An emulated version of the PlayStation classic The Legend of Dragoon that became available on the PlayStation 4 and 5 for PlayStation Plus Premium subscribers last week has been patched to fix a number of problems that, according to fans, rendered the game unplayable. JRPG fans that were eagerly anticipating the chance to play The Legend of Dragoon for the first time in over 20 years were dismayed when they were greeted by a series of game-breaking bugs.The Legend of Dragoon is a turn-based JRPG made by first-party PlayStation developer Japan Studio, which has been responsible for some of the most influential games ever made, including PaRappa the Rapper, Gravity Rush, and the legendary Shadow of the Colossus. Japan Studio released The Legend of Dragoon in Japan in December 1999 and eventually released it in the United States in 2001. While The Legend of Dragoon never quite captured a wide audience, it still developed a small but passionate fan base that had been itching for a legal way to play the game on their modern PlayStation consoles. The recent PlayStation Plus Premium release made that dream finally come true until technical issues sullied the experience.The version 1.02 update, released today, was downloaded and tested by independent video game journalist Stephanie DeCleene, aka @TheGothDraoon on Twitter. Stephanie reports via tweet that using Dragoon magic, one of the primary causes of the port’s most destructive glitch, no longer causes the game to ignore controller inputs which would softlock the game, rendering it unplayable.
Fans who have been eagerly anticipating a return of The Legend of Dragoon in some form since rumors swirled back in 2020 have also detailed a number of additional bugs that made for an unpleasant gameplay experience, including character dialogue not playing during battle scenes, bizarre blue lines surrounding background art assets, unreadable on-screen text, and the rewind feature crashing the game. Fans on Reddit who have compiled a long and exhaustive list of bugs both big and small that have plagued The Legend of Dragoon since its release are reporting vast improvements post-patch.
The Dragoon magic softlock and rewind bugs could combine into a particularly frustrating issue. Players could find themselves in a situation where using Dragoon magic softlocked the game, then using the rewind feature in an attempt to choose a different attack would crash the game. A crash would probably wind up being both a blessing and a curse, as the player would have had to restart the game anyway after the softlock. While it is not yet known if the update addresses all the port’s bugs, a number of players speaking about their experiences on Twitter after installing the 1.02 patch are reporting noticeable technical improvements.
The Legend of Dragoon is out now via the PS Plus Premium Classics on the PlayStation Store.
Source: Reddit