Dragon Fin Soup was a huge Kickstarter success that achieved almost $120,000 after starting with a modest $24,000 base goal, smashing through some stretch goals in the process. Once the Kickstarter campaign was over, a PayPal page was created, and another stretch goal was hit!
The content from stretch goal will be added to the game in the future as post-launch DLC/expansions as they are developed, which won’t be for a while since ports to other platforms are currently in the works along with a few patch updates.
The devs plan to support their first game with content for a long time to come yet as it is their “baby,” so they are striving to make Dragon Fin Soup the best game it can be. I am very proud to be a backer with all the passion they have shown for their game, and that is why I’m doing this review.
As a side note, the game controls are rather complex so before playing, please read the fully illustrated manual called READ OR DIE! You will find this highlighted in blue, below the game modes. It is extremely important you read it, or you will find yourself getting frustrated within a few minutes of starting the game. I have read other reviews, and I must say I am not impressed as clearly the reviewers have not read the manual. If they had taken the time to do so, they would have understood how the game works. I can tell you now, I’ve had absolutely zero problems with playing the game since I have put in over 22 hours across all game modes and didn’t have a single issue. Yeah sure there are some bugs here and there, but nothing game breaking. So to get the hang of the controls and understand how the menus work, please read the manual!
Dragon Fin Soup is a top-down real-time turn-based RPG with three game modes, two of which are of the roguelike variety. The game has a tongue in cheek dark fairy tale vibe, and it is set in the world of Asura. The main Story Mode plus the two other game modes will eat up 55-70 hours of your time plus future expansions that will add to the overall game total, so it is a very big game for a five-man team on a budget of only $120,000!
Story Mode is for those who love to play games for the story and to relax for a bit… but not too much since the game will not forgive your sloppiness! Classic difficulty has absolutely no roguelike elements, and it is there for you to have fun – you can even save and when you die you simply restart where you died keeping all your stuff and your level.
You play as Robin, a re-imagined version of the famous Red Riding Hood. Robin is a cheerful person with a drinking problem. One year ago she lost all her memories in an accident. All of a sudden, someone from her past comes along and upsets her happy existence. Slowly she begins a journey of self-discovery and starts to remember her violent past: the death of her family, the betrayal, and her eventual exile. Robin is taken out of her comfort zone and is pulled into a world of murder and conspiracies as the story unfolds…
You start the game in a tiny little village, and you get all your quests from the owner of the tavern called Jim, aside from Jim you will get various side-quests from NPCs. You can travel to quest markers using the green portals that will take you there. Any quests to do with killing creatures are marked with an orange Q to make it a little easier for you to find.
There is an awesome crafting system in place, although it can be a bit on the slow side since it does take quite a while to get the necessary ingredients for crafting – there are 524 crafting recipes to find and probably more in future updates. So don’t sell anything unless you run out of space; you do have a limited inventory space and your house also has a storage box (I use this to store valuables for the Moneybags trophy). Currently, your inventory size is only 60 and your house storage only holds 63, but I am hoping this will increase in future updates.
Survival mode is the same as story mode but without the story and is a full-on roguelike for those who love a challenge. Survival mode includes 25 floors full of enemies, and each floor becomes progressively difficult. Can you achieve the ultimate goal of conquering all 25 floors and defeat the final boss? Survival mode is also score-based so the further you go and the more enemies you defeat, the bigger your score will be by the time you’re done. Death is permanent so when you die you start back from scratch.
Endless Labyrinth Mode is another roguelike take on the game, but it’s definitely easier than survival. The aim of this mode is to clear out the maze-like maps full of enemies and progress to the next floor. As you play, you can unlock new characters by uncovering a set number of tiles, and you can unlock your first character after uncovering 2,000 tiles. There is a trophy for uncovering 11,111 tiles that will be a little harder than you think. Just play this mode and see for yourself!
Dragon Fin Soup is an excellent game, and I’m happy that I got a chance to back it on Kickstarter to make it happen. If you have a PS+ subscription be sure to add the game to your collection before it leaves the list of free games!
