Rating this game on its own merits, rather than as a Dragon Quest game since it's the only instalment I've played (although I do plan on playing XI very soon).
This game SLAPS. While some people might not like it, I really enjoy how the story follows a very loose structure, going from town to town, meeting various people, seeing their stories and helping them out. It's a really nice comfort game and one of the first real JRPGs I ever played. It can be a bit grindy and it's a shame that a good portion of its multiplayer content is now inaccessible, but I still have a lot of fun regardless. Also this game's sound design, just perfect.

It definitely shows its age at points, but the first entry in the Halo series holds up really well overall!
It has some issues with level design and variety, there's many areas in-which Bungie just copy-pasted the same area multiple times and called it a day which becomes especially frustrating when backtracking becomes involved and the levels become a giant maze, but overall this game is very fun.
The shooting mechanics have aged gracefully, although I'm not incredibly fond of how floaty movement is. Despite the small complaints I have, I really enjoyed Halo: CE and I'm excited to play the rest of the series.

A really great sequel to a promising first entry!
Most of my problems with Halo 1 were ironed out such as the repetitive level design and lack of variety. Halo 2 introduces so much more enemy types, weapons, level set pieces and so on. In addition to new mechanics such as weapon duel wielding, each level feels fresh and interesting, especially thanks due to a new character introduced in this game.
The shooting feels much more refined, the presentation has a much higher production value and overall everything feels greater in scope. Getting rid of health entirely and replacing it with the regenerating shield mechanic was a great change and causes the player to rethink most combat encounters. The graphics look wonderful for an original Xbox game, almost looking like an early 360 title at points and the Anniversary graphics and cutscenes are breathtaking.
The game isn't perfect however, as the difficulty balancing can be very frustrating at points, with checkpoints being given to the player very inconsistently, sometimes not being given for huge chunks of the level. Even on Normal, some enemies are ridiculously strong and tanky and while I wouldn't say Halo 2 is a particularly hard game, playing on Heroic or god-forbid Legendary will be an endurance test to say the least.
Overall, Halo 2 is a wonderful sequel and I can't wait to see how Bungie wrapped up the original trilogy in Halo 3!