# The Legend Of Spyro: Dawn Of The Dragon



## Project_X (May 27, 2008)

Why am I hyped about a Spyro game still? I dunno. He just plain rocks.

Not much information has been exposed yet, considering that almost every catagory in the official website is labeled as "Coming Soon". Take a gander yourself: http://lair.spyrothedragon.com/dawnofthedragon/us/index.php
I hope that somebody has some more info they can share that is not already on this website. I am excited that you can now fly when you feel like it. =D


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## Stratelier (May 27, 2008)

Looking forwards to it.  Strongest part of the first two Legend of Spyro games was the story, certainly, unfortunately the combat was the weak part.  Foes were frequently too numerous and/or outright powerful, did nothing but attack, attack, attack.  Most bosses in the second game could not be engaged at point-blank at all without getting yourself killed in the process -- 

er, but that's a rant of the past.  Sierra gave development of the final game to an entirely new team, and some of the changes do appear promising.

So far my primary concern is this:  How will this affect the game's level design?  Free-flying in platform games just doesn't mesh with traditional (ground-based) level design.

And how will the player's flight ability be limited?  Imagine a level such as the final ones of the prior two Spyro games, where the overall path is primarily ascending.  How do the developers prevent (or, inversely, accommodate) the player from skipping through the level entirely and simply flying to the top?

I'd prefer something akin to the final, secret level from the _original_ Spyro game, "Gnasty's Loot".  You had free-flying at will (akin to the flying levels) but while you could fly at will, you couldn't actually _ascend_ much higher than your initial takeoff point.  Bonus flight levels being the notable exception of Spyro's PS1 era, and if I remember #2 and #3 correctly you could use the jump button to flap Spyro's wings and gain a slight boost of altitude.

Or maybe something like Mario 64's flight mechanics.  Mario couldn't fly either, only glide, but the difference was while Spyro always glided at a _fixed_ angle, Mario could dive and rise at will (again, limited to the aerodynamics from his initial takeoff).

_A Hero's Tail_ had perhaps the best Spyro gliding mechanics ever, allowing you to glide at almost any angle (using the analog stick for direction) or simply hover straight down.

Free-flying means that any puzzles must be constructed without regards to gravity.  Simply jumping from one platform to the next over an open pit is no longer an option.  Water and lava could still serve as useful hazards, and this wouldn't rule out switch-based puzzles either.  And, of course, the flight levels in early Spyro games were replete with corridors and enclosed areas which were either difficult or impossible to access from the aerial outside.


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## Project_X (May 27, 2008)

I can almost bet money that a fatigue meter will appear on the HUD when you take off...


......Don't I know you?


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## Snickers (May 28, 2008)

Well..thats a big change...Seeing that spyro is older really fulfills what i was curious about for..well..ever since i first heard of spyro. The free flying thing seems good but games with slight restrictions seem more realistic and challenging. I just hope they make the enemies/foes more "realistic" in a sense they are more than mindless. They should be more responsive and should be treated in a manner where it takes skill to kill them instead of the constant mash of buttons.

The is the first spyro game im interested in after the first 3 originals by insomniacs or whatever the original company was. The previous 2 seem abit like they pip squeeked spyro into a TERRIBLY overpowered annoying but highly intelligent dragon, which didnt suit at all.


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## DarkTalbain64 (May 28, 2008)

I still have to play the second of the legend games but i liked the first one and i really love the art for this upcoming one.


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## Dyluck (May 28, 2008)

*OH MY GAWD GUYS THE GRAPHICS*

I'm not getting my hopes up, this series is about as dead as Sonic the Hedgehog is.

The promise of free-flight is intriguing, though...


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## Shark_the_raptor (May 28, 2008)

I quit playing *Spyro* after the first PS2 game of it came out.  I beat all of the PS *Spyro* games.


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## Project_X (May 28, 2008)

DarkTalbain64 said:


> I still have to play the second of the legend games but i liked the first one and i really love the art for this upcoming one.



Yeah. Me too. If i'm lucky, I can get a job this summer and buy the last two I need to complete the trilogy...



