a main path that is enjoyable to the player, and a secret section rewarded to those who love to explore. There’s one level where nearly half the level is hidden away, and you can choose to either end the level there, or explore further to see what’s out there. Every level has something that’s out of view, and most of it is fairly easy to find. It would have to be, as the game requires you to collect a certain amount of gems, or free a required number of dragons, or find a certain number of eggs before you can go to the next world. As such, the designers made it so that you could miss out a fair bit of the game so you didn’t have to be perfect, and just enjoy the game as it was. However, there is a secret level if you collect 100% of everything out there, which means you’ll have to collect a fair lot if you skimp over the levels. There are also these flying levels, which gives you the power to fly without having to land. You have a certain amount of time to get all of the four sets of items out there, in which you’ll be rewarded gems for each item destroyed. The more you destroy, the more you get. Harder than it sounds, trust me.
I’ll have to be honest; the bosses are kind of lame. They are pretty easy and work on a sort of hit rule. When they get hit a certain amount of times, they die. When they get hit, however, they run away to another section of the level. It’s an interesting system that works, but is still lame. My only expectation is the boss from Beast Makers, which was a terrific boss. I suppose Gnasty Gnorc as well for being more challenging than all the rest, but most of the other bosses were just too easy by my standards. The level before the boss was harder.
Overall, I give this game a 9.7/10 It’s a must play for any PSX owner. It’s a fairly cheap game to buy, with a ton of replay value and a lasting life in your gaming systems. It’s got a lot to offer and is a ton of fun to play. The graphics are amazing for it’s time, matching the N64 graphics. In fact, I dare say this game has better graphics than the average N64 game. It also has its own sense of humour, which is another thing that makes a great game. Like in the Peace Keepers world, most of the enemies just run away from you on sight and go to their tents to hide. That's funny, but if you burn down their tents, you can see them pulling a moony on you. Just hilarious. If you like platformers, then just play this game as soon as you can, you won’t regret it.
Graphics 10 Sound 9 Addictive 8 Story 4 Depth 10 Difficulty 7
Review Rating: 4.7/5
Submitted: 08-21-12
Updated: 08-23-12
Review Replies: 2
9.3
Spyro: The Famous Purple Dragon ClearAsCrystal
{Overview}: In his debut adventure, Spyro, a small, young purple dragon who, along with his dragonfly pal Sparx, bears the weight of rescuing all of his dragon brothers and recovering stolen treasure from Gnasty Gnorc’s goons. He'll have to charge, jump, glide, run, and fly his way to defeat Gnasty Gnorc.
{Graphics}: The use of a 3D Panoramic Engine perfectly using the hardware capabilities of PS1, although, the camera does have difficulties following the character around using active mode.
{Sound}: The music in the game mostly consists of rock-themed pieces. In fact, you may recognize some of these songs (or pieces of them at least) in theme songs such as The Amanda Show. While some songs are not as memorable as others, the soundtrack for Spyro in each level and world fits respectably.
(Replay Value}: The replay-ability of this game is very high, in my opinion. Players are able to start a new game (or perhaps even continue their old one) with a goal of accomplishing the perfect 120% in the game by saving all the dragons, collecting all the eggs, and recovering all the stolen treasure.
{Story}: The game begins with an interview with a couple of dragons within the Artisan World. When asked by the reporter, a dragon describes Gnasty Gnorc as an ugly, simple minded creature who poses no threat to the Dragon Kingdom. However, he does not know that none other than Gnasty Gnorc is watching the live feed and, enraged, uses a magic spell to turn all dragons in crystal statues and sends in his gnorcs across all five of the Artisan Worlds. One dragon, Spyro, is able to dodge the attack because he is so small. The player’s goal, as Spyro, is to visit all 5 of the Artisan Worlds and rescue all of the other dragons who were trapped in the crystal, collecting gems and eggs along the way.
{Difficulty}: This game’s difficulty depends on whether the player wants to fully complete the game. If the goal is to simply defeat Gnasty Gnorc and save the minimum of dragons, the game can be played through relatively faster, making it moderate in difficulty. Just watch out for the Treetops level!
Graphics 9 Sound 7 Addictive 8 Story 7 Depth 9 Difficulty 8
Review Rating: 4/5
Submitted: 04-25-16
Updated: 04-25-16
Review Replies: 7
10
Awesome Game PokePal435
Heyo People wazzup? It's your neighborly friend and most awesome player there is ;) haha xD I'm here to give my review or one of the most awesome games out there: Spyro the Dragon. So Bear with me, please, as I give you my thoughts on the game. Personally, one of my favorite out of the Spyro trilogy for the PlayStation. Bear with me as I explain how awesome a game it is and always will be.
