Dragon Quest!

Dragon Quest is a milestone of video game history. It led to the popularization of console role playing games, and the development a series of games that combines a rich story, turn based combat, and a cast of interesting characters. The popularity of the Dragon Quest series is a phenomenon in Japan, and influenced other games, notably the Final Fantasy series that was released in 1987.

Dragon Quest was the combined effort between writer Yuji Horii  and artist Akira Toriyama. Horii was imspired to make a video game based on American RPGs of the time (specifically Ultima ,and Wizardry). He created  the plot, monsters, and and brought to life the story of the Dragon Quest series. Toriyama is a manga artist, notable for the immensely popular series Dragon Ball, which appeared in the magazine Shonen Jump, and he brought to the series a specific style and artistic influence that has continued to the present (though I guess you wouldn't be able to tell from the first few games). Horii and Toriyama's combined efforts have made Dragon Quest the most popular game series in Japan. When I say popular, I mean shut down the country, everything stops for this game. It is a video game phenomenon in Japan, spanning every form of media: games, music, toys manga, anime, and whatever else.

It is easy to see with such talent behind the game, that Dragon Quest would become popular in Japan, but would that same formula translate to a North American audience?  A big marketing campaign came from Nintendo Power who covered the game for months leading up to the American release, and offered the game for free with a subscription of their magazine. That's how I ran into Dragon Warrior. Yeah, they had to change the name, because TSR owned the rights to that name at the time. So the localization changed the name, updated some graphical things, reworked the dialog (to something like Olde English), and if that wasn't enough, completely ignored the art by Toriyama (Dragon Ball was unknown to America at the time) to give it a look that would appeal to American kids. The biggest problem for Enix was time. By the time these games had been localized for an American audience, they were dated. Though not as popular as it was in Japan, Enix eventually brought over three more sequels to the American audience on the NES.

The Music:

The music is composed by Koichi Sugiyama who has composed the soundtrack throughout the entire series. He has conducted symphonic suites of his work, and is known as one of the big names in gaming music. Since the 1970's he has produced music for movies, commercials, and television. He was responsible for the first video game concert when he preformed Dragon Quest Symphonic Suite I&II with the Tokyo String Music Combination Playing Group in 1987. He continues to organize other video game concerts and has collaborated with every big name composer in the video game world.

1987 Concert Poster

While I give so much praise for the music, the soundtrack doesn't translate well in the game. Some of the music begins to wear on you over time. So I gradually start to turn the volume down. Don't get me wrong here... I think the symphonic arrangements of Dragon Quest's songs are some of the most beautiful works of game music ever made... but the 8-bit version hurts my ears.

The Art:

It is easy to see how Toriyama's artistic style lends well to a fantasy setting. It gives the game a certain degree of accessibility that would make any Japanese kid want to play it. Being well known for his other work, Toriyama's designs created a bold direction for a fantasy role playing game. The American box strips away all the lightheartedness and instead tries to become this epic fantasy. It looks like anything else that came out for the NES in the US. Its a shame that North American audiences couldn't have been introduced to Toriyama's work earlier. We love that Dragon Ball Z stuff. 

Famicom version

NES version

Advertising:

Here's a commercial for Dragon Warrior in the US. They totally use the high fantasy thing. It's less weird than some of the other commercials Nintendo produced at the the time. Good kingly advice.

Here's the Japanese commercial. I'm not even sure if it's the entire thing, being only 15 seconds long. Maybe just listing the creative credits of the game with brief flashes of the screen is all that it took to create a fury around the Dragon Quest game. Who knows?  The freaky low voice saying "Dragon Quest!" at the end is the best. 

The Results:

Since this game is going to take longer than the others I've played, I'm going to type down my experiences as I go and sort it all out at the end. This will be a rambling mess.

Playing this game brings me back. I remember getting to the end castle.. but I don't remember beating it. The end levels are really tough, and there's a maze of stairs, different floors, and a final battle that probably made me just... forget to beat it. I've probably gotten to that point a few times.. and by then I'm just sick of the game... or the music. One of the two. This time I've turned down the volume and got my iPod with the symphonic soundtrack to substitute.

Some things I've noticed from the start: I'm intrigued by the way the game taunts you with unreachable objectives from the beginning. I don't know of another game that does it quite like Dragon Quest. Locked doors that are inaccessible until the middle of the game, and treasure chests sit visibly behind those doors. Entire areas of the game are behind locked doors, and that means you'll have to remember to come back and explore those areas later. Across the channel from the starting castle is the end castle. That narrow band of water, a few hours, and several hundred battles are all that stand between you and the Dragonlord.

