In remembrance of the late Dragon Ball creator, Akira Toriyama, Xbox is celebrating the mangaka's legacy with a free, dynamic dashboard background of his character designs for Xbox 360's fantasy RPG Blue Dragon.
The legendary Akira Toriyama, who was additionally the creator behind beloved manga like Dr. Slump and paintings for video games like Dragon Quest and Chrono Trigger, passed away on March 1 on account of an acute subdural hematoma.
Since his passing, the anime neighborhood and manga creators behind collection like Naruto, Bleach, and One Piece celebrated Toriyama's undeniable impact on pop culture. Now, Microsoft is becoming a member of in celebrating Toriyama's legacy with a free dashboard background for one of his most slept-on hits, Blue Dragon.
Honoring a true legend.
We’ve added a new dynamic dashboard background that includes Xbox 360's Blue Dragon, with artwork and character designs by Akira Toriyama. pic.twitter.com/ZFj20fX2ed
— Xbox (@Xbox) March 29, 2024
"Honoring a true legend," Xbox wrote on its official X/Twitter account. "We’ve added a new dynamic dashboard background featuring Xbox 360's Blue Dragon, with art and character designs by Akira Toriyama."
The dashboard background options protagonist Shu posing on the height of a mountain alongside his dragon companion, identical to they did on Blue Dragon's Xbox 360 field artwork cowl. Along with displaying the Blue Dragon background, Xbox additionally inspired gamers to present Blue Dragon a whirl this weekend in honor of Toriyama.
Blue Dragon was a Microsoft-exclusive 2006 role-playing game that ostensibly served as Xbox's reply to the favored ongoing Final Fantasy collection. This would've confirmed an inconceivable job for some other game had it not been for the truth that Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi and its acclaimed composer Nobuo Uematsu had been concerned with the game's improvement.
The RPG follows a group of adventurers with the facility to summon shadow dragons as they embark on a globe-trotting journey. The collection was a hit in Japan and would later be tailored into an anime series by Naruto and Bleach studio Pierrot.
In our review, we wrote "Blue Dragon is not the most original RPG as far as design goes. Nor is it the first "will need to have" RPG on a Microsoft console. The pacing through the first half of the game is far too slow to stay engaging for all but the hardcore JRPG fan and the story is not nearly as epic as the multiple disc, 50+ hour game implies. But for those needing a solid traditional role-playing experience on Xbox 360, Blue Dragon will fit the bill."
Isaiah Colbert is a freelance author for IGN. You can comply with them on Twitter @ShinEyeZehUhh.