I want to preface this review by saying I have never played a dragon quest game. So everything in this game was new to me and even if its a "series staple" those elements were still new to me so I cant comment on how they were iterated upon or anything like that. Anyways, lets get into it.
DQIX is one of, if not the, most visually and technically impressive games I've ever seen on the DS. Fully explorable 3D world with countless 3D animated cutscenes, this kind of stuff just wasnt being done on the DS and despite some framerate issues they pulled it off really well. I wanted to start with the technical aspect so that when I go over the rest of what the game has to offer you can get a better idea of truly how impressive it was.
The game features a self insert custom character that starts the game off as an Angel sort of being and quickly finds himself thrust down to earth with no wings or halo. From there he is tasked with helping the people of the Protetorate and locating 7 golden fyggs scattered across the world. This isnt too terribly important but it does give you a good reason to travel the world so I cant fault it too much. From this point on you go from town to town helping the people solve whatever issue is at hand. From posing as a detective to find lost students to saving a town from a widespread disease, this is where the game really shines. Each new town introduces its own set of characters and stakes so the whole time youre playing everything feels fresh and livley. None of them drag on too long and its perfect for the pick up and play / portable nature of the game. This aspect of the game being so good really helps to aleviate one of its biggest could-be-issues in my opinion, that being the party.
This game is almost MMO like in nature as it was designed to be played with friends and online. The entire party is a blank slate with not a single one of them having a single line of dialouge. Very unlike any RPG I had ever played and at first I was really put off by it. Youre supposed to be able to group up with friends and they would make up your party instead of the random characters but in big 2024 that just wasnt going to happen for me. So I went on with the random characters the game gave me. But as I spent more and more time with the game, I didnt mind it as much. The plot is so focused on the story of your character and everything going on in the towns, the rest of the party are never really needed and start to feel like other adventurers that just tagged along for the ride. So as I was kitting them out with new gear and weapons, I started to make up my own stories for them and give them their own personalities. By the end of the game I had no problem with it at all. Now thats just me and I can totally see how this sort of party system would be offputting for people but I really didnt end up minding it.
To finish this off I want to go over some of the other things I really liked about the game. Something that is really inconsequential but offers a lot of charm is changing characters appearence based on what gear they have equiped. This is so cool to me and ensures that your party is entirely unique to you and will look different that anyone elses you see. This in tandem with the job system offer such an awesome suite of customizability. Its really easy to change jobs and each one of them have a large range of abilities that is really unique from one to the next. Leveling up feels meaningful in this game and there is always some new ability or spell to unlock next. This leads me into the combat. Pretty simple turn based action with a handful of different buff and debuff systems thrown on top. What really makes it so intruiging though is how flashy it is. The fights are all full 3D and every turn you get to see your party and the enemies running around duking it out on the top screen as you select what moves to use next. Its purely a visual flourish but it adds a lot to the heat of battle.
Another thing I though was really cool was the overworld. Unlike most RPGs on the DS, the enemy encounters arent random. Instead they appear on the overworld running around with you and the party. So now you can choose to fight or avoid them and know what monster youre going to fight going in.
I wanna finish this off by saying this game is just full of charm, top to bottom. It knows when to be silly and when to be serious. Its a beautiful game visually and a lot of fun to play. There is so much side content I think you could play for upwards of 700 hours and not do everything. The music is great and sounds amazing even out of crappy DS speakers. If you have a DS and havnt played this, please do yourself a favor and pick this up, such and underrated gem.
DQIX is one of, if not the, most visually and technically impressive games I've ever seen on the DS. Fully explorable 3D world with countless 3D animated cutscenes, this kind of stuff just wasnt being done on the DS and despite some framerate issues they pulled it off really well. I wanted to start with the technical aspect so that when I go over the rest of what the game has to offer you can get a better idea of truly how impressive it was.
The game features a self insert custom character that starts the game off as an Angel sort of being and quickly finds himself thrust down to earth with no wings or halo. From there he is tasked with helping the people of the Protetorate and locating 7 golden fyggs scattered across the world. This isnt too terribly important but it does give you a good reason to travel the world so I cant fault it too much. From this point on you go from town to town helping the people solve whatever issue is at hand. From posing as a detective to find lost students to saving a town from a widespread disease, this is where the game really shines. Each new town introduces its own set of characters and stakes so the whole time youre playing everything feels fresh and livley. None of them drag on too long and its perfect for the pick up and play / portable nature of the game. This aspect of the game being so good really helps to aleviate one of its biggest could-be-issues in my opinion, that being the party.
