Despite how much marketing this game seemed to have such as sponsored streams by people who aren't even in the anime space, a demo, and so many ads (unless I was targeted because I frequent the DBZ side of the internet), and this being a full multimedia event with an anime, this was probably the hardest time I've ever had finding a game on release day and not because I think the game is flying off the shelves. Amazon had the order delayed to the following Monday, I couldn't find a copy and any video game carrying department store like Wal Mart or Target within a 45 minute drive and even fuckin pawngamestop didn't have copies but Stellar Blade apparently is in abundance. I ended up double dipping and grabbing a digital copy (praise be to whatever god allowed this game to be only 20GB) while the amazon order got situated because goddamn it, I was looking forward to this. I think this is one of those underproduced copy situations but it gave me time to read the manga before getting into this.

Akira Toriyama's work was one of my main gateways into anime back in the day, with DBZ's ocean dub because I'm that fucking old. His artstyle is something I will always enjoy its why I played games like Chrono Trigger and Dragon Quest that to this day I think is such a standout in the genre. I'm glad another of his works is getting adapted in game form. I think his artstyle translated well in game, especially in terms of the bots (the machines you use throughout the game). That man really loved drawing vehicles and machines and it shows, especially since Sand Land's inception was because he just wanted to draw an old man with a tank which grew into something he never intended it to. Yes some characters I could see the "building blocks" and traits shared from his other work (I will always see Mr. Satan when I see that long square jaw) but his creature designs are also in full effect with giant cats with sabre teeth, dinosaurs with weird tails and prominent back and head spines, large toothed Pteranodons etc, they stand out even if the designs in game get re-used quite a bit with as much as a pallet swap and maybe one slight addition like a head piece to differentiate unless its a boss. There was also a design that was outright used in OG Dragon Ball that I was happy to see. There isn't as much to say about the style of the environments other than they look good and accurately reflect what they're named, Sand Land is very much a land of sand but I am grateful that it is not the only type of scenery available all throughout the game.

The story of the first half of the game mostly follows the manga, two demons venture out with an old man in a tank to find water, but some parts have had their order changed or elongated and there were brand new things added to what I assume more organically bridge into the second half which is entirely new. As I said in the intro, I read the manga but I did not watch the anime which I'm sure this new stuff is covered there. One of the notable new things added to the first half is the new party member, Ann. Originally it was just Rao, Beelzebub (who you play as) and Thief but she joins as the resident gearhead and a more organic style reason why the characters can get more bots because the manga was ONLY the tank. Well that is technically not true. Rao had a car but in the manga when it gets ruined it doesn't get fixed unlike in the game. I did enjoy the main group and think Ann was a great addition, though I can't say they aren't predictable as characters. Aside from a couple of the villains, the ones you spend the most of the time fighting against, I can't say I share the same feelings towards. They are just as basic, not that its a bad thing but it leads to some disengaging of interest in the narrative when I can predict every single plot beat introduced in the post manga content. I'm not saying I was expecting some Yoko Taro or Kojima level narrative and Sand land's is by no means bad, it just didn't do enough to make the predictability engaging. What you think is going to happen after reading the synopsis, is more than likely what will happen. The voice acting is hit or miss with I think Rao having the worst of it which is bad because he is one of the main characters with more of the important lines. I feel like they were going for the "battle hardened, tired old man has seen some shit" route but he is mostly so monotone it comes off as disinterested and doesn't match the character's emotion that is portrayed by the model's animations a lot of the time. Most other named characters were either good or fine but outside of the actual cutscenes, the stilted line reading that is common in this style of game makes even VA's like Kira Buckland (Ann's VA) unable to reach the levels we know they can. The dialogue that occurred during traversal also repeated a lot, and I mean A LOT. The dialogue updates after story beats but I heard the same line of dialogue three times on average when exploring ruins or doing story based dungeons. Its not as if they're allergic to dead air because there's plenty of times without it but other times they talk like its some first party sony game giving you a hint every 10 seconds. "We could get up here, if we had a bot that could jump" Beelzebub says as I am JUMPING IN THE JUMP BOT. This happens every time. I was also surprised that I enjoyed the music. Make no mistake you get plenty of "Desert Music" but the tracks that play specifically in the dungeons and towns at night were pretty beautiful.

