Dragon Quest and JRPGs

[Daystar Clarion]

I don't consider myself a massive JRPG fan, but there have been a few titles that I'll stand by and say are bloody good games. These include FFVII, Star Ocean 3 and Chrono Trigger. These games are not new, they've been around for a long time and one thing I've notice of late is that the majority of JRPGs I've played come across as taking themselves too seriously and are almost pretentious in their story telling.

I'm not a massive Dragon Quest fan. I've only ever played 2 titles, but in a sea of what seem like really bad Japanese soap drama (I'm looking at you FF 13), the Dragon Quest games come across as a breath of fresh air, consisting of old school JRPG mechanics, great characters, brilliant localisation (finally, a JRPG not voiced by horrible high pitched American anime VOs), terrific soundtrack and art direction. For me, the Dragon Quest games remind me of another brilliant JRPG. Chrono Trigger. Except Chrono Trigger is more than a decade old, Dragon Quest games, while consisting of a recycled formula, are still being made and take me back to a time when JRPGs were all about quests, a crap-tonne of gear, funny looking monsters and, while the world may be falling apart from evil, a light humoured sense of rightness about the whole thing.

What do you guys like about DQ, or, if you've never played one, what are your favourite things/pet peeves about JRPGs, new or old.

 

[SUPA FRANKY]

Whats with the constant chatter with JRPGs? If you like them, good for you. If you don't you probably still won't change your mind. I personally love JRPGs, but the amount of debate on them is kind of...tiring.

OT: I'm also one for quirky rpgs myself, being that some of my favorite games are The Shadow Hearts Series, The Dragon Quest Series, Chrono trigger, Earthbound, and Opoona. A pet peeve I have is probably like you, they take themselves too seriously, and they really aren't all that long. Its just that they fill it to the brim with padding like grinding and backtracking.

 

[kaziard]

Whats with the constant chatter with JRPGs? If you like them, good for you. If you don't you probably still won't change your mind. I personally love JRPGs, but the amount of debate on them is kind of...tiring.

OT: I'm also one for quirky rpgs myself, being that some of my favorite games are The Shadow Hearts Series, The Dragon Quest Series, Chrono trigger, Earthbound, and Opoona. A pet peeve I have is probably like you, they take themselves too seriously, and they really aren't all that long. Its just that they fill it to the brim with padding like grinding and backtracking.

yeah its not like this is a gaming website or anything....

Yeah i love the dragon quest titles i have tried so far they really are nice quirky games. I don't know about your point though, i quite enjoy serious rpgs, i suppose if the game has literally no light parts however i could agree with you.

 

[Akihiko]

Well. In all honesty, I can't get into a Dragon Quest game, and I consider myself to be a fairly big fan of JRPGs, my gaming collection is home to atleast 50 of them. However, for some reason these days I find it hard to play older games which I used to love. I used to love Final Fantasy VII when I first played it, played through it multiple times too, however I find myself unable to get past the first few hours now, largely due to the dated system. I've always presumed that was why I could never get into Dragon Quest VIII, I didn't find they'd innovated the combat that much, it was still the same old style turnbased. Some might find that appealing, that it hasn't changed, however, I find it to be a problem. It was an amazing system at the time, but I can't help but feel comparing to the technology that we have now it's underwhelming.

 

[Space Spoons]

I was a Final Fantasy kid growing up, so Dragon Quest, to me, was always "that weird FF ripoff where you can't see your party in battle". Completely off base, of course, but at the time, I really didn't know any better. I didn't get my first real taste of the game until 2006, when for the first time, Final Fantasy let me down.

I logged about 40 hours in FFXII before I finally gave up. The game was simply wrong; it defied all my JRPG sensibilities, and in all the worst ways. It didn't feel the slightest bit like a true FF game. Looking to get my JRPG fix and not content to replay FF IV, V, VI, VII, VIII or X for the millionth time, I looked to Dragon Quest VIII, which had come out the previous year.