This game is almost MMO like in nature as it was designed to be played with friends and online. The entire party is a blank slate with not a single one of them having a single line of dialouge. Very unlike any RPG I had ever played and at first I was really put off by it. Youre supposed to be able to group up with friends and they would make up your party instead of the random characters but in big 2024 that just wasnt going to happen for me. So I went on with the random characters the game gave me. But as I spent more and more time with the game, I didnt mind it as much. The plot is so focused on the story of your character and everything going on in the towns, the rest of the party are never really needed and start to feel like other adventurers that just tagged along for the ride. So as I was kitting them out with new gear and weapons, I started to make up my own stories for them and give them their own personalities. By the end of the game I had no problem with it at all. Now thats just me and I can totally see how this sort of party system would be offputting for people but I really didnt end up minding it.
To finish this off I want to go over some of the other things I really liked about the game. Something that is really inconsequential but offers a lot of charm is changing characters appearence based on what gear they have equiped. This is so cool to me and ensures that your party is entirely unique to you and will look different that anyone elses you see. This in tandem with the job system offer such an awesome suite of customizability. Its really easy to change jobs and each one of them have a large range of abilities that is really unique from one to the next. Leveling up feels meaningful in this game and there is always some new ability or spell to unlock next. This leads me into the combat. Pretty simple turn based action with a handful of different buff and debuff systems thrown on top. What really makes it so intruiging though is how flashy it is. The fights are all full 3D and every turn you get to see your party and the enemies running around duking it out on the top screen as you select what moves to use next. Its purely a visual flourish but it adds a lot to the heat of battle.
Another thing I though was really cool was the overworld. Unlike most RPGs on the DS, the enemy encounters arent random. Instead they appear on the overworld running around with you and the party. So now you can choose to fight or avoid them and know what monster youre going to fight going in.
I wanna finish this off by saying this game is just full of charm, top to bottom. It knows when to be silly and when to be serious. Its a beautiful game visually and a lot of fun to play. There is so much side content I think you could play for upwards of 700 hours and not do everything. The music is great and sounds amazing even out of crappy DS speakers. If you have a DS and havnt played this, please do yourself a favor and pick this up, such and underrated gem.
Kind of an odd Dragon Quest - the main story is not the bulk of the gameplay. Playing through to finish the plot goes by surprisingly quickly (especially relative to VIII or XI), yet this game probably has the most content of any Dragon Quest, technically speaking, as the grottos make the game immensely large. The job system in this game is very solid, so if you like dungeon-crawling and turn-based battle without too much plot, this was a great one. Unfortunately, a lot of this content is locked behind online play, so now that the Nintendo servers are shut down, you need to do some homebrew work-arounds to get this content back.
Rest in piece akira toriyama
Not feeling this game to be honest...
In my viewpoint its the weakest game in the series
It is not a very recognized game because it came out only for the nintendo ds, but it is very worthwhile.
It has a very entertaining story and a vocation system to customize your team with different classes, weapons and skills that gives a lot of versatility to the game.
It has a very entertaining story and a vocation system to customize your team with different classes, weapons and skills that gives a lot of versatility to the game.
After so many Dragon Quest games centered around its core party, it's odd to get one we're but a loose cog in the mechanism of the plot. Our hero is a Celestrian - essentially an angel - assigned to the small village of Angel Falls, but when a cataclysm happens in their home, they find themselves cast down to the world below and stripped of their Celestrian powers. They're then forced to journey around the world, helping people to restore their faith and send the powerful energy of "benevolessence" back to the Celestrian world above.
I actually like the plot here despite the lack of any characterization to our entirely player-created party, plus there's also a really robust job system to boot, which I love! However, the game wants you to engage not just with its main narrative but also a pseudo-MMORPG style system of extremely grindy quests. If you can get into these you'll find Dragon Quest IX to have massive longevity far after the game concludes its narrative, but I found them off-putting and time-wasting.
I actually like the plot here despite the lack of any characterization to our entirely player-created party, plus there's also a really robust job system to boot, which I love! However, the game wants you to engage not just with its main narrative but also a pseudo-MMORPG style system of extremely grindy quests. If you can get into these you'll find Dragon Quest IX to have massive longevity far after the game concludes its narrative, but I found them off-putting and time-wasting.