So how's the gameplay then? Does it carry it if the narrative is as standard as I say? Depends. Do you like driving around? Because you will be doing A LOT of that. I would say 75% of the game was me driving a bot across the maps and doing various activities. There's grotto's to explore, hills to jump up (the game calls them hills but they're more like tall rock formations), field bosses to fight, bases to raid where some are stealth based and others are combat, ruins to explore and radio towers to fix, bounties and races. Those radio towers are not something you have to climb don't worry, and their requirement to fix might as well be non existent with how little you need and how plentiful those resources are as never once did I have to take a leave and come back to fix it and yes it does populate the map with undiscovered activities in the area. The grottos are just these small single room caves that have chests or ore deposits, maybe an enemy or two inside and sometimes need rocks destroyed to access. The hills are these tall rock formations that usually have a group of enemies you should defeat before jumping to the top and getting the treasure or ore deposits. Treasure chests have either materials or parts for the bots in them with the latter being in the large variant of chests. Ruins are generally larger than the grottos and sometimes have multiple entrances. Going through them you'll run into enemies, platforming challenges, and destructible rocks while you look for chests and ore deposits where both tend to be exclusive materials which in my case was assorted coins and old variants of metals. Unless I was just being blind, which is possible, the ruins always seemed to just...end. There wasn't really a noticeable "end point" or even a boss outside of specific mission based circumstances. It made them feel pretty limp, I'll be honest. The field bosses are differently designed but larger versions of the dinosaurs, panthers and crocs who's movesets aren't much different from their grunt counterparts. The human bosses are strictly from missions and have a lot more going for them than their animal counterparts or underlings. They are not just palette swaps with basic gear on their bots like what you find in the field, they have unique or specific optional parts for their bots to make the fights a bit more interesting such as emp mines, large missile packs or a grapple that then shoves 4 drills in you for massive damage.

If you aren't doing those then your time is spent driving around in whatever bot of your choice (until you need to swap for a specific feature one has), grabbing materials so you can upgrade your bots, finding fast travel points, shooting enemies and doing side quests whose contents aren't all that engaging outside of what worldbuilding they do and what they reward. The traversal gets a lot better once you get the first "traversal oriented bot" as early on it is pretty brutal with how slow the tank is even with boost. It was a good design choice to have the boost feature of bots be infinite outside of combat but I'd be lying if I said traversal didn't wear on me when those objectives where nowhere near the fast travel points. There is also a water mechanic. NO WAIT ITS NOT WHAT YOU THINK! It is not for thirst, its actually a heal and if your water bottle is full then its a revive should you die outside of your bot. A bot reaching 0 hp is game over though, no matter how many others you have on your person. The water can be refilled at the various water tanks around the map which is one of your discoverable fast travel point options. There were not many frame drops that I ran into while playing either. I only ever saw them when destroying rocks that blocked grottos, though this game does to the "low framerate mobs when far away" thing which never really bothered me to be honest.

Speaking of side quests, I won't call it a meta game but there's this hub you get early on called Spino. This town starts out with nothing, but as you do side quests they usually end with you telling someone "Hey, this town need people. Why don't you come on down?". This gets the town to grow and become more developed, get more facilities and upgrade said facilities so you can in turn upgrade your bots and just give people with nowhere to go a nice place to live in this harsh sandy land. It reminds me of building up colony 9 in Xenoblade Chronicles. Most side quests leading to "Come to Brazil Spino!" however is part of the reason why they aren't so engaging, the other being their standard side quests gameplay of "get this thing" or "find this person" or "kill this dinosaur" which is also not very captivating. I was doing them for what I got out it not because it was more game to play. You also gain access to a customizable room that you can decorate with furnishings you either buy, craft or find and can even put your bots in them which can also be expanded in size. I am not someone who really cares about interior design so I didn't spend much time on it and can't tell you if its good or bad. If you played Yakuza 8, its similar to the room you have on Dondoko Island.

