I remember it like it was yesterday.
June 2000, I was 9 years old. Little me and his modded PlayStation 1 receive a copy of Legend of Dragoon from his older sister.
“Since you like playing with knights and soldiers, I think you’ll like this one,” she said.
Up to that moment I played mostly whatever I managed to get my hands on, be it games brought by the rest of my older siblings or stuff found at my cousin’s house. At that time I was fixated with Tekken 3, which was the first PS1 game I’ve ever had.
I never played an RPG before that moment, aside from briefly watching one of my childhood friends playing the Final Fantasy 8 demo. I feel super old just saying that, jeez.
Legend of Dragoon Was Not a Game For Kids
Booting the game for the first time was a groundbreaking experience for me. Legend of Dragoon was not some childish game like Crash Bandicoot or Spyro the Dragon. The game started with an army destroying a village and kidnapping some of the inhabitants. One of the first lines of dialogue had the word “Bastard” in it, which was a curse word for me, and you find yourself leading the main character, Dart Feld, examining corpses and fighting enemy soldiers.
Needless to say, I loved it. And that was just the beginning!
Legend of Dragoon Helped Me Socialize
Some time after I started playing the game, I had to move house with my family, and I found myself alone in a new town and school. After meeting some of the kids in the new school, I shared that I was playing Legend of Dragoon and I gladly discovered that one of them was playing it too. He told me that he did not understand how to save the game, so we decided to see each other after school so that I could explain to him how to do it.
Because of it we became best friends. Damn, we still are, and we are now 33 years old.
Yeah, thinking about it, how could he not know how to save? Come on, let’s give him a break. The sparkly save spots were just making a sound, but not really explaining what the hell that was supposed to do. At 9 years old with little gaming experience and no internet, it was not really that easy to understand.
Worst Team Composition Ever
I still remember my first team: Dart, Lavitz/Albert, Kongol. Yikes. It took me a week to defeat Melbu Frahma, because I was getting nuked by magic out of existence. I never managed to get a Legend Casque because I spent my first hard earned 5000g on a Dragon Shield, which halves melee damage, and did not grind at all afterwards. I was not the sharpest tool in the shed.
I still wonder why we didn’t get the super cool version of Kongol with that cool armor and the claws. Whatever.
My favorite character was Lavitz, and I still remember how similar his mother and mine were. My second favorite character was Lloyd, because he was so cool and strong. After the tournament in Lohan I waited for him to join my team. Boy, was I in for a disappointment.
Yeah, if you played the game you know what I am talking about. That sannavabich kills Lavitz, and we get stuck with Albert and his super high voice.
Legend of Dragoon Had Superb Voice Acting (Nah, Not Really)
That reminds me that the voice actors for the game were just terrible.
I had an Italian copy of Legend of Dragoon and let me tell you, you are not ready. Get this video with all the additions voiced in Italian:
I hope you will appreciate how bad they are as I do.
Share your thoughts!
For whoever reads this post, I have so many questions: What was your team? What are your best memories of this game? Did you manage to finish it? Are you still hopelessly waiting for a remake as I do?
In the end, I consider Legend of Dragoon as my favorite game of all time. Sure, there are better games, with better writing, graphics, and whatever else you want. But this is a corner of nostalgia, where video games are not only stuff we have to judge or approach unbiased. I just hope that some of these memories of mine resonates with you somehow!
I have so many other video game-related memories I want to share with you, so stay tuned for upcoming posts!