What an experience that was. It was everything I ever loved about the JRPG genre. It was a breath of fresh air. It was also one hard sonofabitch. I don't know if FF just left me soft or if I was playing the game wrong, but damn, that one was tough.

So yeah, I love the Dragon Quest games. They seem to have stayed true to the genre while the FF series has gone off in God knows what direction.

 

[TheNamlessGuy]

DELETED

 

[Daystar Clarion]

I've loved every dragon quest game except nine, nine just...felt so wrong. It felt like it was trying too hard to be a final fantasy game. The plot, the characters, the side-quests and even the grinding. Everything in it just felt horribly un-Dragon Questish aside from the puns. The puns were still nice but even the general air of humor the series had was mostly gone.

I think I know what you mean. I'm enjoying DQ 9 well enough, but I just keep thinking about how much better DQ 8 is. I don't know what it is.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

I've loved every dragon quest game except nine, nine just...felt so wrong. It felt like it was trying too hard to be a final fantasy game. The plot, the characters, the side-quests and even the grinding. Everything in it just felt horribly un-Dragon Questish aside from the puns. The puns were still nice but even the general air of humor the series had was mostly gone.

I think I know what you mean. I'm enjoying DQ 9 well enough, but I just keep thinking about how much better DQ 8 is. I don't know what it is.

the DS remake of 5 is my favorite DQ game. I despised 9, I could go on for paragraphs about everything in that game that annoyed me.

The biggest glaring fault for me is that, while important characters are in 3D, all the other characters are in 2D. It sticks out like a sore thumb for me.

 

[SUPA FRANKY]

Whats with the constant chatter with JRPGs? If you like them, good for you. If you don't you probably still won't change your mind. I personally love JRPGs, but the amount of debate on them is kind of...tiring.

OT: I'm also one for quirky rpgs myself, being that some of my favorite games are The Shadow Hearts Series, The Dragon Quest Series, Chrono trigger, Earthbound, and Opoona. A pet peeve I have is probably like you, they take themselves too seriously, and they really aren't all that long. Its just that they fill it to the brim with padding like grinding and backtracking.

yeah its not like this is a gaming website or anything....

Yeah i love the dragon quest titles i have tried so far they really are nice quirky games. I don't know about your point though, i quite enjoy serious rpgs, i suppose if the game has literally no light parts however i could agree with you.

I understand that, but have you seen the amount of times people bring up JRPGs? It almost came to the point where there is almost nothing else to talk about it.

 

[Akihiko]

Whats with the constant chatter with JRPGs? If you like them, good for you. If you don't you probably still won't change your mind. I personally love JRPGs, but the amount of debate on them is kind of...tiring.

OT: I'm also one for quirky rpgs myself, being that some of my favorite games are The Shadow Hearts Series, The Dragon Quest Series, Chrono trigger, Earthbound, and Opoona. A pet peeve I have is probably like you, they take themselves too seriously, and they really aren't all that long. Its just that they fill it to the brim with padding like grinding and backtracking.

yeah its not like this is a gaming website or anything....

Yeah i love the dragon quest titles i have tried so far they really are nice quirky games. I don't know about your point though, i quite enjoy serious rpgs, i suppose if the game has literally no light parts however i could agree with you.

I understand that, but have you seen the amount of times people bring up JRPGs? It almost came to the point where there is almost nothing else to talk about it.

Arguably the majority of the people who bring the subject up are people who can't tolerate the genre. In that respect, I agree thoroughly that it gets tiring.

 

[Lord Aronsworth]

I've only played Dragon Quest VIII, and I never finished it. I was young, and I think if I gave it another go I'd really enjoy it.

For JRPGs, you need story, something to level up other than killing friggin' rabbits for 12 hours, and likable characters.

I can't stress the story part enough. I badly, badly wanted to like Resonance of Fate. Graphics were superb, voice acting didn't make me want to put my head through a wall, and the battle system is my favorite in any RPG I've played. But it lacked story. Beginning of Chapter 5- Ok, this guy wants us to go here. Who? Why? What relevance does it have to the overall plot? What IS the overall plot? Why should I care what happens to these people? Trade in.