Combat is generally pretty simple but it also tests your threat assessment abilities and if you've been keeping your bots of choice up to snuff. Generally though it boils down to driving around the encounter and taking shots at the enemy bots and using secondary weapons to pick off the foot soldiers as well as shooting down their missiles. You also need to suspend your disbelief because this game does the whole "The MCs don't kill, everyone they ever fought survived being shot by a tank cannon at point blank range and/or survived their bot exploding into a ball of fire". I'll give the game this though, you see the foot soldier enemies either have the dizzy stars or run away after to take down their hp fully (animals seems to actually die though, fuck their lives I guess) but I call bullshit on the ones in the bots. This also makes the times when the game talks about death to hit a lot more than it should which took me aback each time. Story based boss fights are different story as they have their phases the go in and out of and as you would expect, require a bit more actual ability to lead your shots than an normal encounter as they can be very mobile because yes this game asks that as well as having bullet drop for things like the tank cannon. There is also out of bot combat and Beelzebub is no slouch in that regard. He has his light and heavy attacks which as you should expect and the latter can be charged. Pressing heavy after a light will change the combo ender plus he can do ariel combos and the previous combo rules apply. My favorite was the 5 hit with the heavy ender which makes Beelzebub do that Chun Li super move, Tenshokyaku. Not only that, he can dodge cancel attacks even in the air. I LOVE DODGE CANCELING! Him along with the party have abilities they can use with Beelzebub having a meter and his party having cooldowns but otherwise your party will be fighting on their own. Rao has some moves for an old man, I gotta say.

I've brought up bots a lot so I'll get into them now. There are many different bots although there is some overlap between their unique function and those that overlap seem to have one lean more towards combat and the other traversal. If I wasn't doing every side quest as they appeared they would have been gotten in a reasonable flow. The tank is well, a tank. It is slow but has a lot of health, does fantastic damage with its main cannon and will be your bread and butter more than likely though my personal favorite is the Battle Armor and its goofy style punches. Other bots are made to jump high, traverse over unsolid ground, move items or just be a fast traversal bot among other things but can be used in battle with no issues. That doesn't sound like a lot sure but coupled with the overlap, you're coming up close to 20 different bots you can build and upgrade. Yes this does mean this is a game where you're better off engaging in every encounter if you can as not all materials can be found, some must be crafted with what you have on your person (or I guess demon). I am not someone who upgrades anything and everything, only what I use, so I never had an issue with not having materials unless they physically were not obtainable yet at that point in the game. It seems to be the game's way of limiting your power, though it feels like anything that is under your level scales to you (everything in the first Sand Land map was level 18 like I was when I went back for cleanup) while things that were set above stay that way until you out level them (I ran into level 20's when I wanted to go to a previously unexplored map section when I was level 15).

Even with knowing going in that the bots were a large part of the game, I was still surprised with just how much you could do with the upgrading and customization. Each bot has a different amount of parts they can equip and each individual part can be upgraded but using the tank as an example you can change and upgrade the primary and secondary weapons, body, suspension, engine, option (bonus feature, in the tanks case something like extra armor) and then 2 chip slots for bonuses. Each one of these will change the visuals for that part of the tank, not all are unique but there's several different looks you will see. Not only will they change physically, and stats wise, which should be a given, but after a certain point in the game you can customize the paint on your bots and depending on your bot you can have a lot of things to paint as some weapons have multiple color sections you can adjust. There are also several slots for decals with rotation and size options and you can adjust the metallic and glossy finishes on each individual parts. I gave my tank the angry face with sharp teeth look, some Pteranodon emblems and made it black and white. This does cost paint to do each time so its not free, and you can unlock more colors by doing some side quests. I did not see any way to transmog parts so those of you weirdos who put aesthetics above stats will need to either deal with being underpowered, hope you find a stronger version of that part you like or upgrade that part with materials.

This was honestly a type of game that on paper I should not have enjoyed as I am pretty staunch in my stance of "traversal is generally the worst part of large map/open world games". Until the first traversal style bot is build, going around the map was a chore and I recommend not trying to do too much exploring until you get one. Combat while simple is still engaging enough due to the customizable builds of the bots and ability to make them your own with colors and decals, along with out of bot combat being fun as well. The activities could use more variety to them with more worthwhile rewards other than materials 99% of the time but at least fast travel points are plentiful once discovered. The story is by the numbers at every turn and even with enjoying the main cast, it was really Toriyama's art that did the lifting for me which is how I felt after reading the manga. I don't know why this game was giving me such a hard time to track down but I think it was worth the effort. Rest In Peace, Akira Toriyama. I'm glad more of your work is finally getting attention.

Talk about a wasted opportunity. A fighting game with Sonic characters is such easy money, but this ain't it.