David M. Awesome said:


> *OH MY GAWD GUYS THE GRAPHICS*
> 
> I'm not getting my hopes up, this series is about as dead as Sonic the Hedgehog is.
> 
> The promise of free-flight is intriguing, though...



I wouldn't bet money on that....>>


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## Stratelier (May 28, 2008)

It's obvious the screenshots at current are from the DS and 360 versions.



> I can almost bet money that a fatigue meter will appear on the HUD when you take off...


...like Bee Mario?  It's a good bet there's going to be some kind of limit (or at least a 'ceiling') to Spyro's flight ability.

One of the obvious upshots to this is, Spyro's got a respectable wingspan now.  None more of those puny little flaps on his back.



> I'm not getting my hopes up, this series is about as dead as Sonic the Hedgehog is.


S'true that Spyro suffered a *major* fall-from-grace during the PS2 transition.  He was top of the game during the PS1 era, but _Enter the Dragonfly_ was an absolute disaster.  _A Hero's Tail_ was the treatment Spyro _should_'ve had for his PS2 debut.  If it could have been like that, who knows?  Maybe Spyro would at least still be generally respected.


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## Minu (May 28, 2008)

I used to absolutely love playing the Spyro games, because they were just the right difficulty for me back then(Not pathetically easy, not tortuously hard!) but I can't even bring myself to play the new series of Spyro; It doesn't feel right.  I'm sure that the games are good in their own respect, but I don't like the direction they've turned it.  I don't quite like the art style, either. -chuckle-


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## Kirbizard (May 28, 2008)

_"Xbox 360Â® video game and entertainment system, PLAYSTATIONÂ®3 computer entertainment system, Wiiâ„¢ home video game system, PlayStationÂ®2 computer entertainment system and Nintendo DSâ„¢"_

Am I the only one who laughed when I read that on the site? <(^o^)^

The free-flight feature sounds interesting.
I just hope the pull it off properly... <(._.)>


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## Quaidis (May 28, 2008)

All I remember about Spyro was that the first game was the game that beat all others in making me hurl.  Everything from the bright colors to how the screen was set to how the camera moved was all in some achievement to make gamers sick.  Well, it made me sick.  And I know a few other hardcore gamers couldn't play it for the same reason.

Did they ever improve away from that problem with the future games?


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## CombatRaccoon (May 28, 2008)

Man what happened to the little dude?
I LOVED spyro on the psone. I played those games religiously. Then insomniac sold him off to some shit companies like vivendi and the games starting sucking hard. 

The first legend of spyro.... a new beginning, was just awful. 

The design in this looks interesting enough to prospect a rental, sure, but no buy as long as spyro is in the hands of a company other than insomniac games.


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## Dyluck (May 28, 2008)

Judging from a certain game screen, it looks like the game may be cooperative.

Edit: Haha, fat chance, game companies suck way too much ass to make awesome cooperative games.


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## Project_X (May 28, 2008)

David M. Awesome said:


> Judging from a certain game screen, it looks like the game may be cooperative.
> 
> Edit: Haha, fat chance, game companies suck way too much ass to make awesome cooperative games.



I just watched some interveiw thing. A "bungee" effect has been added to this game's Co-Op. When a player gets left behind, roams too far, flies to high, etc. he/she(Spyro/Cynder) will walk or fly back to their home position.



CombatRaccoon said:


> Man what happened to the little dude?
> I LOVED spyro on the psone. I played those games religiously. Then insomniac sold him off to some shit companies like vivendi and the games starting sucking hard.
> 
> The first legend of spyro.... a new beginning, was just awful.
> ...



In my opinion(not fact), Insomniac made a very plain and limited, yet fun, platformer when they made Spyro. Vivendi screwed him up very badly with Enter The Dragonfly(which somehow made "Greatest Hits") and now Sierra is cleaning up the mess.

A New Beginning was a change of pace and a breather from a very average platformer.


