Take the core formula from the original Slime Mori-Mori and throw in the tanks, and you've got Rocket Slime. Off the bat, there are already a ton of quality-of-life improvements, especially regarding the dungeoneering. All the trains cars/cargo floats now have a max capacity of four items (including yourself if you want to make a quick getaway while holding three items), so no more waiting around or meandering about to offload your goods! There's also no time-limit present in the dungeons anymore, so feel free to explore as long as you want while keeping in mind the day-night cycle that can affect enemy spawns. While there are still some instances of needing to carry around Bomb Rocks to blow up barriers or collecting other assorted objects to imitate totems and unlock doors, there's definitely a lot less of the former and the latter is simplified since objects are now located within nearby rooms instead of having to travel across the whole map. I also appreciate that much of the slower-paced platforming from the original has been replaced with movement-oriented obstacles (such as using the Rollerdash to traverse steeper slopes, or using cannons to both destroy sand castles and shoot yourself across fast-moving water), and that unlike the original, all destroyed and interactable hazards stay destroyed for good upon return trips (looking at you, Plob Balloons). The boss fights are every bit as ridiculous as the original: my personal favorite here has to be Pot Belly, who you must defeat by catching the materials he throws out of his magic urn and then chucking them back at him as he romps about. Finally, the transition from the GBA to the DS has not been missed: the visuals have gotten a nice bump with the DS's higher resolution, and there's a satisfying "YEEEEEOWWWCH" cry every time you slam into an enemy with the Elasto Blast. Just considering the basics that made the original so memorable, I can conclude that the sequel absolutely does all that and more.

What really add much more meat to the game, however, are the tank battles. It cannot be understated how much depth this adds to the core loop: in the original, materials sent back to town could only be used to repair the town (for aesthetics and to unlock some mini-games) or were to be sold for money. This time around, materials harvested from dungeons can now be transmuted with the magic urn once you've gained the corresponding recipes to produce more valuable material that you can use as tank ammo. Additionally, kidnapping monsters becomes much more valuable: send back at least 30 of any species, and you'll create a Bronze statue of that species in the art museum, allowing you to recruit that monster as a crew member for your tank. It's much more worthwhile as a result to forage about the dungeons and send back everything you find, knowing that it'll contribute to improving your tank warfare in some fashion. The tank battles themselves are the perfect mix of controlled chaos: you must fire upon enemy tanks in real-time, managing both the upper and lower cannon while fighting off any invaders trying to infiltrate your own tank and stealing ammo/destroying your interior. While most fights aren't particularly difficult, there is an element of strategy from figuring out exactly what to fire and when (ex: should I use shields to block off an entire line of enemy fire, or should I use carefully placed Kaboomamite instead to create a temporary wall of explosions while firing with the top cannon instead?), and if all else fails, you can just infiltrate the enemy tank yourself and blow up all their machines for the kicks. It never gets old engaging in these over-the-top fights, and the materials gained both for the fights and as a result of winning the fights makes the game's centralization around the tank battles that much more rewarding.

I've played hours upon hours of this game, both in my childhood and recently, and the only pertinent complaint that comes to mind is that the game is a bit too easy. In particular, most tank fights can be cheesed by infiltrating the tank via destroying the door/immediately shooting yourself out of the cannon and landing in the opponent's cannon room, and then just guarding the enemy cannon room to prevent anyone from firing at your tank. It doesn't take much more than a pulse to do so, since enemies can take a while to react to your Elastoblast and killing enemies will put them out of commission for a solid minute or two. I think this could have been alleviated if there were more fights that didn't rely on an enemy crew to fire or if there were more solo fights involved (i.e. just you as the only crew member vs someone else). Regardless, Rocket Slime is an incredibly entertaining and cozy experience that is every bit as charming as the original with tons of upgrades, and while there isn't much post-game to be found outside of the Tank Masters Tournament (which does at least have some entertaining tank battle variations, in fairness), I can respect a game that draws itself to a natural close and never outstays its welcome. It's even better if you can find a friend to play against via local multiplayer Wi-Fi so you can really get a taste of how crazy and complex tank engagements can become. Though, maybe don't pull out the Chili Pepper + Vulcan Bullets strategy if you still want to be friends afterwards. I learned that the hard way.

This game has no right to slap as hard as it did. The tank battles are actually fun and in-depth; trying to look for and find every secret is satisfying, and each slime has its own personality. Being able to recruit the enemies by capturing them and sending them back to town is a fun idea, and well worth it. Really, the only bad thing I can think of is that the music could be more diverse and expansive. Actually, scratch that; the fact that none of the other games in this trilogy made it out of Japan is also bad.

This is my first time playing through this game in maybe 11 or 12 years? I found it for $7 at a GameStop years ago back when $10 games were all I could afford as a kid and big-name JRPGs were the apple of my eye. It’s some of the best sprite work I’ve seen in a 2D game on the DS. Great animations and designs for characters and the tanks. I wish so badly that this used the touch screen more since there are clear opportunities for it, but for a goofy spin-off aimed at younger audiences it is a great RPG and honestly stays really true to the Dragon Quest series, as well. I think where I have issues is that the tank battle gameplay is the only interesting gameplay, and exploring the overworld doesn’t come with many hurdles besides it being a bit of a slog and its puzzles a little obvious. But the tank gameplay is just stellar and I wish this game was out and about more because it seems like something that could’ve really developed a meta! Now that I’ve completed the story and saved all the slimes, I might take a break from this one, but I’d really like to come back and finish a lot of the side-stuff and dig my teeth deep into this one.

