Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies Review

Written by Jorge S. Fernandez, published 23rd August 2010

In Japan, the Dragon Quest series is considered the most popular and beloved RPG series of all time, even eclipsing the world renowned Final Fantasy franchise. The DQ phenomenon is so prevalent in Japan that a law was formed for all newly released titles to be sold on weekends in order to keep workers from taking the day off.

When the latest game, Dragon Quest IX, was announced to be exclusively released on the Nintendo DS, it sent a shock worldwide (and set many internet forums ablaze), but its significance was all too clear; for a series known to appear only on the most popular console, the DS was given the distinct honour, practically cementing its handheld dominance. Unsurprisingly, the Japanese fans flocked to DQ’s portable sequel, and now litter the streets trading maps with one another rather than text messages. In the land of the rising sun, Dragon Quest burns the brightest.

But in America and Europe, it barely registers as a spark. Even though the series practically invented the fundamentals of RPG mechanics that continue to be used today, past localization attempts have been met with mediocre sales, at best. Europe in particular hasn’t had a chance to experience many DQ games. In many ways, Dragon Quest IX is the biggest (and possibly last) attempt for the series to make an impact overseas. Will tightly refined mechanics coupled with brand new multiplayer features be enough to gain the attention of the casual crowd?

The story of Dragon Quest IX revolves around the Celestrians, an angelic race of winged beings who oversee the mortal realm and its inhabitants from high atop their floating city. Each of the Celestrians are assigned to a specific town to watch over and protect the humans, who in turn revere their saviours with prayers of gratitude, which are formed into pockets of energy called Benevolessence. Players create an original protagonist (whose appearance is fully customizable, right down to their gender) who is tasked with protecting the quaint village of Angel Falls, performing good deeds to the unsuspecting but otherwise grateful villagers in order to horde their Benevolessence, but sure enough, things go wrong. After disaster strikes the hero’s heavenly home, the protagonist falls from paradise and becomes a mortal him/herself. With the help of a plucky but enigmatic fairy named Stella, along with several other allies both human and Celestrian, the fallen angel must embark on several quests and encounters to slowly unravel a plot of (pardon the pun) biblical proportions.

While the notion of playing a character who starts off as an angel, and continues to roam the world granting peoples’ prayers is a unique touch, in the end the story of DQIX is the same cliché tale reproduced in several RPGs over the last few years. The kicker, however, is that it works in creating a basic but strong narrative, subtly touching on themes such as faith and fate. And while the cutesy designs (for both the characters and the monsters) give an overall light-hearted impression, there is a fair share of tragic moments that may stir up a few sniffles here and there. And while the characterization is strong in many of the NPCs you encounter, fans of quirky yet loveable party members (such as Dragon Quest VIII’s Yangus) may be disappointed to learn that the only teammates who will grind levels with you are the ones you (or a friend) make yourself; in order to give your hero some much-needed assistance, players can choose to either create their own party members (assigning each a specific job class in the process) or choose from a random assortment that can be recruited at an inn. For the first time in the series, players can also team up through local multiplayer, with up to four DS owners wandering around together, collecting loot from dungeons and fighting off monsters for an extra experience bonus.

The gameplay itself maintains the same basic structure that has shaped RPGs for the last couple of decades; battles are played out with turn-based menus, with the standard commands for attacking, using items, casting spells, and so on. As a series first, enemies are now visible in the field, which significantly cuts down on random battles (an RPG trademark that falls squarely into “love it or hate it” territory) and allows for avoiding unwanted battles entirely. Keep fleeing over fighting, however, and you’ll quickly pay for your cowardice when facing off against the powerful bosses found in each dungeon. The good news is that falling in battle doesn’t result in a Game Over, and instead sends players back to their previous save point with all their experience and recovered items intact. The tradeoff is that you lose half your gold, which can prove especially frustrating considering the high prices for armour and weapons.

As is traditional with any RPG, the key to victory is to gain experience points from every battle. In addition to raising your basic stats with each level up, you are also awarded skill points that can be applied to specific attributes, including weapons (or bare-handed if you so chose), shields, faith, and so on. Allocating these points wisely will open up new abilities and spells, and DQIX mercifully adds a list of all available upgrades, eliminating the frustrating guesswork from prior games. In addition, all characters (hero included) can freely change their vocation, experimenting with each of the six jobs (as well as a few advanced ones later on) without losing any experience or skill points earned. Of course, switching to a new job means having to start over at Level 1, which means more grinding to earn those extra levels.

All this talk about grinding and levelling up may have been one of the prime reasons the DQ series has been overlooked overseas, but the truth is that experience hoarding has never been made easier, or quicker. By making enemies visible on the field, not only can players avoid battles, they can also instigate them at their leisure. As another visual cue to speed up the levelling process, weaker enemies that can be overpowered for little gain will take off when approached, while stronger enemies will do the chasing themselves. Managing equipment has also been made easier, with a streamlined interface that cycles between party members with a simple button press, while individual pieces of armour and weapons can also be equipped as soon as they are purchased from a shop vendor. Even battles can be managed easily by allowing players to assign specific commands to their party members without wasting a turn; knowing how to properly command a balanced group (such as having a Priest focus on healing, or a Mage to keep spell-casting down to a minimum to preserve MP) goes a long way to ensuring victory against even the toughest of bosses.

But despite the claim that Dragon Quest IX is the most challenging iteration yet, the main campaign can be completed with minimal frustration by anyone well versed in RPG mechanics. The statement in fact refers to the end-game content, which features dungeons of incredible length and impossible difficulty. If that wasn’t enough, there are hundreds of quests that can be partaken at any time, ranging from simple fetch quests to full-on monster slaying, not to mention even more content that is available by wirelessly downloading extra maps. This impeccable amount of content will put the playtime well past the hundred hour mark, but at the cost of only allowing one save slot per cartridge, which results in a difficult choice whether to replay the game at the cost of everything players had accomplished in their previous game.

The Dragon Quest series has remained adamant in keeping its classic structure and interface, which also included a simplistic graphical style. This changed with the previous entry, where Level 5 took charge in adapting the series’ classic designs with modernized 3D graphics. The redone graphical style makes a return in DQIX, featuring a host of polygons and texture effects that result in what is possibly the best looking DS title to date, with the exception of two small hitches; the first is that while your hero as well as major characters are rendered as polygons, the majority of NPCs remain as enlarged two dimensional sprites, which can prove distracting at times. The other quibble is the small amount of slowdown present in towns when wandering around with a full party. Regardless, the visuals are fantastic while also filled with personality (including the wacky, but no less dangerous, creatures you’ll run into), while the soundtrack is brilliantly composed by Koichi Sugiyama, who has been in charge of the series since the first game.

Despite the downloadable quests, multiplayer missions and fancy visuals, Dragon Quest IX is still fundamentally the same game that hooked a generation of gamers nearly twenty years ago. No other game series has stubbornly refused to evolve alongside the systems it was made for, not even Nintendo’s biggest classics, but it also goes to show how refined the gameplay is. Whether the series ever receives the same attention and acclaim as it enjoys in the east is uncertain, but for true RPG fans, it will always remain our special little secret.

Final Score: 94%