First impressions were all over the place. The art is out-fucking-standing, this is SUCH a good look for the gang, but I swear I felt my ears bleeding a little bit with that Mode Select BGM. Whoever decided to use that guitar sample for multiple tracks in the game, you have a special place in hell set aside for you. The soundtrack as a whole is pretty weak, with a couple exceptions (Holy Summit is so good, no wonder they brought it back for Advance 3.)

The writing is cheeky and fun, and the story itself was entertaining enough but good lord the progression here is absolute dogshit. How do you like fighting the same character twice(or more!) in a row, with more rounds each time? How about selecting a random building just for shits and giggles since it's your first time playing, only to be assaulted by Emerl clones because you dared to explore a little bit?
The moment I realized I could win most battles by either spamming normal attacks or special R attacks, you bet your ass that turbo button was on and the frameskip was rolling. While the combat system is interesting on the surface, it's just not very satisfying. Even when customizing Emerl with new skills, every fight feels like a slapfest, with everyone waving those foam spaghetti things in the air.

Uh, what else... Oh, it looks really good. Sonic's GBA entries always had beautiful sprites, and Battle brought so many great animations to the whole cast. I also love the 3D environments, always cool to see that on the GBA, even though I wished it was a normal 2D fighting game instead.

That really just sums it up. I wish this was a regular ass 2D fighter on the PS2 or some shit. Instead, we have a weird arena fighter with some interesting ideas that ultimately aren't very satisfying. The story isn't good enough to warrant playing this all the way to completion, I feel. Cute character moments don't make up for all the "fight Gamma again for the millionth time" you have to sit through.

In late February, I left a review on this game. I didn't really get it. I wouldn't say I fully get it now either, but I have been thinking a lot about this game ever since then. That review kind of sucked, but I guess it's a snapshot of that moment in time, the immediate guttural reaction to a challenge like this game is. I acknowledged in that review that as a cis guy, this was a perspective that I was likely not going to fully understand. I do feel as though this game is somehow unreviewable. Maybe this review can be seen as more of a review of my now-deleted review. In that I described this work as "ineffectual". That feels strange to say. I think it being on a site like Backloggd where it's presented as the same sort of product that any other video game is, inclines one to view it as a product. It's art, but is it really fair for it to be judged in the same way that Baldur's Gate 3 is? That just feels off-base to me. For me to suggest that it is "ineffectual" is almost like saying that somebody is venting in an "ineffectual" way. You could say that I guess, but read the room man! Maybe that's fair game because it's released as a Twine game on itch.io, but that still doesn't quite sit well with me. I didn't even really know what Twine games were when I first played this! It looks like this is its own category of game, which is pretty cool. I think my unfamiliarity might have hampered my perception in some way. This is an earnest piece of writing. That's important.

The major takeaway that I got from this game upon first playing it is this acknowledgment that there aren't that many critically acclaimed girly/feminine games. That IS true. As a cis guy I think that's an important point that I hadn't really thought about before. I find this point to be even more poignant after seeing the release of Princess Peach Showtime, recently. Especially with how a lot of people seem to look at a game like that. An industry where everybody feels there are ample games made for people like them and by people like them is a better industry than where we are today.

I love mechanics in video games. I love how much there is going on in a game like Metal Gear Solid 2, that kind of nitty-gritty where there's detail pouring out of every button press, every possibility, every corner of whatever world you're in; in my mind that is some of the best of what video games have to offer as art. I think when first reading this, the frank style of writing made me feel as though I was somehow wrong for thinking that way, like I was being reprimanded as this silly guy gamer. But that's really a reactionary way of looking at it, I think. I don't think that's its purpose. In retrospect I think I was really thinking about it all wrong. I think my older review, and I suppose the divided reviews on this game on this site are a showcase in how a site like Backloggd can and does play a part in the way in which we perceive art. I honestly wonder, if I had found out about this game through a recommendation from a friend, or some other kind of website, would I have reacted to it the way that I had? In a place like this, a piece of writing can end up commodified, as just another product to review and rate, and because it has strong writing it must have some sort of finger-wagging point to say to any and all gamers that come across it. Though I often criticize reactionaries and their culture wars against art, this was a case where I found some other ways that somebody can get sucked into that. Even me. That's humbling, and it has profound meaning to how I engage with art going forward. I realize that it's something that was present with how I engaged with other perspectives in the past, too. I never really understood the whole "liminal space" thing that was popular online, and I don't think I engaged with those feelings in an empathetic way. This was meaningful, important reading for me to have had.

