Finally, a game everyone should know! If you haven't heard of Dragon Warrior, then you've probably been living under a rock, outside of gaming circles, or in another country where it's called Dragon Quest. While Phantasy Star is well known now, Dragon Warrior was well known during its time. However, it actually had a bit of a rocky start. During the first few months the game wasn't selling well at all until articles ran in Shonen Jump (a popular manga magazine). The articles were written by Yuji Horii, who was also the creative lead behind the game. Sales increased so much that the sequel Dragon Quest II was highly anticipated, creating the first blockbuster game in Japan.
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| The opening music is great, actually most of the music is |
Dragon Quest was the first CRPG released for the console market. The purpose of the game was to create the computer RPG experience on consoles. So, they took what they liked most, and attempted to appeal to a wider audience. Game mechanics are simplified from the likes of Wizardry and Ultima, both inspirations for Yuji Horii and Kochi Nakamura.
Dragon Quest arguably started the console-RPG genre, and for that it has a place in many hearts across the globe. Coming to America, the name changed from Dragon Quest to Dragon Warrior. This was due to a role-playing system called DragonQuest already existing, so to avoid any rights disputes the name was altered slightly. Strangely, this tabletop RPG was originally going to be called Dragonslayer, but was changed to Dragon Quest because of the Disney film (released by Paramount).
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| The reason we got Dragon Warrior in the US (Source: Wayne's Books) |
Dragon Warrior was one of the first RPGs we had actually bought. I remember that when my dad would play he'd travel over each and every tile in order to make sure he ran into enough monsters to raise his level. The main aspect that follows this game is the grind. Hopefully it's not all bad though, and can stand up the test of time a bit better than Ultima Exodus (which used Dragon Warrior's menu based interface).
I've never heard of it, but then we do have some pretty big rocks in Australia! ;)
ReplyDeleteThe only game you will ever reach that I've beaten. I'm looking forward to this.
ReplyDeleteI'd only just barely heard of this one. I've heard they're frustrating but good, so I'll be following this one as well.
ReplyDeleteI guess I've been living under a rock too. ;P
ReplyDeleteI guess I don't know my audience very well, and that should probably be console gaming circles too. Maybe I shouldn't make the same assumption when I get to Final Fantasy either. :D
ReplyDelete@Murkha: Honestly, the first one doesn't seem to have much in the way of story. It's all about finding a way to get to the final boss and destroy him.
I'm from a PC background, though, so it's not that surprising. Of actual RPGs that I've played on console, I think it's Final Fantasy 7, Chrono Trigger, Granstream Saga of all things, plus a couple of attempts of Final Fantasy 6.
DeleteFor some reason, the random encounters on console are so much more aggravating to me than on PC, besides the fact that I prefer western style story to Japanese. Following you is sort of an education in the games I'm missing and can't really stand to play.
This is actually one of my hopes for this blog. To give those that didn't, won't, or can't play through these games, but still want to know about them.
DeleteProbably because of the CRPG Addict, it's looking like you'll get more CRPG fans than JRPG fans reading the blog. Funny, all things considered.
DeleteTrue, and I keep forgetting that. I should really remember to write as if the reader has no knowledge of the game. I think I said this before, and sorry to everyone for forgetting. I'll add some more background in the future posts; otherwise, it'd be kind of boring reporting, "well, I grinded from 12 - 15 today, the metal slimes and goldmen are really helpful" for the third time.
DeleteDragon Quest (aka Dragon Warrior) is an incredibly important game in the history of JRPGs. It basically set the standard. All the games that came after it just built right on top of its formula. They took Ultima and Wizardry and they made a whole new sub-genre, which continues to this day.
ReplyDeleteThat said, it plays about as well as you'd expect from a 25 year old JRPG. While good for their time, the graphics are quite primitive, even for those used to retro gaming. The monster designs are actually quite solid, but the rest is just bad looking. The story is lame, you only have one character and one path of development, the interface is God damned terrible, and you basically just grind and grind and grind and grind until the game ends.
If anyone wants to get into JRPGs, start with SNES JRPGs. If you really want to play something of this era, play one of the later Dragon Quests, FF1, FF3 (not FF2, that game sucks ass), or Phantasy Star. Or play one of the Gameboy's decent RPG's. Some of the later SaGa/FFL games are actually pretty good. Seiken Densetsu/FFA is the father to the well-loved Secret of Mana. There are probably others I don't know about, but there you go.
Funny thing about the graphics: When this and DQ2 were localized, they actually gave the character sprites a massive overhaul over the much less-appealing original Japanese versions, which had faceless characters only looking in one direction.
DeleteI'm glad they did this. The game would definitely have felt like a step down if they hadn't taken the time to update the game. I'm not a stickler for graphics, but I don't think it would have had the same impact with dated graphics.
DeleteYou are at metal slimes already? That is the last overground area of the game! Also hard to kill, need to do it in one hit!
ReplyDeleteNo, not there yet. I just chose two of the enemies I remembered best. I really don't know what all I'll be grinding on. Pretty sure Goldman is coming up sometime soon.
DeleteAre you posting from work Zenic? Naughty naught!
DeleteMorning break. :D
DeleteRight, it is lunchtime there. Forgot about that. Actually, I'm running late so I'm going to have lunch soon myself. Too bad you play so late at night; I'd love to watch this one and see how it measures up to the Gameboy Colour version I played.
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