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## CombatRaccoon (May 29, 2008)

Project_X said:


> In my opinion(not fact), Insomniac made a very plain and limited, yet fun, platformer when they made Spyro. Vivendi screwed him up very badly with Enter The Dragonfly(which somehow made "Greatest Hits") and now Sierra is cleaning up the mess.
> 
> A New Beginning was a change of pace and a breather from a very average platformer.



well I dunno. 

the first spyro was a masterpeice, to me at least. I mean the game itself expressed such an artistic combination of beautiful music, whimsical worlds, and dream-like space.
While that was definately the best game of the three originals, I also liked the added characters and starky humor in 2 and 3. 
Now I know that the game play was relatively simple, even for its time, but thats not to say that it was a bad game. All of the three games had plenty of variation in the game play (flying missions, egg chases, and in the later titles other characters to play as and mini games like skateboarding, boxing and hockey)


whereas I found a new beginning to be a huge dissapointment because the enviroments where just repetitive, the music was overly corny, the script was predictable and the voice acting was mundane. I personally found wood to be monotone and all around flat lined in that role... spade did a decent job with sparks but it completely killed the character. 


I did'nt like the fact that Sierra just disregarded the development of spyro's character and placed him in some awful fanfic type situation. 

Vivendi or whoever did the same with crash bandicoot! Did you see crash of the titans? HE DOESN'T LOOK LIKE THAT!!!! 

ugh. But you are right. It is a mess, that's for sure. 

anyway those are simply my opinions, no offense intended.


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## DarkTalbain64 (May 29, 2008)

It's actually different for me.
I did not like the ps1 games at all, though i did like Spyro. The games were just so bland and uninteresting.
Then the ones from Vivendi came and i just thought, "Man, are they just trying to beat Spyro like a dead horse now?"
And now the Sierra ones came and i actually like them, i like the battle system and the story is ok.


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## Project_X (May 29, 2008)

CombatRaccoon said:


> well I dunno.
> 
> the first spyro was a masterpeice, to me at least. I mean the game itself expressed such an artistic combination of beautiful music, whimsical worlds, and dream-like space.
> While that was definately the best game of the three originals, I also liked the added characters and starky humor in 2 and 3.
> ...



If Sierra is failing, how did they get the money to do this?
http://www.velvetoctopus.com/spyro/index.htm

It's evolution. All characters change over time. Like from this:






To this:





Majority of characters change appearance, even storylines. Those who do not like the change fall off the franchise. Those who do, stay on. It's like a bucking horse.
It's the same guy, just revamped.


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## CombatRaccoon (May 29, 2008)

I dunno. I mean theres a line between the different links because they are clearly different people in different plots... 

however spyro is spyro. In Sierra's game there is no mention of the former plots, or avalar, or any of that. Its beyond a revamping. 

and unfortunately its just about money... characters like spyro are taken on as projects because they are considered to be staples in the gaming world. people know them, thus people will buy the games.


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## Stratelier (May 29, 2008)

Megaman X was a sequel series to the original Mega Man, all right.  But whether or not X and Rock (the original Megaman) should be considered the same or different robots remains unclear.



			
				Quaidais said:
			
		

> All I remember about Spyro was that the first game was the game that beat all others in making me hurl. Everything from the bright colors to how the screen was set to how the camera moved was all in some achievement to make gamers sick. Well, it made me sick. And I know a few other hardcore gamers couldn't play it for the same reason.
> 
> Did they ever improve away from that problem with the future games?


Uh, no.  But if you play a constant diet of gritty-realism art-styles, it's no wonder you get sick at the first drop of color.

Interesting trivia:  Instead of mipmapping, textures in the PS1 Spyro games would fade to flat colors in the distance.



			
				CombatRaccoon said:
			
		

> I did'nt like the fact that Sierra just disregarded the development of spyro's character and placed him in some awful fanfic type situation.


Eh, it's called "rebooting", and Spyro is definitely not the first to receive one.



			
				Project_X said:
			
		

> A "bungee" effect has been added to this game's Co-Op. When a player gets left behind, roams too far, flies to high, etc. he/she(Spyro/Cynder) will walk or fly back to their home position.


Oh yes, the age-old law of the co-op universe, "keep both players on the same screen at the same time".  Co-op games have dealt with that in various ways:
- Small arena easily fit onscreen without scrolling
- Split-screen
- Players blocked from going off-screen (e.g. TMNT)
- Penalize or KO players who roam off-screen (e.g. FF:CC)

One co-op game on PS2, _Adventures of Cookie & Cream_, used a variation of split-screen where the levels themselves were split between left and right, and a player could cross-over to the other side only when the other player is close enough that both can be displayed onscreen at the same camera angle.



