Favorite main series game:
DQ 5:
Good: Characters, Plot, World, Monsters, Graphics, Gameplay, Music.
DQ 6:
Good: World, Gameplay, Graphics, Music.
Okay: Plot, Monsters, Characters.
Notes: Although the music on the DS is okay, the original soundtrack on the SNES is better.
DQ 8:
Good: Gameplay, World, Monsters, Graphics, Characters, Music.
Okay: Plot.
Notes: Unforgiving in the beginning compared to the rest of the game, but still amazing.
DQ 9:
Good: Graphics, Gameplay, Music
Okay: Plot, Monsters.
Bad: Characters, World.
Overall, I’d say my favorite is DQ 5. I still need to complete 1-3, 4 and 7 before I can finish this list.
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Spin-offs:
DQM Joker:
Good: Plot, Monsters, Gameplay, Music.
Okay: Characters, World, Graphics.
Notes: Despite it being objectively worse than Joker 2, I like Joker better. I like the atmosphere and setting better, as well as the simpler gameplay and regions.
DQM Joker 2:
Good: Plot, World, Monsters, Graphics, Gameplay, Music.
Okay: Characters.
DQM 2 Tara’s Adventure:
Good: Gameplay, Graphics, Music
Okay: Plot, World, Monsters
Bad: Characters
Notes: Reading through the dialogue on this game is painful. Dialogue on other DQ games is either light-hearted and fun to read, or is so bad that it’s good. The dialogue on this game is bland and boring, the unimaginative monologue that plagues it is an insult to other DQ games. The only redeemable factor about it is the occasional dirty joke. If anyone knows if the horrid dialogue is the fault of poor translation or the dialogue sucks as much in the Japanese release, please let me know.
There are problems with the gameplay as well, such as having to go through the AI-controlled tactics list before going through the specific commands list. This is expedited by the addition of cursor memory, but I do not miss the separation in Joker. There’s also the method of obtaining wild monsters, which is a random chance that they’ll join you when you defeat them that depends on the level of your monsters and the monster that you’re fighting. I personally like the system in Joker, which separates the defeating the monster and obtaining the obtaining. Obtaining the monster instead depends on the attack power of your monsters, not the actual level. In addition, you potentially have more than one chance to obtain the monster if you’re lucky. While I don’t like the “brawn over level” aspect, I do like the potential numerous chances you have at acquiring the monster, potentially trimming off unnecessary grinding that can pile up in this game.
There’s also the Wild mechanic. Wild monsters have a high WLD stat, the higher it is, the more chance that the monster will disobey you and do something else (usually defending), particularly when you command it to do a specific action instead of leaving it up to tactics. The main way to lower this is to do a shit ton of battles with the monster. This is incredibly infuriating, forcing you to do even more grinding every time you encounter a useful wild monster. What’s even more infuriating is that the monsters not in your party slowly gain WLD! While there are items that speed up the process of lowering the stat, I’m very happy they dropped this in Joker.
The characters are terrible. Dragon Quest is not known for its characters (except for maybe DQ 4, I’ve heard good things about its characters), but this is hitting the bottom of the barrel. The main characters family could not have a more bland personality. Every other character except for a douchebag and his equally douchey purple shit stain don’t really have actual personalities. This is mainly because of the awful dialogue and no effort put in to establishing characters traits.
The plot has some holes in it. So you’re in a universe where there are a multitude of worlds that can be accessed through a door in a shrine in each world. You live in the “main universe” and you can access a specific world if you have that world’s specific key. The main universe has no monsters, but other worlds do. However, your family is able to acquire monsters because your father has the ability to tame them. So… that means that your father must have a key, right? Otherwise, he would not be able to go into other worlds and get monsters. Couldn’t we nick the key off of him and have one more world to explore? Not only that, but your brother decides to not explore with you because he does not want your mother to worry. But wouldn’t two people searching instead of one save a lot of time and effort? Couldn’t we just leave a note or something?
DQ Heroes: Rocket Slime:
Good: Gameplay, Graphics, World, Music, Monsters.
Okay: Plot, Characters.
Notes: Very cute and fun game, I especially like how it had the perfect balance between a collectathon world which scratched my exploration and “collect every possible thing” itch and massive tank battles that had quite a bit of strategy and originality to it; I never played something like it before.
DQ Heroes:
Good: Graphics, World, Music, Monsters, Characters.
Okay: Plot, Gameplay.
Notes: A very addictive time waster. The gameplay could be fleshed out more, particularly to make it a little less repetitive, but it’s still very addicting in its own right. The graphics and world are especially amazing, with every environment having great detail and thought put in to making it. However, I feel like the color swap is used far too much. When you ignore the color swaps and look at the amount of actual designs, there’s not a lot, especially compared to other Dragon Quest games. The story is also uninteresting, uninspired and bland, with clichés galore. Still, it does its job and gives the player enough incentive to chug on. Quests could also do with more variation: killing specific monster this number of times and getting this specific item in this specific quantity or more gets old fast. However, the quests that were story-based were a very fun and tough challenge.
Overall, I'd say my favorite is Joker.
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Top Three Favorite Monster Designs:
1: Hunter Mech, Killing Machine.
2: Demon-at-Arms, Hell Gladiator, Zombie Gladiator.
3: Restless Armor, Lethal Armor.
Top Three Favorite Fan Art:
Number 1
Number 2
Number 3