I remember hearing about this game on YouTube when I was younger, how it's an underrated classic or a hidden gem of the console. As I was a huge fan of the Dragon Quest series, and still am to be quite frank, I was surprised that I never heard about this. So the first chance I got I made sure to pick this up and try it out, and I must say this is easily one of the best spinoff games in the franchise and one of the best games on the console as a whole.

You control a slime named Rocket who had his entire village kidnapped by a gang of Playpunks and it is up to you to find each one of the villagers and stop the evil group, thus saving your village. It plays like a fairly simplistic Zelda game, you explore each region of the map, solving puzzles and fighting enemies by jumping, stretching and throwing objects around.

Each area of a level feels meticulously crafted, built in a way to have a singular solution, and it always feels rewarding to find the next area to go to or to solve a puzzle of an area. You are constantly rewarded with items, enemies, and slimes to bring back to your home village. There are also boss fights that you need to tackle, which are creative.

However, that is only half of the gameplay. You aren't just collecting items to fill out a checkbox. They are instead ammo that can be utilized in tank battles all across the world. I didn't write that wrong, at certain points you will be tasked with managing a mobile tank while going one-on-one with an enemy. There is a great blend of resource management, with how you must use the ammo loadout you've created, strategy, with how you utilize your cannons and later team members for firing, and mastery over the controls to succeed in these sections.

The gameplay truly carries this gem, however the other aspects are still very good. The overall story of this game is pretty silly but effective. All the characters are likable and have that Dragon Quest charm about them. The music, as always, is iconic. Utilizing all the main themes in the different areas of the game, this is a great soundtrack though it is a shame that it is all MIDI instruments. Graphically this game is bright and colourful. The spritework is stunning and you can tell there is a lot of detail that went into this game.

I will be honest, there is one drawback to this game. As it is a game targeted at children, this leans heavily on the easier side of things. Except for some tank battles in the back half of the game, and a few tricky post-game puzzles, this game is not difficult in the slightest. I don't think it is a huge detractor though, as it becomes more accessible for a wider audience.

It is such a shame I am unable to play a modern version of this game. I truly wish we could get a port or a sequel available to us overseas, as this is truly a unique and quirky title that deserves to be remembered within the Nintendo DS' legendary library. If this game looks even remotely interesting to you, I highly recommend it. This is a genuine hidden gem.

This is definitely a but of a rough and easy game in a lot of respects, but I still think that this is basically a masterpiece regardless and an absolutely hidden gem. There are few games I can think of that have been able to give me such a concentrated and extended amount of dopamine as this one has, but the charm combined with a selection of insanely creative and cool systems ended up barely leaving a moment where I wasn't grinning like a fool. For a fun, comfy sort of game, I also think that making it centred so heavily around the Dragon Quest slimes was an especially great choice because well, look at them!

Really most of what makes me appreciate this game so much is the fact that basically every aspect of it feels really, really clever in one way or another and manages to connect so many seemingly disparate elements into a really solid, easy to grasp gameplay loop that carries through the 12 or so hours it goes on for. Of these I think that the whole tank system is an especially awesome part of the game, both for how they work and the surprising amount of depth that can go into it, but also for the sheer spectacle. No matter how many times one of these tank battles would happen, I never got sick of controlling this 2 storey battle fortress and slowly destroying an enemy's equally massive battle fortress both from the inside and out. While it's not especially complex since this game was clearly targeted towards a relatively young audience, there's a lot of nuance to these encounters nonetheless, not only with your ammo choice, but also your crew and how you yourself interact with this lightly strategic real time battle.

This all ties nicely into the other half of the game, which is like a simplified take on the early top down Zelda titles but with some interesting twists on the formula, namely the carrying mechanic. Rather than having a wide array of tools at your disposal to use at any time, you instead can carry up to 3 items as a stack on your back, and these can be almost anything you find in the level. This not only can contribute to some neat puzzles here and there, but you can also choose to pick up what you find and transport it back to the city that acts as your home base, being able to recruit the enemies you've brought back into your party, and use the items you find as alchemy ingredients or even ammo for your tank. I love this idea because not only is this a really interesting, unconventional idea, to be able to take the raw items you find in the environment and use it as ammo, no matter what it is, but it also makes the game incredibly rewarding through and through, knowing that literally everything you find has another use that contributes to an ever strengthening repertoire.

While all of these above points would make for a very interesting game on its own, it's all wrapped up in a really comfy aesthetic, taking a selection of the cartoony Dragon Quest monsters, making them even smaller and cuter and then having a whole little goofy story with a lot of charming characters. Watching your village fill up with characters as the game progresses is absolutely lovely, and you can tell that there was some time dedicated to a lot of smaller details to really flesh things out. The fact that each of the approximately 120 NPCs in the town feel as if they have some distinct characteristic along with having entirely separate dialogue for if you decide to attack them is only one of the many extra tidbits Rocket Slime has to really flesh out the experience way beyond what one might expect from this little DS spin off title.

Regardless of how easy this game is (because frankly there were only 2 instances where I felt at all threatened), this is still a fantastic little game that is so full of charm and heart, and it's one that I could definitely see myself returning to in the future because it's so happy and comfy while also not being quite like any other game I've played. Highly recommend giving this a shot as long as you keep in mind that it is rather simplistic in a fair few ways, which might leave some people bored if they're looking for a consistent challenge, even if some post game stuff is nasty enough to really make you consider cool strategies and the like. Kinda wish this was the Dragon Quest spin off that got some more entries rather than the Monsters one, even though those games were pretty good as well.