Graphic 10 - Man I can't remember the last time I have played the classic Spyro games. I guess IT's been so long that I forgot how good the graphics were. I love Spyro and always will for as long as I live and even after I'm dead. That is how much I love Spyro the Dragon. I mean, come on. How can you not say the graphics aren't good. They are crisp and easy to play the game. If the graphics for any game weren't clear and easy to play, how do you think we would continue playing the game? These graphics are really good and I just love Spyro and I will play it all day if I could. That is how much Spyro means to me. I rate Spyro a big fat 10 in graphics..
Sound 10 - I love listening to every but of the game because I forgot how awesome the sound is in Spyro (from the whooshing of when he spits out fire to the ding of when you pick up the gems to the sound each of the bad guys make when they are defeated) Not to mention The music of the different levels. It's just like it to have such awesome sounds throughout the whole game. That's why I give a 10 to the sound.
Addictiveness 10 - Being a Spyro fan makes this game one of the best games to play day after day. I plan on playing Spyro more once I get batteries for my PS3 controller I bought to use to play it. I can't fathom to explain how much I would play Spyro. I love Spyro to the Moon and back and forevermore. Spyro is one of the games on my top 3 list alongside Pokemon and Final Fantasy. Nothing will ever make me hate Spyro because Spyro is my life and always will be. No need to say more because I already explained how addicting Spyro is to me. There's no doubt that I would give this game a 10 for addictiveness since I'm so in love with the classic Spyro.
Story 10 - I love the story of the game. Going to each world, collecting gems, rescuing all the dragons, bonuses, etc. I mean, throughout the game it gets a little bit harder every time. It makes me just wanna keep playing Spyro. I have always loved the story behind the classic Spyro games. Not just the first one, but all the classic Spyro games (Spyro the Dragon, Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage, and Spyro: Year of the Dragon). Spyro has just always been the best game alongside some of the other games I have played. It definitely has the best story out there. Hence why I rate it a 10 for the story.
Depth 10 - This game has so much to it (bad guys, Gems, Good guys, etc.) The story has a lot to it as well. Even the graphics are well. There's nothing more to even say to this section. !0 all the way around.
Difficulty 8 - Just because I haven't played Spyro in ages doesn't mean I can't figure out what to do. Yes there are parts of the game that were difficult but I always figured out what to do to reach unreachable spots. So 8 is what I give difficulty.
Overall 10 - I just love everything about Spyro. Enough said right here. 10 for overall rating.
I gotta go now so see ya around peeps ;)
~PokePal435 has left the building~
Graphics 10 Sound 10 Addictive 10 Story 10 Depth 10 Difficulty 8
Review Rating: 3.9/5
Submitted: 12-08-14
Review Replies: 6
9.6
Spyro arwingstarfight..
Spyro the dragon was the first playstation game i had gotten, my late grandmother, had bought this for me, knowing i was fond of dragons, i'm still fond of them today. As soon as I saw it i thanked her and couldn't wait to play it,introduced to the title screen had me instantly hooked and I knew this was a game I would keep in my possession. The world that Spyro calls home is divided into six homeworlds in a full 3d environment in a time where 3d gaming was still relatively new at the time. The story is pretty simple and has a fairy tale kind of vibe to it that makes it lovable to children back in the day and is still a great game to play today. Simply put, Spyro's friends have been trapped in crystal by a horrid creature named Gnasy Gnorc (the g is silent naturally.) Not only that but Gnasty has turned the dragons treasure into his personal soldiers to enforce his dominion, the problem is he missed Spyro, who being too small was missed by the spell as it went over his head, so he takes it upon himself to save the dragon realms eager to fight the Head Gnorc himself the controls are simple to use and easy to get used to.
There are two forms of attacking enemies, each attack is used against the corresponding enemy, (eg: large enemies must be roasted while shielded enemies must be charged with Spyros horns. The replay value is amazing and the one best thing about the original Spyro trilogy is its replay value when u beat the game the first time, there are still some dragons (possibly) to free, and more treasure to pick up, by getting everything, u will unlock the true ending and replay value is a great way of keeping the game going on longer. The game is utterly addictive and take it from me, you will come back to this game thirsty for more, its just impossible to not want to play it from time to time.
The bosses on the other hand are just plain weak operating on a hit system, meaning all it takes is three hits, two in the final bosses case, if you fight Doctor Shemp, he will use an attack used by Papu Papu from a sister series named Crash Bandicoot which I think, is a fantastic reference and tribute to another playstation icon the difficulty is so easy a new player can easily play it and hardly die. You are accompanied by a dragonfly who acts as spyros bodyguard, he can take three hits and then disappear, if Spyro is hit afterwards and sparx isn't there, you will lose a life. The graphics are a beauty as well and are generally eye catching. It took great advantage of the Playstations graphical capabilities. The graphics never get old even when outclassed by superior graphics of more modern systems. the world in Spyro the dragon is a diverse one, including rolling green hills, arid deserts, high mountains, a murky swamp a dream like world in the sky and an industrial world, and shared between these home worlds are even more environments, that make it a cult classic game.
