Dragalia Lost Resplendent Refrain Event is Keeping Me Interested

Dragalia Lost has released another timely update. This time it’s another co-operative raid featuring a captivating coming of age tale of a talented young boy and his world-renowned choir.  The Harmonia Choir, lead by the dragon Maritimus, is widely respected as the foremost producer of vocal talent in the Dragalia Lost universe. Producing characters like the famous mezzo-soprano Lucretia, and the creative director Vixel, and many more summonable units, this event has a music theme that’s not to be missed. Boasting new tracks from IRL musical artist DAOKO (who consequently released the music from the game as a whole new album), the update has a unique spin on growing up.

The Story of Resplendent Refrain

Young Elias, one of the male singers in the choir, is harboring resentment about his ever advancing march into young adulthood, and the changes that brings. His voice is getting deeper, and threatening to challenge his aptitude at singing. An alumni from the choir, Vixel, commiserates with the boy and tells him the story of how his own voice changing lead him to choosing the path of conductor so as to remain close to the music that shaped his life. However, the strife hidden away by Elias has been amplified by a dark shard of magic and has unleashed a great evil that the protagonist prince Euden and his crew must dispatch.

 

As for mechanics, the fight against the big bad, Sabnock, is entertaining and reminiscent of other great raid fights in other games. To replicate that feeling on mobile is always a welcome surprise, but the overall concept behind the event feels recycled. Dragalia Lost has created a system where the player must farm a resource in order to enter the raid. In order to acquire the resource, you must do a lower-tier battle for 10-15 of these shards, of which 10 are required to challenge Sabnock.

Repetitive Raid

At first, the scramble to get these shards is the primary objective, but quickly becomes irrelevant as you often get the same rewards for beating the raid itself. This structure is similar to the last few raids they’ve done, and I fear the formula is getting stale. This is the first event that I haven’t been endlessly grinding for materials, new titles, and other worthwhile rewards simply because it’s a bit too much of the same old, same old. The rewards are always welcome, and plentiful, but if it’s at the cost of my personal time to grind out a sub-par event every month, it’s unlikely to keep me as hooked as I have been. I want to reiterate that the actual combat is fun and challenging, and it’s exciting to watch the community adapt and develop a strategy for best practice over the span of the event, but applying a new skin to an old structure repeatedly might spell disaster for a game that has boasted $50 million in sales since September.

That being said, the story, as cheesy as it sounds, is actually quite compelling. It promotes the importance of exploring one’s emotions and looking to role models for support and guidance rather than ignoring anxiety and grief. I think it’s pretty easy to write off mobile games as trite and hollow, but Dragalia Lost continuously impresses me with not only the quality of the overall story, but the dialogue written within. The localization team is full of rockstars, and it shows in the attachment you develop with characters who only get the spotlight for a week or so during events.

Dragalia Lost is still on my hit list, and currently the only mobile game I’m playing despite not having a very deep multiplayer feature (which is almost always a leading factor in my game choice). I hope to see it thrive, and encourage anyone with enough space on their phone to give this one a shot.

Written by
Jamie is a co-host and writer for the Super Gamecast family when she isn't neck deep in her latest gaming obsession. Whether it's table top, console, PC or analogue, game is life. Recovering Call of Duty scrub. Unabashed Stardew Valley fangirl, WoW veteran, Zelda stan, and Nintendo Switch junkie.

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