I wanted to look into Dragon Skies VR, knowing already that this game likely doesn’t have much in the way of fitness but rather a sense of what VR is supposed to be about. I know, the title hyped up the ability to fly on dragons and we’ll get to that, but this video really shares what the vision is in the world of VR.
What is Dragon Skies VR?
Dragon Skies is what I dreamed of when they released the ability to ride a dragon in World of Warcraft, when the Dovakin rocked the Skyrim universe, and as I read books about dragons as a child. There’s so much do in this game it is kind of difficult to keep track of it all, but once you get used to it it isn’t difficult to learn. The core of the game is that this is a Dogfight Simulator.
Yes, you do fly a dragon but you will bank and stall much like you would in a real aircraft. You beat bad guys, which are flying ships, and also collect seeds throughout the map in order to craft ingredients. You need these ingredients to determine your type of fire power and to upgrade your dragon. The game is story driven so you will not just be fighting ships all the type but rather fighting them to complete a goal in the story. Depending on what you do and achieve, the story will change. Yes, this is so similar to Skyrim that Bethesda should be ashamed they didn’t make this type of game first.
Graphics and Visuals 4/5
The graphics of the game are impressive when they are meant to be impressive. For instance, the dragon is very impressive to look at and you get a real sense that this beast is really standing/sitting in front of you. However, the game maps are really lacking in that quality detail we expect from next gen games. The mountains are a repeated texture that’s very obvious and the trees look like Lego toys with modifications to make them slightly more real. However, in retrospect this makes a lot of sense because the game is very extensive in gameplay so trying to load all the artifacts including a highly detailed background texture would likely require something like a Crossfire combination with 16GB of RAM. The loss of the background is a small disappointment though.
On the other hand, you get a very real sense of sending out spells from a gun and you even get tunnel vision when you get too many G-forces pulling on you, like you would in a real plane. This is something that really impressed me, not so much the spells but the realism they went after in flight. I can only think of a handful of games that included the symptom of tunnel vision in flight and Ace Combat, one of my favorite fliers, was not one of them.
Hardware Requirements 4/5
You will need an Intel i5 processor with 4 GB RAM on an NVIDIA 970 graphics card with 2GB of space on Windows 7 or newer. For a game like this, that is a very impressive low standard for entry into this game.
Fitness 0/5
It’s virtually non-existent within this game because all you do is sit on the back of a dragon and point your wand to force the dragon to fly forward. You can explore the town square, but this requires controller interaction rather than any large physical movement. You will find that this game is more for the RPG player that preferred to sit and camp with a mage rather than actively fight with a warrior or paladin.
Gameplay 3/5
If you haven’t experience motion sickness in VR, you will likely feel it in this because not only do you get the VR sickness to contend with but you also get flight sickness. The game does have a learning curve when it comes to playing, but you can usually get used to it within the first mission. As of right now, the game is only available as a Free Demo but will be releasing shortly because most of the game is finished and the developer said they are finishing up packing in content for the game. This is one of those rare games that the main developer actually talks with their audience.
Overall Rating: 2.5/5
While I do love this type of game, I dislike when an RPG doesn’t involve the option to physically move around the game. The lack of physical movement breaks the experience of the game and while I love the fact that you can ride dragons in the game, only being able to ride dragons, listen to a story, craft small things, and beat up more bad guys follows the old repetitive motion of MMORPG’s. There’s a lot of improvements this game has gone through and after the release of the game we may see even more improvements released, but, until then, I can’t easily give this game a high score.