In one of the caves/tunnels is a dragon guarding the princess you're supposed to rescue. You're supposed to rescue her during the middle of the game, not at the end. You can even choose not to rescue her. That's something that stands out from other games on the NES, where the princess is always at the end of the game. All these elements make Dragon Quest an interesting open ended game of exploration, grinding, and retracing your steps.

The Hero

So there's lots of grinding. I forgot that's what the game really is. You're killing monsters to improve your stats, and the game assumes that you will eventually travel to all the towns, and then get strong enough to beat the end boss. That's it. Crossing bridges is like jumping into a new zone of difficulty. A few steps over and you'll find a monster that will instantly destroy you . After a while you start to do the math and realize that you need to kill another fifty monsters to achieve the next level. At the end of the game it gets old. I've played the SNES version and it seemed more forgiving with extra experience and gold to keep the game moving. The original is rough... and something that should only be approached by the hardcore RPG fan.

When you die in the game, you are resurrected in front of the King and half your gold is gone. That's the price of death. It's a departure from other games where you have to start completely over or get brought back to a certain spot. The King will also save your data, so you can take a break and come back to it later. I'm always reminded to save the game often, because something will happen and you'll be forced to replay everything. If you saved not too long ago and end up dying, a quick reset will keep you from losing half your gold. But you have to be quick. 

I'm not sure if it's based on what level your character is, but it seems like monsters are super tough up to a certain point, and then the difficultly drops off dramatically and you end up one or two shotting monsters. For as hard as the game is at certain points, once you're able to get past that invisible barrier, everything becomes easy mode.

There are two monsters in the game that give you great rewards for defeating them: Goldman and Metal Slime. Goldman is a giant Golem made of ... bars of gold. By killing him you can get up to 200+ gold a pop. So I spent most of my time between objectives killing them and accumulating gold. Metal Slimes reward you with over 100+ experience points which is a serious boost for leveling. Too bad they're nearly impossible to kill, and they run away in fear as soon as they see you. So I'm killing Goldmen to extinction.

A note on games with random encounters: sometime you can walk around forever and never get hit with a fight, and other times every step you take results in an encounter. That sucks if you're about to die. This game seems to be set to high encounters, because I'm hitting them every three seconds.

I was so frustrated playing this game that I had to walk away from it for a few days. And I forgot to save the game. Something happened, and for whatever reason, my game just quit and I was forced back to my last save point. So I lost some time and any motivation to continue. Totally frustrating, and totally an NES RPG through and through.

After leveling up and gathering up the required items, I was able to build the bridge to reach the final obstacle: the Dragonlord's castle. Inside is a labyrinth of stairways are some of the hardest monsters in the game. The object is to get through the multiple levels unscathed to save your strength for the final fight with the Dragonlord. And interesting fight it is...

"A" Dragonlord?

When you greet the end boss he asks you if you want to join him to rule the word. Supposedly if you choose YES you get a game over and your entire saved data is erased. I was too chicken to test this, having come so far. After a short battle, the Dragonlord reveals his true form (a huge dragon) and utterly destroys you. I reached the end at Level 20, but after the first five defeats, was wondering if it was statistically impossible to beat him. Apparently your stats are derived from how you name your character... and with the level cap is 30, and I absolutely did not want to grind for more levels. On the seventh attempt, I got lucky and beat him, and restored peace to the land. Woot!

"The" Dragonlord.

     

VICTORY

Epilogue:

This game almost killed me. I was sick twice during this challenge and found myself unmotivated to kill another fifty monsters to level up. Definitely a tough game because of it's raw, unforgiving nature. But it is a game that I remember fondly, and I had fun revisiting it and finally conquering it. In my frustration, I managed to start playing Dragon Quest IX, the latest game in the series. It is an amazing experience, and is a testament to the foundation established with the first game, with familiar monsters, sound effects and menus. The artwork of Akira Toriyama shines throughout. As far as role playing games go, Dragon Quest is one of my favorites of all time, and with the announcement of the tenth installment for the Wii U, a series that will continue to entertain its fans. 

Statistics:

Levels reached: 20 Game Overs: 23 Continues: 23 Saves: 17 Boss deaths: 6 Treasure Chests: 14 Doors Opened: 12 Inn Visits: 55 Low Life Warnings: 87 Highest Critical Hit: 115 Gold: 38020 Approximate Time: 18 hours

Dragon Quest®, and all associated video games, music, characters, etc. are owned by SquareEnix - all rights reserved.