2/5 ★ – Gibbs's review of Drakengard 3.

There’s some good ideas in here, but most of Drakengard 3 sucks. And not in a thought-provoking meaningful way, but just a bad way. This combat isn’t too bad, but it’s hardly better than serviceable. What really makes it miserable is much of the same you do over and over and over again. Every enemy is a chore to fight and not a single fight is satisfying, and yet you’ll fight the same things again and again. This could have been alright - I mean I don’t really like the combat in other Taro games all that much, and plenty of other games I like don’t have the best combat. But, what really makes it painful is how bad this level design is. Incredibly flat and uninspired. And exploring somewhere completely bland is bad enough, but having to go through these same areas multiple timed was too much. People will tell you that Zero agreeing these repeated fights and locations are annoying somehow makes it OK, but I struggle to understand that. All the while, you’ll have to listen to your these characters. I like Zero and Accord alot. But every one else in this party is extremely annoying. And not in a profound - ‘wow maybe these killers being bad people is poignant’ way. Your party consists of a sadist, a masochist, an old pervert and a dumbass. I’d say at least every other line in this game is about sex or toilet humour. How many times did I have to hear about Decadus wanting to get kicked in the balls, Octa’s dick, or listen to Mikhail shitting and pissing. It’s eye-rolling at first and mind-numbing by the end. Drakengard 3 is ‘unfunny sex joke: the game’ and I wanted to bash my head by the end. So extremely unfunny it was miserable. I will not be told they’re unlikable on purpose because there are far far better ways to write bad people. And it’s annoying, because it covers up the actual good story in here somewhere. I like the lore here and I like Zero’s story. But it’s also told quite poorly. Very loaded towards the end, and a lot of the interesting character stories aren’t even in the base game. Just a thought but maybe we could have replaced the meaningless levels filled with fully voiced sex jokes with backstory in interesting locations telling the best parts of our characters’ stories. I still pushed through to the end of Ending C and the Lost Verses. But once I saw I had to grind for every weapon for Route D I just gave up and watched the last part on YouTube. Genuinely insane that this game is this monotonous already, and yet to see the most interesting parts of this game, you make the player grind hours for money to buy on weapons they won’t even use. Route D is the best part of the game, and that final boss sure is something. I actually kind of appreciate what it went for (but the notes off camera and slowed in full black are indefensible), but I’m actually glad I quite before I got there because no way I would have seen that through. There’s a good game in here somewhere. Great voice acting, some good tracks, and an interesting story. There is some really beautiful parts to Zero, the ending, and the music, but God, does everything else just blow. However, Drakengard 3 is like one of those aftertaste biscuits, in which actually playing it sucked but it did leave me with some interesting characters, music, and thoughts on game design, so I’ll be fairly generous with my score.