In my vague quest to complete the mainline Dragon Quest games, I took a little detour. A 40-hour ish, meandering detour through Dragon Quest Treasures.
Meandering is the key word here. The game unfolds at a leisurely pace as you unlock quests, locations and characters with every task or action. Do we all remember Chocobo Hot or Cold? This is that taken to its sumptuous extreme.
You set out with your party of monsters and search for as many treasures as your grubby mitts can carry. Then you bring said treasure back to base and watch languorously as your treasure total increases, thereby unlocking more features, monsters, treasures.
At its core, I found it too simplistic and, possibly, at any other time of year apart from this Season of Ice, I wouldn't have given it more than a few hours before bouncing off. But there's something to be said about COSY experiences - and this was akin to a blanket of soft, muffling snow to my wrazzled mind. So, cheers for that, Dragon Quest Treasures!
Dragon Quest aficionados (e.g. who've played every mainline game) will perhaps find more to love. All the treasures and trinkets which you collect are call backs to items and characters from all previous Dragon Quests. And there's an impressive variety to collect.
Even though this isn't a mainline Dragon Quest game, it still retains the charm and attention to detail for which the series is now known. Apart from the performance, of course. The graphics struggle to be on par with Dragon Quest 11 (which runs much better on the Switch than this game) and can become rather choppy in places. All those massive open areas...They should have taken a leaf from Breath of the Wild and just made everything slightly more....impressionistic?
In conclusion, I spent 40 hours with this game. I have fond memories of it. A cosy, winning experience from a beloved series.
Meandering is the key word here. The game unfolds at a leisurely pace as you unlock quests, locations and characters with every task or action. Do we all remember Chocobo Hot or Cold? This is that taken to its sumptuous extreme.
You set out with your party of monsters and search for as many treasures as your grubby mitts can carry. Then you bring said treasure back to base and watch languorously as your treasure total increases, thereby unlocking more features, monsters, treasures.
At its core, I found it too simplistic and, possibly, at any other time of year apart from this Season of Ice, I wouldn't have given it more than a few hours before bouncing off. But there's something to be said about COSY experiences - and this was akin to a blanket of soft, muffling snow to my wrazzled mind. So, cheers for that, Dragon Quest Treasures!
Dragon Quest aficionados (e.g. who've played every mainline game) will perhaps find more to love. All the treasures and trinkets which you collect are call backs to items and characters from all previous Dragon Quests. And there's an impressive variety to collect.
Even though this isn't a mainline Dragon Quest game, it still retains the charm and attention to detail for which the series is now known. Apart from the performance, of course. The graphics struggle to be on par with Dragon Quest 11 (which runs much better on the Switch than this game) and can become rather choppy in places. All those massive open areas...They should have taken a leaf from Breath of the Wild and just made everything slightly more....impressionistic?
In conclusion, I spent 40 hours with this game. I have fond memories of it. A cosy, winning experience from a beloved series.