Golden Sun is one of those series’ that, while I enjoyed what I played of it, I completely forgot it existed; that is until Golden Sun: Dark Dawn was announced for the DS at 2009′s E3. Then I quickly forgot about it again until I finally got my hands on the title at this year’s Penny Arcade Expo (PAX).

There were two demo’s available on the show floor. One concentrated on the adventure elements while the other focused on the battle system. I played the battle system demo to completion, so I will start there.

The first thing I noticed during the battle demo was the graphics. Much like how the GBA Golden Sun games used tricks to make sprites look like they were on a 3D plane, Golden Sun: Dark Dawn uses tricks to squeeze extra power out of the DS.

The ground characters stand on is a 3D plane, but it blends near-seamlessly into a map painting that makes up the background. Games like the remake of Final Fantasy IV have shown that the DS often struggles to render a full 3D battle arena and the characters inside it. The map painting allows two things: a sharp and detailed background and extra power to devote to rendering the characters and their attacks.

The characters aren’t “chibified” in battle (though they are on the field), they have normal proportions. They also have a reasonable amount of detail. Combine this with lots of dynamic camera angles that change depending on what’s happening and you have a really slick looking game.

The battle system is completely turn-based. Nintendo doesn’t seem to have added any real-time elements. This might turn off some, but I couldn’t be happier. Truly turn-based RPGs are a dying breed outside of Dragon Quest afterall, and I prefer them.

I’m not sure how the skill progression will play out, but each character in the demo had a surprisingly large number of skills. Some of these affected single enemies while others hit the surrounding ones as well. Unlike Dragon Quest (which I’ve had on the brain lately thanks to IX), these enemies don’t have to be the same type, they just have to be adjacent to each other.

Aside from the normal magic abilities, Djinn make a comeback. Each character has their own unique set of Djinn abilities that have consistent elemental affinities (fire, water, etc.) within the set. Some of the Djinn abilities are attacks while others are stat boosting support skills. They seemed to be as varied as the normal magic.

To keep things balanced, you only seem to be able to use each Djinn once in a battle. Once you’ve used multiple Djinn of the same element, you can spend that built up energy to do a full-on summon. These are impressive, cinematic abilities rendered in-engine. While they look great, I can’t confirm whether or not they’re skippable.

The scale and implementation of these summons remind me of the Final Fantasy series, but the designs of the summoned creatures do not. My biggest worry is a problem I had with one of the earlier Golden Sun games. Will the battles rely too heavily on repeated use of Djinn and summons and not enough on the characters’ own abilities? It will be hard to tell until the full game releases.

After beating all the battles, I was awarded with the opportunity to explore a town. The town avoided the standard layout of a flat plane with rectangular buildings on it. Instead, buildings were built into a cliffside, creating a very interesting layout that required entering through certain buildings to access parts of the town.

During the adventure demo, field magic was showcased. Abilities allow you to push blocks from afar with telekinesis, set fire to fuses, and so on. It will be interesting to see how these abilities are implemented into the dungeon’s puzzles.

I walked away from Golden Sun: Dark Dawn impressed. Hopefully, that impression will allow me to remember the series exists when the full game hits shelves.

Tags: Camelot, DS, Golden Sun, Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, hands-on impressions, Nintendo, PAX, PAX '10, PAX 2010 COVERAGE

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