Dragon Quest IX: Simple But Effective

Dragon Quest has been a key player in the RPG world, often eclipse in the American market by Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest has not lost steam in the Japanese market and with good reason. Dragon Quest IX doesn't rely on ever growing damage points to make you feel like your characters are growing, it has a simplistic and effective class and skill system and it doesn't take itself too seriously.

All too often people associate strength in RPGs with the number of 9s you see pop up on the screen. DQ doesn't feel the need for that and I think to its advantage. Without the focus on how big the damage points are getting you have more time to focus on the strategy of your character, working within the limitations of your class. This gives Dragon Quest IX a challenging edge without taking away from playability. Sticking with defined classes with specific jobs to complete to aid your party is where Dragon Quest IX 'makes up for' not having 15 rows of 9s popping up.

The class/skill system set up within Dragon Quest IX is simple but extraordinarily in depth when put into a multi player environment. For Example, when partying alone as a Mage your immediate job is to deal as much damage to as many monsters as quickly as possible. For the obvious reason of your Mage getting one shotted into the ground. But once you enter the multi player realm of DQ IX, you find yourself needing to hone your attacks more as to not draw the attention of the monster, so your meat shield (Warrior) can draw in the damage. Although there is not an exorbitant amount of skills to learn the narrowed scope makes the game much smoother to play then similar RPGs. Another problem of similar RPGs is that all too often realism get substituted for fun.

DQ IX is a fun little game that anyone can enjoy, especially those who are children at heart. Most RPGs and games in general have gritty backdrops with quasi good characters and graphics that make it hard to distinguish whats real and whats not. Which is great, but sometime companies need to remember as tale can be epic but still fun. One of my favorite moments of Dragon Quest IX was when you fight the evil "Master of Nun" a transformation of "The Jack of Alltrades". Sure its not the greatest pun in the world but I chuckled and had fun with it 'nun' the less.

Overall DQ IX is a fantastic title for all and I suggest picking it up today. If you want a full synopsis of the game and all its features have a look at this link.