Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars, is led by people who worked on the Drakengard / Drag-on Dragoon franchise as well as the Nier franchise, both products of Square-Enix. What was initially pitched as an idea for a mobile game, made the switch and was released on PC, Nintendo Switch, and Playstation 4 on October 28, 2021.
A story as old as RPGs go
“Long, long ago, the people lived in peace. But then the Dragon appeared, sowing terror throughout the land. Valiantly the kingdom fought, claiming narrow victory. Grievously wounded, the Dragon fled. Thereafter, the years passed. People again knew peace, until the Dragon returned. Now the queen gathers adventurers to slay the Dragon…“
More than one team of heroes
Wynifred (woman mage), Berwyn (muscular man), and Heddwyn (elder man) pictured on the far left, known as the Ivory Order Trio, are a group of heroes you first get to learn about. They are not the main group of heroes, rather Ash (young man), Melanie (young woman), and Mar (mysterious creature) pictured on the far right are with additional characters joining them later.
You are able to name the main hero anything you want, but be warned the name you register it as will remain in that language should you choose to switch languages later. For example, it will be ‘Ash’ by default and ‘ダスト’in Japanese and those will show up as is regardless of the language change. Story-wise, seeing as the queen wants to eliminate the Dragon, it makes sense that there is more than one team.
It’s all in the cards
The overworld and subsequently every town and dungeon is laid out a few cards at a time in which you have to turn over by being in front of. Some terrain may not be accessible at first like crossing mountains and oceans, but unturned cards give you an idea off where you have explored and where you haven’t.
Be careful as wandering too far from your next objective, which you can access at any time, can lead to potentially dangerous enemy encounters. A good feature implemented allows you to move your cursor to any card already flipped over immediately accounting that there is enough visibility unlike in a dark cave or misty forest.
A traditional turn-based random battle system akin to classic RPGs
Battles in Voice of Cards are relatively simple with some unique features here and there. Hit points are in the bottom middle of a card while offense is listed to the left and defense to the right. Without accounting for elemental affiliations or other possible effects, damage is calculated by doing a simple cross calculation of your attack and its defense. Attack usually requires gems that are stored in the red-lined box in the top-left of the screen.
The number of gems required is listed on the bottom right of each card. Each character is given a basic attack that does not require any gems to use. Gems are given out at a rate of once per character turn with an option to pass or sometimes get a gem as an ability. Once you get more than four-card skills per character, you will have to choose which four to carry into battle so plan accordingly. Item cards are also able to be used by any character and do not require the use of gems but are usable.
An optional card game within a game of cards
Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars features a card game you can play in town at a game parlor that is somewhat similar to poker. Each turn, you draw two cards. You either make a pair of two or three cards or a pair in sequential order similar to that of a straight with just three cards.
The points of each pair will be added to your total and the player with the most points wins. You are only allowed to keep three pairs so you will have to discard a pair when you make four so choose the one that is lower in points which will be traded off in point total.
Simple yet adequate
Question quests
Whether you land on an event square out in the field or dungeon, or whether it is an NPC quest, you will be given plenty of options to choose from for an answer in Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars. Some quests happen more than once so you can experiment with it without having to reload. Even dropped items from monsters are chosen from groups of three.
Established establishments
There are five main types of establishments in each town.
Inn: Rest and recover party’s hit points.
Apothecary: Purchase items to restore hit points, cure status elements, and other similar items
Armorer: Sells weapons,armor, and accessories.
Item Shop: Stocks items that are more like tools that aid your adventure.
Game Parlor: Where you can play a card mini-game and take a break from the main game.