Leveling is always a key element in a JRPG. Even something as simple as those missions in Crisis Core keep me satisfied. You have a goal, you get a reward, and you're moving in a direction other than circles or in whatever wacky pattern you come up with. The best leveling I've seen is in Lost Odyssey. If you just don't run from a fight, you're kept exactly where you need to be for every area. Good that you don't have to load your last from 2 hours ago when you find yourself underleved, and things also aren't insultingly easy.

For characters, I've seen the best bet is a silent protagonist a la Golden Sun. They get simple yes/no questions, making them you. Their personality is yours. Now don't get me wrong, just controlling a character works too, but it's hit or miss. Vyse from Skies of Arcadia is--to my knowledge--one of the first to be a fully developed, opinionated player character. You play as him, but in cutscenes, he voices his own opinions. You get some input, but also the feeling he's his own person. I should also point out he's emotionally whole, not these Linkin Park tween characters that keep getting recycled into RPGs.

Above all else, Nippon Ichi Software needs to stop making games. They seriously have some godawful "funny" Final Fantasy Tactics knock-off with Shin Megami Tensei knock-off artwork coming out close to once a month. Each one is progressively worse than its predecessor. The first Disgaea was amazing, and Prinny: Can I really Be the Hero?* were awesome. Just stop there, you're only embarrassing yourself after that.

*I'm aware Prinny was a side-scroller, but I still give them credit for the game being great.

 

[Ultress]

DQ8 was my first DQ and when I first played it's wicked difficulty put me off as grinding was a foreign concept to me, I picked it up last year again at a sale and absolutely loved it.

I really need to get around to playing the DS re releases but for some reason have been too scared to do so. For some reason I think they'll be really unforgiving and off putting the way SMT Nocturne is.


As for specific grievances I'd say the long winded cut scenes some JRPGS have*coughSO4coughcough* leave me begging to be allowed to play again.

Also Random battles, they don't totally ruin a JRPG for me but they do bug me somewhat.

 

[Pearwood]

I logged about 40 hours in FFXII before I finally gave up. The game was simply wrong; it defied all my JRPG sensibilities, and in all the worst ways. It didn't feel the slightest bit like a true FF game.

I have to disagree with that. The level up system was Final Fantasy, as was the combat. It just hid its turn based nature behind cooldown times between autoattacks and cast times on spells. But I might be biased because that game is one of my favourite RPGs, j or otherwise, of all time

I've never been a fan of Dragon Quest, a big reason Final Fantasy is my JRPG series of choice is it doesn't just stick to the definition of JRPGs, it mixes things up a bit. The most recent was a mix of SRPG and a cinematic game, one before that was a sandbox the size of the fucking Sahara Desert. Dragon Quest is just the same crap I've been playing for years, bog standard JRPG with absolutely no unique features. Although I'm not aware if they have started experimenting cause frankly I stopped following the series long ago. Even a fucking materia or junction clone would be original for that series and I hated those systems.

 

[TheSupremeForce]

Above all else, Nippon Ichi Software needs to stop making games. They seriously have some godawful "funny" Final Fantasy Tactics knock-off with Shin Megami Tensei knock-off artwork coming out close to once a month. Each one is progressively worse than its predecessor. The first Disgaea was amazing, and Prinny: Can I really Be the Hero?* were awesome. Just stop there, you're only embarrassing yourself after that.

*I'm aware Prinny was a side-scroller, but I still give them credit for the game being great.

No way. Disgaea 3 was better than the first one. Two was also a very good game.
La Pucelle wasn't as good as Disgaea, but I believe it was made prior to Disgaea.
Phantom Brave was pretty good.
Odin Sphere and GrimGrimoire were also quite interesting, but NIS may have only published them.

Thanks for reminding me that I still need to track down a copy of Soul Nomad.

The world needs more strategy RPG's, not less.