The sound is by far one of one of the richest soundtracks in a video game with loads of variety and if that is not enough then the police (the band that is) will take pleasure in knowing that this games soundtrack and three games afterwards (two great ones and a really bad one) was composed by the drummer of the police, Stewart Copeland. A personal favorite track of mine and many others is the background music for Dark Passage (Nightmare Road in Japan) because it features heavy guitar chords and pounding drums. That is a big bonus in itself. Whats more is that Spyro is voiced by Carlos Ala whats his name? I don't know how to spell his last name, even Clancy Brown is in this game as the voice of several dragons and who could forget the iconic blue thieves taunting sound
So this game is one i will probably take to my grave, its that special to me, thanks to my grandmother, without whom i never would have been a spyro fan
Graphics 8 Sound 9 Addictive 9 Story 8 Depth 7 Difficulty 4
Review Rating: 3/5
Submitted: 02-15-16
Review Replies: 2
10
Spyro the Dragon prettyangel18to..
I love this game!!! I use to play it when I was a kid, and it is my favorite video game of all time. What made this the most memorable game for me is that it was the very first video game that I played considering my older sister would always "hog" the PlayStation or the other gaming devices that we had at the time. Also the quests and mini games were so addicting that I couldn't put down the controller, so I would get in trouble a lot for not getting my chores done, but I always thought that it was totally worth it.
Graphics 9 Sound 10 Addictive 10 Story 10 Depth 10 Difficulty 6
Review Rating: 2.7/5
Submitted: 08-04-13
Updated: 10-09-13
Review Replies: 1
10
Spyro the Dragon.. Jesse Powell
this is one of best ps1 game of all time and is one of my childhood gaming i used to play the demo version back in 1998 when i was 5 yrs old you start off in artist world with a dragon in front of you.you first run up to the dragon and take him about gnasty and then you start collecting gems and dragons in artist world there are 100 gems to collect and 4 dragons to collect there are total of 80 dragons in the game..and around 20000 gems to collect you will have to collect all the gems in every level in every door you go through including the time trail courses some the first level is the stone hills which has a total of 200 gems and 4 dragons there is key down below the finish part inside a tunnel you grab the key go to the hole in the middle of the level and walk up to the key box and the key should go to it and bust it you get the 10 gems out of it the colors of gems red gems are worth 1 gem and the green gems are worth 2 gems and the blue gems are worth 5 gems and the yellow gems are worth 10 gems and the purple gems are worth 25 gemsyou won't the purples gems until you get peach keepers which requires 10 dragons to fly to peach keeper don't forget there are 16 dragons in the artist world the hollow level has 3 dragons and 100 gems this level is fairly easy there is another key box in this one it in the tunnel but what out for the 2 metal armor guys as they bulk you back to kill them you run up behide and shoot with you fire and get the blue gems..once you get past them you will find a dragon inside and a key next to it to open the key box to get gems once get the gems up the stairs and get the last dragon and the rest of the gems in this level be sure to get gems and every level in the game in order to get to the bouns level in gnasty world by getting 80 dragons..
Review Rating: 2.5/5
Submitted: 12-14-13
Updated: 09-24-16
Review Replies: 6
9.6
A fun time back then, and still a fun time now j-flo777
One of my first video games where I couldn't complete everything due to its difficulty, but couldn't put it down because I loved it and wanted to enjoy all the components.
From the get go, the 'open world' aspect it contained in the hub worlds opened my eyes to the possibilities of video games, and the power of the PlayStation. Final fantasy VII had yet to come into my life at the time, thus Spyro was a big game for me. Also my first impression of Spyro came from the demo hidden inside Crash Bandicoot: Warped.
As far as graphics are concerned, they were a delight for the time, though they may not have aged well. But let's go back to '98. My first impression was the game being completely colorful! It was awesome, purple dragon, green hills, crystal dragons, blue water, red gems, blue gems, green gems, yellow dreams, purple gems, pink eggs, chests, and other scenery made playing the game a pleasant experience. Everything was easy to determine what was the environment, what was usable, what was an enemy, what was an ally, and so on and so forth.
The sound was extraordinary! Stewart Copeland made one of the best video game soundtracks that to this day still rivals the games of today. Seriously I go to Youtube just to listen to the soundtrack instead of listening to conventional music.
The story is very basic however. There isn't much of one and there are no twists and turns, or emotional moments, it's all driven by gameplay. But it doesn't lack a story: Gnast Gnorc is tired of being belittled by the dragons and puts them into a crystal state, basically capturing them all. He then steals all of their treasure and scatters it everywhere in the homelands and among his minions. Spyro is young and small and is not affected by the spell. He takes it upon himself to save them and stop Gnasty Gnorc.
Overall the game can either take you over an hour or a couple of hours if you know what you're doing. If you have never played it before then it's a wonderful game to enjoy, it's a casual experience with just enough challenge to satisfy and make completing this game worthwhile.
Graphics 8 Sound 10 Addictive 9 Story 6 Depth 7 Difficulty 8
Review Rating: 2.3/5
Submitted: 07-20-16
Review Replies: 2
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