Test Zoo Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars – Nintendo Switch – Endeavor

There are games that make a great first look with outrageous action, new gameplay mechanics or simply provocation. Voice of Cards: The latest creation of The Isle Dragon Roars, Square Enix and developer Yoko Toro – named for the games in the NieR series – is particularly eye-catching. Because the game presents its entire game world in the form of playing cards, which was the topic of conversation when it was announced. We took a closer look at the roll-flaming game and clarified whether the title, with its unusual appearance, could be trusted in terms of the game.

Greed saves mercenaries the world … Did you hear that?

Anyone who has played from the NieR series knows that they are both profound and very humorous, and that both the structure and the characters are very unusual and different. At first glance, this is not the case with Voice of Cards, because JRPG is mostly classic: you create a hero, the game suggests the name Ash, who accepts the job along with a monster mate, which is a dragon. Reappearing after an eternity and now terrorizing the kingdom. As you can guess from the beginning, in the course of the game it should be your task: of course, it will not be so simple. But Voice of Cards does not come with many phrases like NieR: Automata. However, the game starts from the classic fantasy conferences, however, Ash’s motivation: instead of acting with pure heroism or caring about his country, he is all about money. The first game you take with you on an extra companion on your trip, he will place the game on your side at the beginning. After all, that means every extra party member will eventually have to share the reward!

This is where one of the best strengths of the Voice of Cards comes into play, which becomes more and more apparent as the game progresses: the characters and, above all, the humor. Each of your prospective comrades has his motivation, why he wants to come with you on your journey and very few really want to turn the dragon into skin. A lot of work is done with humor, making imaginary stereotypes easily flexible. It works well in most cases and the game master contributes a significant portion of it. The narrator of this game is the one who comments on all your actions, and sets the individual characters to music as you know them from a classic pen and paper round. When he is not in the business of underlining the game with his conversations, he likes to post cynical comments about the style or plot of your game, for example, when you try to jump into the water he calmly realizes that you will go. Under.

In addition to comedy and characters, the real star of the game is its game world and its representation. Because the Voice of Cards is represented in the form of completely unique game cards. Your characters, all objects and your equipment, NPCs and a portion of each building or lawn will be displayed as individual game cards. So when you start the game in the role of Ash in the Throne Room, you are first in a small room, the visible walls and floors are displayed as exposed cards with a corresponding theme, while the other rooms and characters you are in. Still not visible, they are all still displayed as hidden cards. This type of scenario may be the most characteristic feature of the game and the developers have done it very well. The personal themes, especially the main characters are all very detailed and the themes of the materials and tools and spells are pleasing. This also applies to NPCs, but their card core concepts are repetitive very quickly, which costs the game world a little in terms of reliability and efficiency.

Walking on screen is not always static; The cards “interact” as much as they can. When a character bows gratefully, the card tilts slightly forward as if to lower its head, especially in battles, and the creators show well what can be done in a controlled situation. So, our archer throws arrows into the air with one of his later attacks, jumps from one place to another while firing, and then retreats to finally shoot a powerful arrow – all of which are symbolic. The character’s map jumps and moves at the right time. It may seem awkward in text form, but it looks unusually attractive in motion.

These are just a few plus points, making the title proud and stand out from the rest of the competition. But that’s about it, because under the beautiful interface, Voice of Cards is the most common JRPG. This is especially noticeable in battles, all of which follow well-known patterns: you choose the attacks and abilities of your characters one after the other, causing damage to your enemies and taking counter-victories accordingly. Each character has a fixed ability, and thus has its strengths and weaknesses. When the title hero Ash becomes an amazing versatile close fighter with healing abilities, Muscle Bruno is the usual close distance fighter and your magical companion blows basic spells around her and arms against many different types of enemies. The jewelry that the team shares and the only change you get in battle stands for itself.

Glowing stones are a prerequisite for using other skills beyond your standard attacks, through which a certain tactical element is activated; Are you using the three stones you have collected for a powerful area attack or are you collecting two more so that Ash can increase the defenses of the whole team to multiple rounds? Such considerations may actually be in favor of the combat system, but it leads us to the next problem: the Voice of Cards is much easier. Fights are unnecessary, but if you use the right skills, even those who oppose the boss can be defeated without a win. The artificial difficulty that negative level effects are only activated on the opponent when you roll a certain value does not help. You will now be embarrassed because one of your characters is temporarily blessed because an opponent can get a lucky critical win, but usually even beginners will not let you fight in fights. The game comes abruptly with a fight with the final boss that lasts for several stages, it requires pure luck and it is still incomprehensible that the opposite will become serious.

Unfortunately, very easy fights are sometimes the most annoying of the many random fights that arise when you wander around the upper world or dungeons. Although you can move from one place to another on the world map at the press of a button, making it so much easier to get around, the chances of encountering dungeons from the second half of the game are annoying. Especially if you have to climb a tower, cross a volcano or explore ancient ruins. The problem these three areas have with each other? They are so big and carelessly tied together. If another fight occurs after every fifth beat, even the most flexible thread of patience will slowly begin to fade. While parts of the first half of the game still have their charm, you can’t eliminate the feeling that the developers ’ideas are exhausted in the course of the second half, which makes the big and long dungeons feel more. Like the artificial stretch of the game.

Card games in a deck do not feel like a stretch. Each city offers you an additional building in which you can play cards with the locals. The rules are very simple at the beginning: gradually create three different sets from the layer of cards that will be revealed, and in the course of the game, notice which cards you want to discard and which cards you want to keep. Must end up with more points to emerge as the winner. The more often you win in different games and different locations, the more additional and complex rules you can unlock. So you can activate special level effects while playing a particular combination cards and more. Matches do not play a role in the actual process, so they are always preferred because only cosmetic items such as new card packs or another type of dice you can use in battle are tossed as rewards. As a small bonus, you can also play a card game in multiplayer against card players from all over the world, but could not test this during the trial period due to the lack of players. Nevertheless, the card game is a nice and very demanding change, which adds a nice feature to the voice cards.

Musically, the game can eventually compensate a lot. The individual pieces were all successful, and at one point I remembered NieR: Automata, the soundtrack of which already fascinated me. Some pieces may recur over time, but each time you reach a new area or progress to a new chapter you will be rewarded with one of the most beautiful and melodic songs. What you expect in the classic JRPG is game controls and solid implementation. The game’s sole speaker, Game Master, was fully dubbed into English and Japanese, and well – written and fun texts were translated into German.