Last week we brought you our first impressions of the English version of Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King. We've since spent some time getting a little deeper into the game. We already know the game looks and sounds great, but how does it play? Read on to find out.

When we last left off, we had just finished up the lengthy intro to the game and were given a taste of what the story is all about. Just to bring you up to speed, Dragon Quest VIII is, as the subtitle implies, about a cursed king. As it turns out, the evil madman responsible for that curse is a jester named Dhoulmagus. You play as a generic hero who is employed by King Trode to find Dhoulmagus and put an end to his wicked ways. Also in your motley crew of outcasts are the horse princess Medea and a stout fighter named Yangus.

We set out to find the evil jester Dhoulmagus in Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King.

The first real mission in the game has you search an underground cavern for a crystal ball. Turns out, the crystal ball belongs to a fortune-teller known as The Great Kalderasha. Since a capable fortune-teller would be pretty useful to a band of adventurers, you set off to find Kalderasha's crystal ball, hoping that in return he'll give you a clue about the whereabouts of the enigmatic Dhoulmagus. And Dhoulmagus really is a mysterious villain. In fact, we haven't even really seen him yet. There was a flashback scene that showed the evil jester in shadow, but intentionally refrained from revealing his face.

The first dungeon we ventured through was a fairly small cavern with three or four large rooms. The first treasure chest in the dungeon yielded a map, which came in handy when we ran into a few areas where the main pathway split. As you might expect, exploring different areas results in more treasure, but, of course, more battles as well. Although the game does use the typical random-encounter system found in past Dragon Warrior games, the encounter rate feels just about right here. You'll usually end up in a battle every 15 or so steps, which is just enough to keep things interesting without impeding your progress too much. The battles offer a good challenge too, so you'll want to make sure to stock up on medicinal herbs to keep your life up, because there's no way to revive a fallen ally. If you do manage to die in battle, you'll be resurrected at the last church you visited--at the cost of half the gold you were carrying.

When we reached the end of the first dungeon, we fought the first boss in the game. The boss was introduced with a short exchange between the monster and our party. The exchange consisted of the usual perfunctory boss babble, but it was still entertaining. We were able to defeat the boss without much difficulty and were given Kalderasha's crystal ball as a reward.

After a lengthy sequence with the fortune-teller, we eventually moved on to another town and a whole new set of problems to solve. As with most role-playing games, it seems Dragon Warrior VIII is all about helping every random person you come across throughout the course of the game. Whether it's a young girl investigating the murder of her brother, or a slick gambler who finds himself on the wrong side of an angry brute in a local pub, you always manage to get called upon to solve every last problem in the kingdom.

Helping people out can pay off in more ways than simply moving the story ahead, though. In one town, we helped a feisty young girl named Jessica, and she predictably decided to join our party. Jessica started out fairly weak, but she's set up to be an offensive magic user with an emphasis on fire spells. She's also very well endowed physically, and she has a special sex-appeal skill that you can develop to have her distract enemies with a few flirtatious gestures.

You can develop your characters' skills with a variety of weapons using skill points you earn as you level up.

Sex appeal is just one of several different skills you can develop in the game. Each character has a special skill, as well as proficiencies with each type of weapon they're capable of using. When you level up you earn skill points, which you can distribute among various skills and proficiencies. For example, the leader character can develop skills with any of the handful of weapons he can use, or he can increase his courage skill, which allows him to learn healing and lightning magic. If you choose to put all your points into weapon proficiencies, you'll get attack bonuses when using those specific weapons, and you'll also learn new attack abilities. Setting your skills requires a bit of forward thinking, though, since you have to decide what kind of weapon you'll want to be using throughout the game. For instance, the best weapon available to your fighter at the moment might be a club, but it's a fairly safe bet that later on you'll find an axe or mallet that's even more powerful. If you've spent all your skill points developing your skill with a club, those new weapons will be much less effective once you finally get them.