> In my opinion(not fact), Insomniac made a very plain and limited, yet fun, platformer when they made Spyro. Vivendi screwed him up very badly with Enter The Dragonfly(which somehow made "Greatest Hits") and now Sierra is cleaning up the mess.


Completely agree.  _Enter the Dragonfly_ was broken on so many levels, it earning GH status is about as significant as POTC3 having a huge opening weekend at the box office.  PS2 version had 50+ second load times, bipolar ambient noise (either on or off), framerate dropped to 10fps (or worse) at regular intervals, some events didn't always fire right, occasionally causing the game to get stuck in a loop, etc etc etc....

_A Hero's Tail_ was actually decent as a platformer, just 2-3 years late to the party.


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## Quaidis (May 29, 2008)

Project_X said:


> If Sierra is failing, how did they get the money to do this?
> http://www.velvetoctopus.com/spyro/index.htm
> 
> It's evolution. All characters change over time. Like from this:
> ...



What about Mario?  Excluding Paper Mario and other Mario spinoffs, he really hasn't changed at all in plot and he's still the goofy-looking plumber.  People still pay to play as Mario trying to save something (usually a princess) from an evil (usually a giant turtle) by collecting things.


I'm still at a standstill with Spyro.  The first game, for the ps1, made me violently ill.  I'm curious and kind of want to rent the most recent Spyro game, and that's all primarily because of this thread.


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## Project_X (May 30, 2008)

CombatRaccoon said:


> I dunno. I mean theres a line between the different links because they are clearly different people in different plots...
> 
> however spyro is spyro. In Sierra's game there is no mention of the former plots, or avalar, or any of that. Its beyond a revamping.



Hunter is in the new one....That is a reference to the preveous games....


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## Stratelier (May 30, 2008)

Legend of Spyro 2 specifically mentioned "Hunter of Avalar", and the final scene before the credits clearly featured an anthropomorphic cheetah armed with a bow and arrow in the foreground.  I'm sure it's unlockable in the concept-art gallery, but I still have to find the last 10 or so Quills....


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## LordWibble (May 30, 2008)

The first three spyro games were my life when I wa younger... I didn't play the second Legend of Spyro, do they still have David fucking Spade?  *twitch*


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## Project_X (May 30, 2008)

LordWibble said:


> The first three spyro games were my life when I wa younger... I didn't play the second Legend of Spyro, do they still have David fucking Spade?  *twitch*



No. In the second one, Billy West takes his place. In the third one, Wane Brady takes Billy's place.


And what of the transition of Megaman X to Megaman Battle Network/Megaman Zero? No ref to X or classic at all and Megaman is still thriving....better than ever even...


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## NornHound (May 30, 2008)

Oohh! First I heard of the third installment O:

I like Spyro, played the first PS games, I bought the redone!Spyro games, but at the moment I'm stuck about 2 hours into the second game, because of the constant fights with no chance to breathe.

The third game looks awesome, but I'm hoping it will be like the first game. Challenging, but not demanding, or impossible with the 'glitches' like Death by Camera Angle or the bloody constant fighting.


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## Project_X (May 30, 2008)

NornHound said:


> Oohh! First I heard of the third installment O:
> 
> I like Spyro, played the first PS games, I bought the redone!Spyro games, but at the moment I'm stuck about 2 hours into the second game, because of the constant fights with no chance to breathe.
> 
> The third game looks awesome, but I'm hoping it will be like the first game. Challenging, but not demanding, or impossible with the 'glitches' like Death by Camera Angle or the bloody constant fighting.



They might force you to play with two players by overwhelming you. Some games do that...


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## Stratelier (May 31, 2008)

Nornhound said:
			
		

> but at the moment I'm stuck about 2 hours into the second game, because of the constant fights with no chance to breathe.


2 hours?  That must be the first pirate ship level.  Yes, too many enemies, and some enemies too difficult in the first place.

