Blue Dragon

Blue Dragon(ブルードラゴン, Burū Doragon) is an Xbox 360 game. It was developed by Artoon based on a design by Final Fantasy series originator Hironobu Sakaguchi, who is also supervising development. Microsoft hopes this game's release will be a great boon to Xbox 360 sales in Japan, as it will be one of the first traditional Japanese RPGs to come to the Xbox 360 system. They hoped to sell over 200,000 copies, breaking their record for sales of an Xbox 360 game in Japan to date. As of January 2007, while the game has sold less than expected (135,000 units) it is the highest selling Xbox 360 title in the territory. The RPG genre is especially popular in Japan, and the failure of Microsoft's first game console, the Xbox, in Japan is often partially attributed to the system's lack of traditional Japanese RPGs. Along with a quick video shown at E3 2006, Peter Moore promised the game would be out by the end of the year in Japan.

This game is the first of a series of Blue Dragon games, manga and anime.

The game is the first Xbox 360 title to ship on 3 DVDs.

Designers
Blue Dragon's designers include two of the creators of Chrono Trigger, the extremely successful RPG for the Super Nintendo. The game features art from Akira Toriyama, the creator of Dragon Ball and visual designer and illustrator of one of Japan's most popular video game series, Dragon Quest. Blue Dragon's soundtrack is produced by Nobuo Uematsu, a composer responsible for much of the music in the popular Final Fantasy game series. The music was performed live at the PLAY! A Video Game Symphony concerts in Chicago on May 27, 2006, Stockholm, [Swede on June 14, 2006, Philadelphia on July 27, 2006, on August 4, 2006 in Vienna, Virginia, and, as an encore, on September 30, 2006 in Toronto, Ontario. One of the boss themes also includes vocals by English singer Ian Gillan.

On October 19, 2006 all 10,000 Blue Dragon preorders bundled with a limited edition Xbox 360 Core system were sold-out in Japan.

Plot
Each year for the past 10 years, purple clouds would appear, and bring disasters to people around that world. When their village is attacked again Shu, Kluke, and Jiro fight back against the fin that appear only to kill the people. However they soon discover it is a strange machine. But even after damaging it, it takes them back to the flagship, with the three still on it. There, they encounter constant attacks from metal soldiers until they discover three orbs of light. After hearing a voice tell them to swallow the orbs, they do and discover their shadows grow into monsters; Kluke's becomes a blue phoenix, Jiro's a blue minotaur, and Shu's a blue dragon. They then fight the ship's captain, Nene, and discover that Nene is behind the yearly attacks on their town. He easily defeats them, and they can barely make it to a escape capsule. They then land far from home and must then journey to find a way to save their land.

Following their escape from Nene's air fortress, they encounter more people from towns that have also fallen victim to the purple clouds, and decide that they must try to stop Nene from continuing to bring ruin on their world.

Heroes

 * Shu: The protagonist, a 16-year-old boy who lives with his grandfather. Has a dragon shadow.
 * Kluke: A childhood friend of Shu and Jiro. 16 years old.  She is kind and mature. Has a phoenix shadow.
 * Jiro: A childhood friend of Shu and Kluke. 17 years old. He is smart and enjoys it when his plans work out.  Has a minotaur shadow.
 * Zola: A mercenary. She is strong and distant from the others. 20 years old. Has a killer bat as her shadow.
 * Marumaro: A cat-like humanoid from the "Debi" tribe. He looks similar to Cait Sith. Looks about 14 years old. Has a saber-toothed tiger shadow.

Villains

 * Nene:Main Antagonist. A man from an ancient 10,000-year-old race.  He leads the attacks on Shu, Kluke and Jiro's village.  He has a purple dragon shadow that has similarities to all blue shadows.
 * Deathroy:Nene's pet, who enjoys watching him cause suffering.
 * Mecha General Szabo: Causes suffering all over the world.

Manga & anime
On the November 14, 2006, Shueisha announced that a manga adaptation of Blue Dragon will be produced. Blue Dragon ST (Secret Trick) will be drawn by Shibata Ami and will premier in Monthly Shonen Jump in January. Takeshi Obata, the illustrator of Death Note is handling Blue Dragon Ral Grado, which began serialization in Issue 1 2007 of Weekly Shonen Jump. An anime adaption of the game was also announced in November 2006.

Japanese Version

 * Inoue Marina: Shu
 * Kawasumi Ayako: Kluke
 * Miyata Kouki: Jiro
 * Kuwashima Houko: Zola
 * Kozakura Etsuko: Marumaro
 * Norio Wakamoto: Nene
 * Tessho Genda: Szabo

English version

 * Tara Strong

Reception
With a total of 80,348 units sold on the first four days of release in Japan, Blue Dragon became the fastest selling Xbox 360 game in the region.