It’s some time since
I played Dragon Quest VIII for the PS2, but I have very fond memories
of it. At the time it had the best overworld of any game I’d
played, the combat was well-balanced, and Jessica’s voice actress
was enchanting. Would DQXI, the first Dragon Quest for consoles since
VIII, measure up to its illustrious predecessor? In a word: yes.
Story
The story is, mostly,
very simple. You are the reincarnation of the Luminary, an ancient
hero who defeated (temporarily) the darkness ages ago. Having
discovered your incredible destiny during a rite of adulthood with
your girlfriend, you set off to the capital to see the King, at the
suggestion of your adoptive mother. From there, all hell breaks
loose.
Most of the story you
will see coming a mile away. It’s fun but straightforward. However,
there are some later twists you may not see coming, and a lot of the
strength of the game in this area comes from the companions you get.
This is covered in the gameplay section as well, but in story terms
their contribution comes from making it feel like your character is
first among equals rather than them just being appendages or minions.
Each has their own distinctive character, from bossy Veronica to the,
er, flamboyant Sylvando. Not only do they bounce off the
(traditionally mute) player-character, they interact nicely with each
other too.
There’s not much
freedom when it comes to changing things, you’re very much
following the hero’s story.
Gameplay
Combat is fantastically
well-balanced in almost every way. The difficulty is enough that you
have to pay attention but you won’t, usually, be flattened, and
each character has varying ways to advance (everyone has at least two
available weapon trees, as well as other options such as magic). Use
of pep powers is important too. Characters sometimes enter a stage of
enhanced power, and if specific other characters are present or are
also in a pepped up status increasingly powerful attacks or defensive
spells can be cast.
The characters are
phenomenally well-balanced too. For example, Jade is a very powerful
character but cannot heal others and can only heal herself via
certain attacks, and she has no magical attacks. Veronica has
powerful magical attacks but that’s almost it (until the latter
stages). Serena and Rab can both heal and attack, whilst not being as
aggressively strong as Jade or Veronica.
In short, you can mix
and match companions in a variety of ways to create a party that
works.
Enemies come in a wide
range. There are some reskins, as was the case for VIII, but there’s
a large selection and many unique bosses as well. The slimes, of
course, make a return (if you can, defeat the metal slimes. They
appear randomly and give huge amounts of XP), as do the endless puns
(sham hatwitches are little pigs that wear giant witch hats).
Outside of combat, the
game is easy to explore, and there are multiple large cities, in
addition to a well put together overworld. Although, this has changed
from being totally open, as it was in VIII, to connecting specific
areas, which does make it feel smaller (it’s still large, I should
stress, but there’s less freedom).
Draconian Quest:
These are a range of
options you can toggle on and off to make life more challenging. I’ve
started a new game with a few switched on, including Shypox, which
makes the player-character sometimes freeze in combat due to
remembering embarrassing memories, or fail to talk to NPCs the first
time because he’s afraid they’re going to think he wants to chat
them up, or remembering when he accidentally called a stranger ‘mum’.
It’s quite amusing, and definitely increases the difficulty. If
you’re familiar with the series or want an immediate challenge, you
can start with some/all of them switched on and can remove the ones
you dislike in church.
Graphics
The art style is very
much Japanese manga, so if you like Dragon Ball Z, or videogames like
Valkyria Chronicles, then that approach will be to your liking. For
those unfamiliar, the heads are a little cartoony but there’s a
great sense of realism in most other aspects and it looks very good.
The graphics themselves
tend to be great although here and there, being finickity, you might
see a short draw distance in some areas and occasionally closer shots
of exterior walls/doors can be slightly pixellated, but I am being
picky. In general terms, it looks fantastic, and the lighting changes
(there’s a day/night cycle) works well too.
Sound
The voice-acting is
infinitely better than the Japanese version, which didn’t have any.
The voice actors mostly sound British (the spelling is British too,
huzzah!), though there is plenty of variation, with some American
accents and Aussie etc. Voice acting quality is generally good.
Music is MIDI but high
quality. It didn’t bother me, indeed, it’s pretty good, but some
are irked by the absence of an orchestral score which, reportedly,
does exist but isn’t included in the game for some bizarre reason.
Longevity/Replayability
My full playthrough,
including the post-game section (which, unlike the main game,
involved a lot of level-grinding) took me about 90 hours. I’d guess
maybe a third of that was post-game. There is no new game plus
option, although the Draconian Quest options mentioned above do offer
increased replayability. In my playthrough I did not do all the
quests, but a clear majority of them.
I’d guess a total
completionist playthrough would take about 100 hours, maybe a shade
longer.
Bugs and Other
Issues
I’m not sure I
encountered a single bug. No hangs, freezes, lags. The closest to a
problem was that if you rush into some areas the game deliberately
pauses to load (usually in a city) but that’s clearly working as
intended because a little slime-timer appears. Technically, that’s
pretty damned impressive.
Conclusion
If you’re after a
light-hearted, traditional RPG that offers engaging combat, likeable
characters and an old-fashioned Good versus Evil storyline complete
with excellent Japanese art style, this is the game for you. I do
like grimdark (The Last of Us, The Witcher 3 etc) but it’s nice to
take a break sometimes.
Thaddeus
