Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake has arrived, drawing in a new crowd of players that didn’t get to experience it as well as veterans who have played all of its other versions. It’s arrival has heralded much chatter among the staff about their favorite entries in the Dragon Quest series, which prompted today’s Shack Chat. So, join us in the comments and let us know your favorite!
Question: What’s your favorite Dragon Quest game?
Dragon Quest 1 (AKA Dragon Warrior) - TJ Denzer, Senior Alefgard news editor
Source: Square Enix
The first Dragon Quest on the NES, known in the United States as Dragon Warrior, was one of the earliest games I remember ever playing. It may have been one of my first introductions to RPGs as I knew them. Little did I know that it would spark an interest that would grow over decades.
Dragon Warrior truly was the foundation of JRPGs as we’d come to know them. Everything there can be found in hundreds of other games that would follow, including the magic and equipment systems, first-person encounters, questing and interaction with the world around you, talking to NPCs to discover hints, and so much more. It established the lore of the evil Dragon King and story of the legendary hero Erdrick.
Dragon Quest 1 aged pretty roughly with its archaic design, intense encounter rates, and other features that didn’t quite withstand the test of time, but it’s still a good one, and I’d return to it whether we were getting a remake or not.
Dragon Warrior - Asif Khan, CEO/EIC/EIEIO - Very old
I spent countless hours wandering around the overworld of Dragon Quest 1 (aka Dragon Warrior) back in the 1980s. It was one of the first RPGs I had ever played. I need to play some of the later entries now that they are seeing remakes on new consoles, but I still look back fondly at my time with the OG on NES.
Dragon Quest 9 - Sam Chandler, Fledgling Dragonhead
I have, never in my life, played a Dragon Quest game. I am woefully unfamiliar with the series, and I’d go so far as to say JRPGs and turn-based games are a blind spot in my video game literacy. Turn-based games (even Pokemon) have never jived with my playstyle. So while I don’t have a favorite in the series, what I do have is a desire to be a learned man.
As such, I reached out to the biggest Dragonheads I know (that’s a term, right?), Donovan Erskine and Lucas White. I consider these two blokes an authority on the matter. While they each gave slightly different answers, there was a common game among them: Dragon Quest 9.
So, I’m going to do my best to acquire Dragon Quest 9, and a spare 40-80 hours, and see if I can’t finish it, or at the very least get an idea what all the fuss is about.
Dragon Quest 9: Sentinels of the Starry Skies - Donovan Erskine, Celestial
Source: Square Enix
Sometime in early 2010, an 11-year-old me sat in the kitchen to eat a bowl of cereal before leaving for school. It was during this fateful morning that I saw the commercial for Dragon Quest 9: Sentinels of the Starry Skies on TV. I heard the franchise overture for the first time, and my brain chemistry was permanently altered.
Later that summer, I got Dragon Quest 9 a couple weeks short of my twelfth birthday. At that point, my JRPG experience started and ended with Pokemon. DQ9 blew my mind with its rich class system, full character customization, and 3D graphics. It was also thoroughly challenging, forcing me to actually strategize about my moves instead of just spamming powerful attacks against every boss. It was the perfect DS game, and I spent many nights under the covers struggling to beat a boss or figure out where I was supposed to go next.
Playing DQ9 felt like the jump from black & white movies to technicolor. It showed me everything an RPG adventure could be, and I chase the feeling of wonder it gave me every time I check out a new game in the genre.
Dragon Warrior Monsters - Steve Tyminski, Train to win!
Source: Tose Software
What is my favorite Dragon Quest game? I didn’t play too many Dragon Quest games growing up but I do really like the RPG genre. Fans of the Stevetendo Show will know that I’m playing Dragon Quest XI on the show and am having a fun time with the game. Those same people will also know that I’m a big fan of the monster training genre like Pokemon.
It was around the same time as Pokemon Red and Blue when my favorite Dragon Quest game was released. I remember seeing it on the same shelves at Toys R Us as Pokemon and thought it looked interesting. That game was Dragon Warrior Monsters. In that game you go around different locations and find different monsters to train on your team. You can also breed them together to get stronger monsters.
My young mind didn’t understand all the details of Dragon Warrior Monsters but it still fits the bill as my favorite Dragon Quest game. Dragon Quest XI is very close to taking that title and the Dragon Quest 3 remake could make things messy as my order in the top 3.
Those are the Shack staff picks for their favorite Dragon Quest games ever release. Now, let’s hand it over to the Chatty. Drop the name of your favorite Dragon Quest game! Take a look at our Shack Chat page to see other questions we’ve asked in the past.
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replyShack Staff posted a new article, Shack Chat: What is your favorite Dragon Quest game?
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Not a single vote for DQ11, crazy. i am a massive fan of the first game, as it was one of the first rpgs I ever played, but man, Dq11 is just one of the greatest games i’ve ever played.
Sylvando is one of the best characters ever. He started off being such a stereotype and then later in his story i was driven to tears.
My only complaint is the game is too fucking long!-
I wasn't sure if I should pick DQ 11 or DQ11S.
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Yeah, it has some cool features. Maybe it will go on sale for Black Friday?
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I got a good chunk through and then just "nope'd" out. The grind just hit a threshold where I was done. I was rebuilding the party for the second half and had gotten the flamboyant dude back and stopped. I 100% 8 or 9, forget which (princess turned into a horse, king a frog thing).
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