Dragon Quest VII Thoughts Volume 1

As a big Dragon Quest fan, I have been playing the remake of the seventh game on the 3DS. Thing about it is that it is notorious for taking forever to complete. Some people say 80 hours, others say much longer. Since I try not to review games before I finish their main story/ mode/ whatever, I've decided to do a blog series every once in a while that gives my thoughts on the game so far, and eventually I'll write up a complete review.

Time played: 13 hours

The beginning to this game takes its time, that's for damn sure. It took me an hour and a half before I was finally able to fight a single monster. It wasn't awful, though, as I found the game to do a good job at establishing the world and cast, moreso than other entries in the series.

For those that don't know, this game is about rebuilding the world one island at a time. Basically, the protagonist and his friends Maribel and Kiefer live on the island of Estard, the only island in the world. After a lot of running around and various shenanigans, they're sent to the past on an island they don't recognize. The place as a problem that needs solving, and they're the ones to do it. This is how the game has played out so far; uncover new island in the past, play through a story arc, go back to the present to explore and get more tablet pieces to explore more islands in the past.

The structure is inherently repetitive, but after playing through several arcs (I'm on the fifth or sixth one) I don't really mind it, because so far this has one of the best sets of stories in the series. Most of the other games tend to follow an episodic format, where each town has a problem that needs solving before leading up to an endgame focused on some big bad guy. Certain entries, like V, have more connections through their arcs than others. This episodic structure means that the stories of Dragon Quest games tend to be a pretty mixed bag since they live or die by these episodes. Thankfully, the arcs in VII are actually pretty damn interesting, showing a higher level of writing not seen in other DQ games.

Often times, DQ games have standard writing in that you show up, everyone fulfills the exact roles they need in the story, events happen, then you move on. The biggest fault with this is that character development tends to be weaker than in other RPGs since stories move along at such a fast pace. This games takes its time with each story, all of which have unique and creative elements not found in a lot of other JRPGs.

Apart from that, I think it's a pretty standard DQ game, although I have to wonder why, after 13 hours, I still can't change my characters' classes. There's some strange decisions in this game for sure, but I'm enjoying it so far.

What do you think of the game?

I'm a little over 10 hours in and at first I was getting a bit concerned about the pacing. Now though, I'm actually kind of grateful for the slower speed of the game. It's not very often that a RPG really takes its sweet time to go about things like this one.

Just got Ruff a little while ago and the feeling of accomplishment is great. The characters are, in DQ tradition, fantastic. The battles are very well designed and strategic even early on. I'm in no hurry here to rush through the game either. I can easily see myself spending well over 100 hours with this game no problem.

@kk_slider: I actually like the characters more in this game than others... one of the downfall of the series is that most of the characters get like a few lines then say/ do nothing for the rest of the game, but in this one they seem quite a bit chattier and therefor more developed. Same with the storylines, I think the fact that it takes its time makes you more invested in what's happening, even if there are times where they drag (like the automaton one, which was cool but definitely could have been paced a little quicker).

Ive been enjoying it a bunch. I cant remember the islands name, but im on the one where everyone is like turned to statues. Im still getting use to stuff, but overall i feel very comfortable with the games systems. I havnt used any guides or anything at all except when i had to find that old hermit.

But Nintendo has the best guide ive seen for the game.

http://dragonquest7.nintendo.com/quick-start/

It doesnt spoil anything, but is super simplistic and easy to use. So i feel if i have any issues, i can resort to taking a peek.

Also I wanted to say that coming from gamefaq.com, this place is barren by comparison. Their boards have a lot more traffic, and plenty of people who are playing DQVII. There's even dedicated boards to games like DQVII.

I mention this because there are almost no posts in this thread.

@kk_slider: Yep, Gamespot has seriously fallen from grace. If you go on System Wars, that board is insanely barren compared to the days where you could post in one thread, refresh the page and have ten new comments in it. It's a sad state of affairs for surre, and I'm considering moving back to Gamefaqs with a new profile (way back when I was a fourteen year old and GF and GS were sister sites, I got banned from GF for being a dick- totally deserved too, mind you). It's really sad, because as many problems as this site had a few years ago, it was still much more communal with things like Unions and active boards. IDK what I'm still doing here sometimes.

Only on the 2nd island but like it quite a lot at the moment. It feels like it's building in its quality. I just hope there are more interesting areas to explore. The first island was great but the 2nd is a bit simple.

I am a little past the Vocation Station and it does pick up. I just explored a massive dungeon that took quite a while to beat.

I've only played the PS1 version and liked what I've played. Gonna dive into the 3DS version one of these days.

@glitch-: Set aside A LOT of free time for it. I'm thirty hours in and apparently nowhere near the end. It's fun, though. I like that they take an extremely episodic approach- it keeps the game from feeling drawn out.