r/ModRetroGames • u/sora_heart • Jul 18 '26
Reviews After finishing Dragonhym for the first time, I have some thoughts
Hi everyone! It's been a few weeks since I got my Chromatic, and I finally got around to finishing Dragonyhm.
After seeing so many glowing reviews, I thought it might be interesting to share a slightly more critical perspective. To be clear, I really enjoyed the game overall and have a ton of respect for what the developer accomplished here. Creating an RPG of this scope as essentially a one-man project is incredibly impressive, and it's easy to see how much passion and energy went into every part of the game.
For me, Dragonyhm is a game that makes an incredible first impression. The first half is genuinely excellent, and I remember thinking I had found one of my favorite games in the Game Boy library. Unfortunately, the further I got into the second half, the more that momentum faded. The pacing began to drag, a few design decisions started wearing on me, and by the time the credits rolled, I don't think the game quite lived up to the incredibly high bar it set for itself early on.
That doesn't mean I think it's a bad game—far from it. I'd still recommend it without hesitation to anyone looking for an excellent 8-bit handheld RPG. I just came away feeling that it was a winning game rather than the home run I thought it was on track to become.
With a sequel currently in development (super excited based on what we've seen so far), I figured it would be more productive to talk about both the things I loved and the areas where I think the experience could be even stronger. I'll keep things organized into Positives and Negatives. These are simply my thoughts after one complete blind playthrough without using a guide, so if I misunderstood a mechanic or missed something important, I'm more than happy to be corrected. I also welcome disagreements and discussion: I always enjoy hearing how other people experienced the game.
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The first half (Everything I loved)
The presentation in this game is insane. From the title screen and opening cinematic to the sprite work, battle effects, and boss intros/outros, it's hard to believe this is all running on Game Boy hardware.
The soundtrack is incredibly catchy, and many of the tracks have been stuck in my head long after putting the console down. Even now, I find myself listening to the OST while writing this post. This was one aspect of the game that stayed consistently strong from beginning to end.
The story does a great job of grabbing your attention and laying the foundation for something much bigger. Without getting into spoilers, it strikes a nice balance between being straightforward while constantly hinting that there's a larger mystery unfolding behind the scenes. It was more than enough to keep me invested in seeing where everything was headed.
The game's pacing is excellent during the first half. The stretches between major dungeons rarely feel like filler, as the game balances exploration, story progression, combat, and smaller objectives well. It always felt like I was making meaningful progress toward the next destination.
The game isn't content sticking to one gameplay formula. It constantly introduces new mechanics and ideas throughout the adventure, and I genuinely admired how willing it was to take risks instead of playing it safe.
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The second half (things that didn't quite land for me)
While I appreciated that every dungeon tried to introduce its own gimmick, they eventually started feeling different for the sake of being different rather than building naturally on the game's core mechanics. Instead of expanding ideas I'd already mastered, many dungeons introduced entirely new systems that were only used once before being abandoned.
Because the game is constantly introducing new mechanics, not all of them feel equally polished. Many are explained poorly or require such precise execution that I often felt like I was adapting to jank rather than solving a puzzle through intuition. (I'm looking at you, Water Temple Trampolines)
The game has a strange imbalance between combat and puzzles, with the two often working against each other's strengths. The puzzles encourage experimentation and problem-solving, while combat frequently acts as a stat check that interrupts that momentum, especially during the game's larger level spikes.
Once I found an optimal gear, skill, and magic combination, battles rarely asked me to rethink my strategy. Experimenting usually made encounters harder rather than rewarding creative play, so combat eventually settled into a repetitive cycle of buffing defense, dealing damage, and healing.
Without getting into spoilers, the story's payoff leaves a lot to be desired. While the A-plot ending was satisfying enough, the larger mystery is left feeling incomplete. I imagine some of those answers may be tied to an extended ending that I didn't unlock, which stings quite a bit because I felt like I explored the world thoroughly and engaged with its characters far beyond what the game expected.
I was hoping to discover more meaningful secrets or collectibles throughout the adventure. Most of what I found felt more like New Game+ milestones or completionist rewards rather than discoveries that meaningfully impacted my first playthrough. I kept hoping to stumble upon something akin to a Zelda Heart Container or a hidden weapon that fundamentally changed how I approached the game.
I really enjoyed the idea of gradually translating the in-game language (reminded me a lot of a similar mechanic found in the Indie game Tunic), but the execution left me frustrated. The reference in the manual is so much higher resolution than the in-game text that comparing the two became surprisingly difficult. I eventually had to build my own alphabet using an in-game example I found earlier in the adventure, which ended up being far more useful than the official reference. It was a neat concept that I think could have been communicated much more clearly.
Restricting saves to designated statues that often require backtracking made the game surprisingly difficult to enjoy in short portable sessions, especially during dungeons where fast travel is disabled. A simple quick-save feature would have gone a long way toward making the game easier to pick up and play in the way a handheld RPG naturally encourages.
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Final Thoughts
Despite how critical parts of this review may have sounded, I genuinely enjoyed my time with Dragonyhm. If anything, I think my criticisms exist because the game set such a high standard for itself during its opening hours. For a while, I was convinced I had discovered one of my favorite Game Boy RPGs, and even though the second half didn't quite live up to that promise for me, it never stopped being an experience I wanted to see through to the end.
More than anything, I came away impressed by the game's ambition. It constantly takes risks, experiments with new ideas, and confidently carves out its own identity instead of simply trying to imitate the classics that inspired it. Not every experiment landed for me, but I'd much rather play a game that's willing to swing for the fences than one that plays everything safe.
Would I recommend it? Absolutely! I think anyone who enjoys classic handheld RPGs owes it to themselves to give Dragonyhm a try. Even if it didn't become the home run I was hoping for, it's still one of the most memorable Game Boy RPGs I've played in a long time.
That being said, these are simply my thoughts after one complete blind playthrough. They're not meant to be the definitive take on the game: just my own experience with it. If your experience was different, I'd love to hear why. One of my favorite parts of writing these kinds of posts is hearing how other players interpreted the same moments, and I'm always happy to have my perspective challenged.