As someone who adored the original I knew that I was going to spend another 100+ hours playing this version. Nostalgia would have led me to giving this 5 stars but upon revisting the game in this version I agree with many that there are times that it does go on needlessly a bit. The game is long even if you don't engage much with side content.

The thing I truly love about this game is the way the story is told. The way each island you restore has it's own condensed story felt like I was playing a fairy tale always wondering what the next island would be about and how it connected to the main plot. The 3DS version cut some of the unnecessary intro content and made things a bit easier all around which is nice. While I'm more a fan of the PS1 graphics I did not mind them in this either. When I played the original as a kid I spent over 200 hours in it and it was one of the longest I ever played a game until years later so it does have a special place for me in my mind.

Is it the best DQ game? To me yes but I would not recommend it to someone new to the series as it is very slow. Does it provide you with lots to do? Yes, the town building and monster park as well as the amazing class system kept me busy for a long time. I think to this day this game may have one of my favorite class systems in any game other than FFT.