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Gorasul - The Legacy of the Dragon

 

I'm liking this already.


If you are an astute reader of mine, you may recall from my article regarding the sallomandyr, Zeta, that there was a small mention of this game. Despite certain speculations, Gorasul does in fact have several dragons, and those dragons are highly intelligent. Most of the time, they are even happy to help you, or at least deign to politely let you know exactly why they are attempting to flip out and bite your head off. Usually it's because they're half-starved to death after humans invaded their natural habitats and destroyed the ecosystems.

Gorasul is an RPG similar to the likes of Baldur's Gate or Planescape: Torment. You take on the role of Roszondas. The dimwitted kobolds call him Rossi, if that helps to remember his name at all.

When Roszondas was a baby, he became deathly ill. Desperate and with no other option, his parents left him on the doorstep of Crakan, a benevolent dragon who was living among humans. Crakan gave Roszondas the magical Breath of Life, which is given to all dragon young. It saved Roszondas from his illness, but also gave him draconic powers not intended for humans -- powers that he never gained total control over.

When Roszondas was older, the Ultimate Evil (scary!) entered the world -- horrific demons and undead that threatened to destroy all that the civilized good races of humans, elves, and dwarves held dear. Roszondas was a paladin on the side of good, utilizing his dragon-gifted powers in an attempt to turn the tables. Though he eventually died in battle, his heroic efforts prevented total disaster for the mortal races. Fierce war still continued between the gods of light, and the demons -- war unseen by mortals.

Six years after Roszondas' death, Crakan disappeared. Four years after that, Roszondas was resurrected by the gods, though a good portion of his memory and powers were lost through death. Roszondas was the best hope in fighting against the demons ten years ago, and he's the best hope again now. This is where the game begins.

You can choose Roszondas' profession from six choices, which are actually frighteningly similar because all professions can use the same weapons and magic (you are automatically able to cast any spell you have enough mana for). So basically Roszondas and all of his allies are warrior/mage hybrids unless you deliberately specialize in one or the other through your stat assignment choices when you level up. Theoretically, the classes are:

-Warrior: Your standard "run up and hit things with pointy objects" sort of character.
-Scout: Your standard "shoot things with a bow" sort of character. Arrows travel slowly, and often miss targets that are moving. Thus, the scout is really just a high-dexterity warrior that emphasizes accuracy over power.
-Judge of the Swords: Knight or paladin-like character. Basically the same as warrior.
-Magician: Magic specialist that gets a slight mana discount on attack spells.
-Banisher: Magic specialist that gets a substantial mana discount on necromancy spells.
-Priest: Magic specialist that gets a moderate mana discount on healing/protective spells, and huge additional mana costs on necromancy spells.

Making Roszondas a pure warrior is a terrible choice. Once, I made a warrior and died to the weak monsters at the first level. You can't do area of effect damage, you can't heal yourself, and you don't necessarily take hits any better than a magician because magicians can wear any armor and put lots of stat points into constitution if they want to.

Priest sounds alright, but it just so happens that the resurrection spell is necromancy-based. If all of your allies except Roszondas die (and they likely will), then he can potentially bring everyone back to life with that spell. If you're a priest, you'll complete the game before you can resurrect! If you're a banisher, you'll get it early, but necromancy isn't real big on damage-dealing magic. Magician is better at damage, decent at healing, and will get the resurrection spell in a timely manner. Horray for character customization!

Roszondas also has a magical talking weapon that levels up along with him, increasing in damage and other stats that you assign. You pick the weapon yourself from a small, yet diverse list. For a spellcaster, dagger (not staff) is the best choice by a slight margin. Then you give your weapon nothing except "intelligence" stat, because it will help you regain mana faster. Your weapon will also talk to you from time to time. Intelligent weapons talk more often (but not annoyingly so - they just speak up when something important is happening).

Roszondas is also the only character that has dragon powers. You put points into these powers each time he levels up. They activate on their own when Roszondas' life is in immediate peril, which is a fancy way of saying, "when his health is very low and he's getting pwned". These abilities saved his life countless times over the years that he was fighting demons:

Eyes: I lied. This one is always activated; it just lets you see farther. This is actually the best power, because after a little investing, you'll be able to see dangerous monsters way before they see you.
Fear: The Gorasul instruction manual says, and I quote, "The higher level of dragon fear, the quicker enemies flee from Roszondas, as every inhabitant of Gorasul has a natural fear of dragons." Inexplicably, this works on other dragons.
Breath: Roszondas' attack will be replaced by fiery dragonbreath which is powerful and hits several enemies at once.
Strength: Basically the same as Dragon Breath, minus the area of effect part. Probably more useful for warrior-types than for spellcasters.

Gamespot gave Gorasul a 6.4, saying that it's a good game brought down by technical bugs and laughably poor translations from the original German-developed version (Zero Wing or Midnight Nowhere caliber). The 1.06 patch provides immensely improved English translation, and it is the version I use.

Why am I pointing that out? Because I'm now going to list some of the better conversation trees.

-After being forced to kill a hostile dragon, Roszondas tells his talking weapon that he doesn't really like dragons. Talking weapon flatly replies that Roszondas has no taste. Never mind that Roszondas is a dragon's stepson, of course.

-If you're fighting a monster that's tougher than you, your weapon will sometimes warn you about it. Sometimes, Roszondas will call his weapon, "Pig face."

-Even battle-hardened warriors can go insane.

-Roszondas prefers to buy bottled water for the rest of his life, and his hobbies include shooting down the budding dreams of sentient daggers.

-Roszondas asks a woman who can see the future if she can also predict the weather.

That's it for now. This review is a work in progress.