My first hour with Drakengard was not impressive at all. It seemed to be a half-assed Dynasty Warriors married to a half-assed dragon-flying game. Through the miracle of addition, that comes out to "ass".

Then one day I came home from school or work or something, and Morgion told me he had "played too much" Drakengard. And he had found a weapon I didn't have. The bastard. After playing for another couple of hours, and finding some weapons that weren't swords, Drakengard had gone from a game I wanted to send back to a game that I might possibly to have babies with. Forget Dynasty Warriors, in DW if your character starts with a spear, all you get are bigger/flashier spears. In Drakengard, you get maces, swords, long swords, axes, spears, wands, pickaxes, and hammers. No rocks, though. Each weapon, even within a type, handles a little bit differently and has its own super magic attack.

And then! You get a dragon, and it kills everything dead if there are no archers around. And then! You get partners to use in emergencies, and all of you are crazy!! You kill thousands of enemies singlehandedly, but they keep coming because they're evil. Even with the tiniest wand, Caim the DeathSlayerMaster can lay low entire battalions of armored foes. Most of the time you don't even need to use the dragon -- hence the title.

So Morgion and I have been taking turns inching through the game, collection all the weapons we can and leveling them to max just to see what kind of crazy magic shit they can do. Big thumbs up.