This writing is another perspective. The best thing you can hope for with something like this is that it'll make you think, or at least feel. If it's lucky, it may even change some minds, open up mental doors. Evidently, it's successful. Based on Princess' perspective shown here, I'd really like to check out her games.

Before of this, I thought Sonic never had a good game and all their games were only "good" because they were powered by the allmighty nostalgia.

The fandom and the wholesome way Sega treats their fandom, attracted me to this game, and at 30€, i sais lets give it a try.

Oh boy, i can see now. Such charming games with tons of content to play, but with obvious jank to add a little more playtime. I love the characters and the music is stellar.

I think i liked Sonic CD the most. I get why people complain if they bought the original sonic origins, but i don't understand the complains now, Sonic Origins Plus was a wonderful experience that gave me a chance to experience something from an era I wasn't even born. Will check other games of the blue hedgehog for sure

I recommend watching Nerrel's video on Super Mario 3D All-Stars as he makes a very interesting case regarding fan-made ports and how current compilations fail to meet them in quality without knocking one or the other. A lot of what he says I feel applies here, I just didn't want to regurgitate points from it verbatim.

Sonic Origins Plus be so good when ya don't got a bitch in ya ear telling you to just download and compile Sonic 1 Absolute and 2 Forever and 3 AIR etc whatever.

Yes, the fan ports are the better selections, but the convenience of having all 4 classic titles in one package here can't really be understated. Being able to play all the titles as one big game with the bonus cutscenes is a great 10 hour package.

Yes, there are elephants in the room: the port job itself is subpar and it's very easy to trigger a glitch you previously couldn't in the originals, Game Gear emulation has input lag and an odd decision to faux stereo that is earbleed inducing, "Classic Mode" are just the shoddy ports on 4:3, Amy's moveset isn't great, yadda yadda.

You know what is great, though? All 4 of these fucking games. Roadblocks aside, they're still very well playable, and the added benefit of widescreen and drop dash (especially in CD onward), make Origins win out as a package.

"But the fan ports are better!" Yeah that's great, I play those too. I love them! I prefer them! You could argue that, historically, fanmade ports of any game have always lead out official compilations and rereleases, unfortunately that's the way of the capitalist gaming world.

I paid for the barebones Mega Man Legacy Collections, Super Mario 3D All-Stars, I even saved up allowance money to get Sonic the Hedgehog Genesis on GBA as a kid and Sonic Classic Collection on DS. I own two copies of Sonic Mega Collection, I bought Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection on PS3 both physically and digitally, alongside SEGA Classic Collection on both PC and Switch. I even saved up $110 in allowance money when I was eleven to buy a copy of Sonic Gems Collection on eBay, used with no manual, way back in 2009, and wayyyyy long after it's been out of print.

While I got this as a birthday gift from user Detchibe, the point remains that, within reason, I support it both ways, and I love game compilations, especially SEGA ones, because I love having updated, modern ways to play classic titles, officially or unofficially, and I don't particularly care that it comes with a few caveats; that has always been my preference. Yes, I agree about its overpricing at $40, it would definitely feel more snug around $30. Yes, I agree it has its problems. Yes, it's still fucking Sonic, and yes, that makes it fucking good to me.

Sonic Origins é uma coletânea que foi lançada em 2022 para comemorar os 31 anos da franquia, porém ela possui bastante controvérsias como o preço ou até mesmo a pouca quantidade de jogos que estão presentes no pacote. Em 2023, foi lançada a expansão chamada Sonic Origins Plus, parecido com o Sonic Mania Plus, a intenção dessa DLC era melhorar o jogo e adicionar mais conteúdo mas ao contrário do Mania Plus, o Origins Plus é uma bela merda.

A principal atração da DLC é a Amy Rose jogável nos jogos de Mega Drive, sendo bem sincero essa foi a única coisa que me empolgou e jogar com ela foi um pouco decepcionante, eu gostei dela mas ela é só um Sonic com Insta Shield consideravelmente melhor e com um Drop Dash piorado, eu esperava que ela fosse mais diferente como nos jogos Advance por exemplo.

Antes o Knuckles não estava presente no Sonic CD por conta que ele não estava na versão de celular (foi a versão dos jogos usados na coletânea), agora com o Origins Plus ele é finalmente jogável e é bem legal jogar Sonic CD com o Knuckles, ele possui alguns caminhos alternativos exclusivos mas sinceramente não é muito bom, parece que foi feito bem nas pressas.

