Dragon Quest 6: Realms of Revelation
Dec. 4th, 2011 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroThe Dread Fiend threatens the land, and the last hope is a hero and his two companions—who are promptly defeated by the monster. The hero finds himself living a new life, and must explore the mysteries of two interconnected worlds to rejoin his companions and defeat the Dread Fiend—all of the Dread Fiends—once and for all!
This is a remake of a game originally for the SNES, done with the same engine as the Dragon Quest 4 and Dragon Quest 5 remakes. Pretty much all of the standard Dragon Quest tropes (that I’ve discussed earlier) are out in force. If you ever played DQ7 (which came out in the states about a decade ago, despite being made after the original version of this game), you’re in for a faster version of that. Pretty much everywhere you go involves finding a town that has a problem you can solve in the other world.
The game is rather linear and can be pretty much played straight without a walkthrough until you get the ship that can go underwater, at which point the world opens up and there are a dozen poorly-labeled sidequests and no clear order to do anything in. (If you like DQ games, this should come as no surprise.)
DQ6, I think, sets a record for most modes of transportation in the series: You’ve got a wagon, a ship, a floating island, an underwater ship, a flying bed, a magic carpet, and a flying horse. Each one opens up a few new areas of the map, though most of them open fewer areas than you’d think and keep the game relatively linear.
The class system is the same as DQ7, too: You change classes at Alltrades Abbey, but class levels and character levels are unconnected. To gain levels in your class, you need to fight (and win) a certain number of battles, but they must be against character-level-appropriate monsters. So 20th-level character can’t go fight slimes to raise their class levels. (In practice, this works by different areas of the game having different level caps. The class system can be totally broken starting from when you hit Swanstone, because that area has no level cap, and neither do the endgame areas.)
Raising class levels gives you special bonuses while you stay in that class, and also skills you keep even when you switch to a different class. Also, mastering the first tier classes lets you access the higher-tier ones, which have better bonuses and better skills. The most important class is Sage, the second-tier wizard class. It’s the class that teaches you Multiheal (the heal-all spell); Kazing (the 100% successful revive spell); and Oomph, Magic Barrier and Insulatle (the most important buff spells). Boss battles are significantly easier once you have a Sage. The Warrior/Martial Artist->Gladiator track also gives some really useful hit-all, no-MP skills, but takes about as long to get through. The annoying thing is that the most useful mid-game skill is Flame Breath, taught by the Monster Master class. It’s the same fire breath monsters use, it costs 0 MP, and it hits all enemies and deals 30-40 damage regardless of defense unless they have fire resistance (and most enemies don’t). It’s exceptionally useful, but it’s on a class track with Merchant and Thief (who don’t have many useful skills) that leads to Ranger (which isn’t great, either). So you end up with a character (or several) who pwns the mid-game but then becomes increasingly less useful.
Also common to DQ games is using weapons/armor as items in battle. The Staff of Ghent, acquired with one of the party members, is by far the most useful of these because it casts Midheal infinitely for free, long before you get a Power Shield or Sage’s Stone.
DQ games have an interesting relationship with character personalities. In Final Fantasy games, during cutscenes, everyone present will play some role and react to the situation. In DQ games, your party is generally a passive group of observers, unless one of them is specifically part of the events, in which case only that character will react. Most of the DQ games from DQ4 on were pretty good about the party members having names and backstories (until DQ9, at least), but their passive observation of some events is odd. (Annoyingly, in this game, there’s an optional character who doesn’t even figure into the ending, even if you do get him.)
Overall: I’d put it on par with the other two DS remakes, classic JRPG fun with less unpleasant grinding than the first time around and a better experience overall. If you liked them, you’ll like this.
And with that, I’ve played all of the main-series Dragon Quest games. I wonder if they’ll try to make a DS version of DQ7?
This is a remake of a game originally for the SNES, done with the same engine as the Dragon Quest 4 and Dragon Quest 5 remakes. Pretty much all of the standard Dragon Quest tropes (that I’ve discussed earlier) are out in force. If you ever played DQ7 (which came out in the states about a decade ago, despite being made after the original version of this game), you’re in for a faster version of that. Pretty much everywhere you go involves finding a town that has a problem you can solve in the other world.
The game is rather linear and can be pretty much played straight without a walkthrough until you get the ship that can go underwater, at which point the world opens up and there are a dozen poorly-labeled sidequests and no clear order to do anything in. (If you like DQ games, this should come as no surprise.)
DQ6, I think, sets a record for most modes of transportation in the series: You’ve got a wagon, a ship, a floating island, an underwater ship, a flying bed, a magic carpet, and a flying horse. Each one opens up a few new areas of the map, though most of them open fewer areas than you’d think and keep the game relatively linear.
The class system is the same as DQ7, too: You change classes at Alltrades Abbey, but class levels and character levels are unconnected. To gain levels in your class, you need to fight (and win) a certain number of battles, but they must be against character-level-appropriate monsters. So 20th-level character can’t go fight slimes to raise their class levels. (In practice, this works by different areas of the game having different level caps. The class system can be totally broken starting from when you hit Swanstone, because that area has no level cap, and neither do the endgame areas.)
Raising class levels gives you special bonuses while you stay in that class, and also skills you keep even when you switch to a different class. Also, mastering the first tier classes lets you access the higher-tier ones, which have better bonuses and better skills. The most important class is Sage, the second-tier wizard class. It’s the class that teaches you Multiheal (the heal-all spell); Kazing (the 100% successful revive spell); and Oomph, Magic Barrier and Insulatle (the most important buff spells). Boss battles are significantly easier once you have a Sage. The Warrior/Martial Artist->Gladiator track also gives some really useful hit-all, no-MP skills, but takes about as long to get through. The annoying thing is that the most useful mid-game skill is Flame Breath, taught by the Monster Master class. It’s the same fire breath monsters use, it costs 0 MP, and it hits all enemies and deals 30-40 damage regardless of defense unless they have fire resistance (and most enemies don’t). It’s exceptionally useful, but it’s on a class track with Merchant and Thief (who don’t have many useful skills) that leads to Ranger (which isn’t great, either). So you end up with a character (or several) who pwns the mid-game but then becomes increasingly less useful.
Also common to DQ games is using weapons/armor as items in battle. The Staff of Ghent, acquired with one of the party members, is by far the most useful of these because it casts Midheal infinitely for free, long before you get a Power Shield or Sage’s Stone.
DQ games have an interesting relationship with character personalities. In Final Fantasy games, during cutscenes, everyone present will play some role and react to the situation. In DQ games, your party is generally a passive group of observers, unless one of them is specifically part of the events, in which case only that character will react. Most of the DQ games from DQ4 on were pretty good about the party members having names and backstories (until DQ9, at least), but their passive observation of some events is odd. (Annoyingly, in this game, there’s an optional character who doesn’t even figure into the ending, even if you do get him.)
Overall: I’d put it on par with the other two DS remakes, classic JRPG fun with less unpleasant grinding than the first time around and a better experience overall. If you liked them, you’ll like this.
And with that, I’ve played all of the main-series Dragon Quest games. I wonder if they’ll try to make a DS version of DQ7?
