Probably the best out of 4 NES Dragon Quest games.
While there are still not enough improvements, this game finally decides to tell a story with characters! First few chapters you're being introduced to the world and your future party, and only by around 5-6 hour mark the heroes get together. It's a much better system and it breathes life into the game.
That said, Enix really needed to change some things about the controls by this point. The movement and menus are still laggy (it takes maybe 1/3rd of a second for your character to start walking when you hold the button), and coupled with NPCs that like to run everywhere, this can create a lot of annoyances.
I still don't see the reason for them to keep talk/search/door options on different commands in the menu, as nothing I've seen so far, or indeed in previous games, requires to, say, search a door or talk to a drawer.
This game is still very old and janky, but it has more charm than previous titles combined thanks to people in the world feeling more like people and less like one-liner machines (although of course those still exist). It's also not as horny as III.
However, this game should only be played if you can withstand slow repetitive gameplay, as enounter rate can get incredibly high. Unless the game shits itself in the final act, I'm comfortable grading it now.
While there are still not enough improvements, this game finally decides to tell a story with characters! First few chapters you're being introduced to the world and your future party, and only by around 5-6 hour mark the heroes get together. It's a much better system and it breathes life into the game.
That said, Enix really needed to change some things about the controls by this point. The movement and menus are still laggy (it takes maybe 1/3rd of a second for your character to start walking when you hold the button), and coupled with NPCs that like to run everywhere, this can create a lot of annoyances.
I still don't see the reason for them to keep talk/search/door options on different commands in the menu, as nothing I've seen so far, or indeed in previous games, requires to, say, search a door or talk to a drawer.
This game is still very old and janky, but it has more charm than previous titles combined thanks to people in the world feeling more like people and less like one-liner machines (although of course those still exist). It's also not as horny as III.
However, this game should only be played if you can withstand slow repetitive gameplay, as enounter rate can get incredibly high. Unless the game shits itself in the final act, I'm comfortable grading it now.