No menu do modo Missão foi adicionado a opção Surpresa, é um modo que devemos fazer algumas missões específicas para liberar pedaços de um quadro que no fim revelará uma linda arte dos personagens festejando o aniversário da franquia, tinha MUITO potencial na minha opinião mas temos pouquíssimas missões para completar o quadro e as missões em si são bem simples tipo jogar Sonic 3 & Knuckles com a Amy, a única missão realmente boa é encontrar a Estátua escondida no primeiro ato da Wacky Workbench do Sonic CD, de resto é bem decepcionante.

Agora chegou a hora de falar da bomba, os jogos de Game Gear ! Pagar 50 reais pra jogar 12 jogos de Game Gear emulados que nem receberam tratamento como os jogos de Mega Drive que ideia foda ! Eu fui trouxa de acreditar que pelo menos ia ter Knuckles Chaotix, Sonic 3D Blast e até mesmo Sonic Spinball de Mega Drive por conta que algumas coisas desses jogos estão na coletânea base como músicas e até mesmo ilhas (com exceção do jogo do Knuckles) mas não, ao invés disso a gente recebeu 12 jogos de Game Gear, vou falar brevemente deles:

-Sonic the Hedgehog: é quase a mesma coisa da versão de Master System do Sonic 1, é um bom jogo mas a versão de Master System é melhor por causa da tela e resolução que fica bem melhor do que a versão do Game Gear.

-Sonic the Hedgehog 2: o mesmo caso do jogo anterior só que dessa vez o jogo é igual ao de Master System, ainda assim a versão de Master System é melhor pelos mesmos motivos.

-Sonic Chaos: é um jogo divertido porém assim como antes, a versão de Master System é melhor.

-Sonic the Hedgehog Triple Trouble: com certeza é o meu jogo do Sonic favorito do Game Gear, não tenho nenhuma reclamação.

-Sonic Drift: Imagine um jogo de corrida com duas telas igual ao Super Mario Kart só que no Game Gear ! Sonic Drift transcende e consegue ser uma maravilha do inferno.

-Sonic Drift 2: mesma coisa do primeiro jogo porém um pouquinho menos pior.

-Sonic Labyrinth: acho ele divertido e bacana, não é o melhor spin-off mas não é ruim.

-Sonic Blast: já fiz análise dele, de longe um dos piores jogos do Sonic de todos os tempos.

-Tails' Skypatrol: péssimo e sem graça, além disso achei incrivelmente difícil principalmente na última fase.

-Tails Adventure: meu jogo favorito do Game Gear, ele se destaca por ser um Metroidvania, apesar de alguns problemas como poder levar só 4 itens durante a fase, o fato de que poucos itens são realmente úteis e os blocos que você destrói com Regular Bomb ou Large Bomb serem idênticos atrapalha um pouco, mas ainda é bem bacana.

-Sonic Spinball: apenas jogue a versão do Mega Drive, não vou falar mais nada.

-Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine: novamente apenas jogue a versão do Mega Drive.

Resumindo, apesar de ter alguns jogos legais, não justifica o preço caro pra jogar só Game Gear.

E por último quero falar que eu paguei 50 reais porque eu já tinha o jogo normal e comprei o Plus como uma DLC e não o jogo inteiro com isso eu recebi todo o conteúdo das versões Premium do jogo base mas o povo que comprou a versão Premium não recebeu absolutamente nada, ou seja, para as pessoas que gastaram nessas versões no ano passado elas pagaram a versão Premium atoa e terão que comprar o Plus, além disso, a SEGA aparentemente removeu as versões Premium nas lojas digitais.

Sonic Origins Plus é uma completa decepção, tudo deveria estar no jogo base, incrível que essa coletânea simplesmente teve as piores DLCs que vi em toda minha vida, eu recomendo jogar o Sonic Mega Collection Plus que é bem melhor e mais completo.

