The prolific publisher of JRPGs that is Idea Factory has released new information for their upcoming game Dragon Star Varnir. Developed by Compile Heart, the game follows protagonist Zephy, a young knight who once sought to destroy all witches, but now seeks to protect them. A large part of the gameplay seems to revolve around battling various dragons. Defeating these dragons allows you to access new skill trees and yields dragon blood. This item is given to your witch companions. Not enough blood and they go mad, and too much and they will transform into a dragon themselves.
Dragon Star Varnir features multiple endings based on your decisions. Always a welcome addition to a game. You engage in battle via a unique sounding vertically-oriented, tiered, turn-based system. It sounds odd. But does look fun in the trailer. Time will tell if it’s solid or a mess. What little we hear of the soundtrack sounds decent. And it will feature both English and Japanese voiceovers.
Idea Factory games tend to cater to a particular niche of JRPG fans. Games like Hyperdimension Neptunia and Mugen Souls. Full of Anime art-styles, waifus, and fan service. It doesn’t look like Dragon Star Varnir will be bucking that trend. Waifu loving anime fans will probably be drawn to it like metal to a magnet. However, many of their games do have solid mechanics. So, there may be something here for the general JRPG audience as well. Fun turn-based battles and light-hearted humorous stories have drawn me to them in the past.
Dragon Star Varnir will see both a physical and digital release in North America on June 14th. At this time it is exclusive to the PlayStation 4. And will retail for $59.99. In addition, many of Idea Factory’s games end up with a slew of post-launch DLC. And I imagine this will be true for this title as well.
