After releasing the brand new trailer of the JRPG Dragon Star Varnir, Idea Factory International followed up with a press release including a ton of new screenshots and some info.
The screenshots showcase the battle system of the game and the “Dragon Awakening System” and you can check them out at the bottom of the post.
On top of the screenshots, we also get an official notice that a couple of alterations had to be made to the original game compared to the original.
“Two CG scenes were slightly modified for this game.”
While no further explanation was provided, this is likely to be to comply with Sony Interactive Entertainment’s recently-enforced policies, since the game (being a Compile Heart JRPG) includes a lot of fanservice, and a couple of its characters have a rather youthful appearance.
To Idea Factory International’s credit, it’s good to see that they’re transparent about this.
Update: Below you can see what are likely to be the modified images from the Korean website of the game. The original images have respectively a much lower view angle giving a rather unobstructed view of the character’s backside, and less steam [Thanks for the tip Zach Z].
Below you can also read new information about the battle system.
Where Battles Take Place: Fights take place in a 3-tiered battlefield: Top, Middle, and Bottom Levels, where players can move freely between the tiers during battle.
Physical & Magical Skills: Active players can use 4 different physical attacks that can be performed against an enemy on the same tier: Slash, Hit, Pierce, and Shoot. Deny an enemy’s turn by attacking their weak point! There are 6 different Magical Skill attributes that players can utilize: Earth, Water, Fire, Wind, Light, and Dark. Physical attacks can only be performed on enemies on the same tier for the chance for critical attacks, but can leave you more vulnerable to damage. Magic attacks can hit enemies on any tier, but have no chance for critical damage. You’ll have to strategize positions to do the most damage!
Devour Skill: Attack enemies to increase the enemy’sFear Level. Speed the process by attacking their weak points and performing critical hits. The higher the Fear, the easier it will be to eat the dragons! Eat an enemy using your Devour skill to obtain the enemy’s skill tree. Additionally, when the enemy’s Fear Level is 100%, this will cause a weak point rush to occur! This trick will allow three allies to execute a consecutive rush attack with the last person performing the Devour skill. If the enemy’s HP drops to 0 during a rush, the Devour skill is guaranteed to be successful.
Dragon Awakening: The Dragon Awakening system allows characters to transform into an unstoppable force with stronger armor and increased abilities. In this state, you can use special skills, including the Special Devour Skill. However, if you ignite it when your HP is extremely low, there are chances that your power may go berserk and you may incur a Rogue Dragon Awakening. During this state, your attack power and escape rate may increase, but your defense will greatly decrease – a huge gamble, so make sure you utilize the Rogue Dragon Awakening carefully!
Giant Dragon Battles: Players will experience battles against Giant Dragons who takes upall three levels! By damaging each of its body parts until their HP reaches 0, that part of the body (and the associated attacks) will be sealed. Additionally, you can temporarily knock out the boss so be strategic on which body parts or main body you will attack!
Dragon Star Varnir will release in the west exclusively for PS4 (at least for now) in summer 2019, which is a bit later than the previously-announced spring release window.