You know how it is. The most an artist's death has gotten me to cry in a long time - the infectious creative energy I've felt lent down to me from his work is something that'll never leave me. And just like everyone else, I've found myself pouring through dozens and dozens of heartfelt tributes to the man's legendary career. But reading it all got me thinking...ain't the meat and potatoes reputation Dragon Quest has earnt itself kind of like, an error? An impossibility?
So, lemme ask you a question: when's the first time you saw something that made you think "Dragon Quest is cool"? I couldn't tell you what mine was, but recently finishing a full playthrough of the original NES Dragon Warrior pulled me back into the correct reality in which this series was not "generic", but an outlier in style. Toriyama's enthusiasm to play the hits puts the personality on display in its monsters maybe 20 years ahead of the curve. As an aside, I also recommend to anyone playing any older Dragon Quest to look up some scans of the old manuals; the effortless coolness of his artstyle had already bled into DQ's identity.

You could call this game a "grind", but the grind is the gameplay and the gameplay is good. Each individual battle is simple to solve in a bubble, but enemies are split between the ones you can defeat with or without expending resources - instantly spiraling the world into an ever-evolving puzzle to solve. Planning out a trajectory of travel immediately prompts a dizzying amount of dice rolls in your head: how many resources should I spend to gain EXP? How much should I dice roll running away, and how much magic will I have left to heal myself up considering both the expected and unexpected outcomes? Inner workings filled with perfect math to never quite satisfy things with a clear answer; but what raises this from good to great is how through my entire time playing the game, I always undershot my potential. Enemies that are apparently stronger than you can be taken down with perfect resource management, finding consistency in a haze of lottery tickets that makes you feel genius every time you take one down and keep a little more magic for the rest of the trip than your last encounter with the same guy.
And in comparison to how grinding is often characterized as a boring chore-like task, I think playing this game is way closer to exhausting - you can do a good run, and do another, and then lose to a Skeleton you've already defeated 10 times and now half your gold is gone. You probably haven't even made it halfway to the level you want yet! But for every moment of flighty confusion, there's also a moment where you get to level 3, gain heal, and kill the first slime you see in one hit.

and that's how they get you

Random encounters are most frequently characterized as one of those unsavory bits of RPG we chop off, but playing this helped click into place how much texture can be applied to identical floor tiles simply by the difference in looming threat. The invisible encounter sheet constantly shifting under your feet giving cool and hostile sensation to each step, and when you realize you can kill something that once scared you off, the level design changes. Reinforces the process of seamless non-linear exploration with an information game unique to the format - a grind made engaging by the real question being where to even grind in the first place. This is an RPG with no vestigial limbs. Every single part of an RPG you've questioned the integral elements of is present working in perfect harmony with each other; last year, I found myself actively frustrated playing a newly released turn-based RPG in which the mindlessness of each individual encounter serves no purpose. Without long-term resource management, of course random encounters are boring! Or, in contrast to RPGs where levels feel like guided progress, here, lower level enemies to begin to run away, breaking the consistency of previously successful sources of experience and gold. Now, with every moment of newly found strength matched by a push out of my comfort zone, I'm like "ohhh i get it now"

and they got me

This is all coming from a relatively young person's perspective (i turned 22 around when i wrote most of this happy birthday me :D ), so there's this tough balance to reach when it comes to simultaneously embracing that sometimes, traits of oldness are endearing to me, and making sure I don't sound like I am looking down on something, or it's a novelty.
In the past few months, I ended up playing a bunch of games from the mid-late 2000s, and it was easy to lose yourself in a sea of fifteen year old Gamefaqs threads, and chat with people just a bit older than me who experienced all these things organically in their childhood. Especially due to growing up with games from the same era, it was easy for me to imagine myself playing these as a kid, wondering how this could've effected me sooner. Dragon Quest on the contrast is for a bit older of a generation than me, especially with some of its strongest cultural imprint existing beyond language barrier. I played this alongside someone close to me - we honestly couldn't stop gushing to each other about how satisfying the sleuthing was as we kept a million notes marked down. There's a great moment in which a secret that's visibly hinted to you in one of the last towns has an equivalent but invisible secret in one of the first towns; this is one of the oldest games I've played with a strong design language. Things like this got us close to that ideal you hear of pen and paper hint tracking. Eventually, it became natural to feel like playing the game like this was making me fall into the past footsteps of someone else; it's hard not to romanticize it like we were 2 little kids playing the game lit by nothing but the humming static of a CRT. And even though I've literally known people not even a decade older than me that grew up with this game, it's immersing myself in a distinctly different time-frame from usual that makes that era feel so far away. It's that solidarity with a perspective just out of reach that starts positively haunting the game with the ghost of lived experience.