You control the titular character throughout the game. Eragon has the basic
attack moves meaning he can use a quick strike, a more powerful but slower
strike, and block. As you progress in the game you will learn different combos
but what really happens is that you just press buttons as fast as possible and
hope that everything works out. This brings us to the problem with the game ...
well actually the couple of problems. First is that the game gets repetitive
pretty darn quickly. You are are just pushing buttons quickly; no matter what
the situation is it boils down to quickly mashing buttons. And the bummer is
that the collision detection is not very good. So not only to you need to press
a lot of buttons you also need to do it more than you should have to because you
will often watch as your sword goes right through some dude and causes no
damage. I suppose I would feel better if I knew every hit was actually counting!
Most of the enemies take several hits to go down and there is no shortage of
these guys. In between fights there are some simple platforming areas to try and
take your mind off of the repetitive nature of it all, but this isn't fooling
anyone. The magic ability of Eragon basically involves using “the force” to push
and pull people and objects.
But hey, there's a dragon that I get to ride right? Well, kind of, but not
really. You do get to ride a dragon but you don't really get to drive a dragon.
It's like the old-timey cars in a theme park. Sure you get to turn the steering
wheel but the cars are on rails and are going to go where the rails go, not
where you want to go. But since you don't really control the dragon it's a big
let down. Oh did I mention that you don't get to control the camera at any part
in the game. Seems rather silly in this day and age, but you will often find
yourself hidden by a column while trying to fight or trying to hit something
that is hidden.
The graphics were decent for a first or second generation Xbox game but by
now we all expect and deserve better. There is not much variety in the enemies
and even the main characters are not very detailed. Sound-wise it's a little
better but still nothing exciting. The co-op feature is nice in that another
player can jump in or out at any time but the fact that it's not on Xbox live is
a bit embarrassing.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated: 54%.
Eragon for the Xbox is a good example of why reading can be better than gaming.
Buy the book instead.
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