The second pirate ship level's a bit easier.  The ancient temple after that is probably the best level in the entire game, no overwhelming mass of enemies.  But the final level is murder.  About halfway through you have to cross a waterfall, and there's a major battle zone after that against too many undead foes.  But at least you didn't have to fight squadrons of flying bats like in the first Legend of Spyro, electricity became my favorite weapon if only because you could zap and throw enemies off ledges for instant KOs.


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## Daniel Kay (May 31, 2008)

*Sighs*... legend of spryo...

I loved the originaly spyro trillogy on PS, "Enter the dragonfly" sucked because of technical reasons and lame story and "a heros tail" was ok but made Spyro an ass which didnt fit his character at all (and i dont mean a badass, more like jackass)... and seriously i didnt even touch Legend of spyro for 2 major reasons:

1: COMBAT system... what the hell was wrong with the old system, you ram into things and torch stuff, simple but works

2: Changing him from "hero by accident" which pretty much was how all 3 original parts worked to "the big propcey", i abolutley HATE prophecy storylines, as good as the story around them may be using THIS as a base is just plain out cheap

In addition to that spyros design is just awfull in my opinion, he doesnt really look like the cute dragon from back then but more like heÂ´ll bite if you come to close and the play length issues

I specially liked the very first one mostly because of the themed worlds and the levels still beeing unique to eachother without loosing the worlds tone and lets not forget the great music... i still after YEARS got the music of the night level of the first world stuck in my head... and i loved his voice from part 2 and 3 (tom kenny really did a great jorb there)... sure part 3 already had a few issues, maybe they started running out of ideas but i still loved that one... they all where just so unique, cheerfull and sweet and they kept simple things simple and great things great

No wonder i started a spyro-playing-marathon last year, playing all 3 original games back to back and enjoying them... maybe i should dig them out and play again...


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## Stratelier (May 31, 2008)

> 1: COMBAT system... what the hell was wrong with the old system, you ram into things and torch stuff, simple but works


Did you ever play "Spyro: Shadow Legacy" for the DS?  That was the first Spyro game to introduce a combat system.  It was also the first Spyro game to mention purple dragons being something special.  Vivendi Universal (which owns Sierra these days) simply wanted to do shift Spyro more towards the action genre than platforming.  After all, it's not very often you find an action-based platform (or vice versa) game.  Most action games feature minimal platform elements, most platform games feature minimal and simplistic combat.

And for #2, I believe the proper term you're looking for is "clichÃ©".


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## NornHound (May 31, 2008)

Stratadrake said:


> 2 hours?  That must be the first pirate ship level.  Yes, too many enemies, and some enemies too difficult in the first place.
> 
> The second pirate ship level's a bit easier.  The ancient temple after that is probably the best level in the entire game, no overwhelming mass of enemies.  But the final level is murder.  About halfway through you have to cross a waterfall, and there's a major battle zone after that against too many undead foes.  But at least you didn't have to fight squadrons of flying bats like in the first Legend of Spyro, electricity became my favorite weapon if only because you could zap and throw enemies off ledges for instant KOs.



Yep, that area! Those giant scorpions are a major pain, if it was one at a time and kept to being really strong... fine! But not two of them, complete with riders, trying to kill you at the same time D:

The temple sounds interesting, the small temple in the first LoS game was great fun to run around in O:

I liked the bats in the first LoS, though in that ice-world where they kept coming, it started to get a bit irritating. It was good, they weren't that difficult to defeat and Spyro wasn't brought to near death, unlike in Eternal Night, in just about any fight.

Electricity was also my favourite skill, then it was the fire-balls and then ice. It was great to freeze the enemy and roll them into lava pits.


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## Project_X (May 31, 2008)

NornHound said:


> Yep, that area! Those giant scorpions are a major pain, if it was one at a time and kept to being really strong... fine! But not two of them, complete with riders, trying to kill you at the same time D:
> 
> The temple sounds interesting, the small temple in the first LoS game was great fun to run around in O:
> 
> ...



I still have yet to play the second one because I don't have the money(for now...) and I'm trying to get the Wii version.

Ice World = Dante's Freezer.

The results of only having one of the three and beating the game 4 times w/upgrades and twice w/out them....


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