7th Dragon III Code: VFD

Often times, companies want to release games within a franchise in a proper order. Missed prequels or sequels can often do more harm than good for a story-driven series, by alienating players that don’t know the story’s context. Thankfully, 7^th Dragon III: Code VFD falls outside of this realm, and delivers a great dungeon crawling experience despite being the 4^th and final entry in the now seven year old series.

It has been almost a century since the True Dragons ravaged the world in 2020 and 2021. Humanity has begun the slow process of rebuilding itself by bringing its people together and attempting to find a cure for the remaining cases of “Dragon Sickness” still threatening the populace. Another attack by the dragons is imminent though, and the game development group Nodens has been secretly scouting out those with the potential to fight dragons with their VR game 7^th Encount. Your player-character avatar is one of these individuals and, by working together with Nodens and the International Self-Defense Force (ISDF), is chosen to embark on a mission putting the past, present, and future of the world on the line.

The story of Code VFD isn’t too hard to get behind, despite it being the 4^th game in the 7^th Dragon series. Much of its plot elements, such as Dragon Sickness, what the true dragons are, and pieces of the calamity from 2020 and 2021 are re-explained in brief. Where it does falter is with a few characters that reappear from previous entries. Their stories and struggles have much less impact than they should, and fall flat amongst some of the heavier themes in Code VFD’s last few acts. Overall, the story does what it’s supposed to: introduces a cast of colorful characters (albeit, lightly explored), moves those characters forward, and presents a nice conclusive end to a series finale.

7^th Dragon III: Code VFD offers the “gather your party” experience found in games like Etrian Odyssey or older Dragon Quest titles. After choosing a character portrait, you pick a class for each of your party members. While the game has standard classes like mages and swordsmen (samurai), there’s also some oddball and interesting choices. Within the starting class options, Duelists and Agents stand out the most. Duelists are a caster class that use a luck-based system to draw cards and summon elemental monsters. Their damage output is a bit higher than mages, but this comes at the cost of using turns to setup hands of cards. Agents on the other hand are like de-buff machines. Using a skill called “hacking” they can bypass enemies’ natural defenses to lower their stats, have them attack other enemies, or force them into status ailments. Agents also require setup like Duelists but, with bosses having the ability to sustain status effects, the payoff is often very worth it.

Party balance is very well done. No class feels truly underwhelming, and when paired the right way you can make just about any combination of characters mesh. This all works its way into Code VFD’s combat, which is a careful balance of knowing who needs to be on support duty for a turn while other either do damage or try to set up their bigger combo pieces. VFD is one of the rare instances in an RPG where players can find themselves constantly using recovery items in battle. Overcoming bosses feels rewarding, as even multi-turn setups to do ridiculous damage require a decent amount of planning lest everything goes to hell. Ultimately, Code: VFD’s combat is balanced around its numbers more than exploiting weakness or looking for enemy-specific gimmicks. Figuring out how to properly balance your party’s damage and support skills goes farther than trying to cover every single damage option.

While combat and story are the carrying points of VFD, its side-material is not worth overlooking. The game’s titular dragon enemies drop their own special resource called “Dz,” which is used to upgrade facilities at Nodens and unlocks new side-quests and stronger items and skills for your party. After upgrading the Skylounge to its final level, you can start hanging out with other NPCs, which can lead to strong end-game equipment for specific classes. For the completionist that goes out of their way to eliminate every dragon, there waits a post-game dungeon where they can fight some of the games strongest enemies, and maybe unlock a little bit of extra story. These extra incentives are sometimes small, but every now and then have a big payoff.

Despite their blocky exteriors, Code VFD’s visuals have a lot of character to them. In particular, the graphics and backgrounds for the various dungeons throughout the game are diverse and striking. The submerged metropolis of Atlantis is made of fantastical buildings colored in soft purples and blues, tinted with white to feel like it’s underwater. The dystopian future-world of Eden is a stark contrast to it with bright reds, sickly greens, and tinges of black and orange. It gives off the oppressive vibe of a land cursed by dragons. And finally, the present day Tokyo is a unique mix of the two. Nodens HQ is crisp, clean, and proper, but the surrounding Tokyo area is filled with dilapidated buildings and crumbling railways. A game’s aesthetics are more than just its visuals though, and Code: VFD is backed by an amazing soundtrack.

Code VFD’s soundtrack is composed by Yuzo Koshiro, who also composed for the very similar Etrian Odyssey series of games. Dungeon themes and battle themes are catchy and reflective of their location. The theme for Nodens base of operations is nice and laid back, while the music in Eden feels depressing and mirrors the attitude of its inhabitants. Most striking are the lyrical boss themes though. Almost all the boss battles have story-heavy ties, many of them accompanied by emotional moments from the supporting cast. Adding lyrics gives these fights a much more memorable backdrop and can really pull you in. By actively combing elements of story, graphics, music, and gameplay together, Code: VFD stands as a great example of how to make use of all its elements to create an engaging and enjoyable game.