Finally finished DQM:Joker, beat the post-game events, and beat the secret boss. The main story line takes 20~25 hours to finish, the post-game events and secret boss takes 15-20 hours (depending on your level beating the main storyline). The games monsters are ranked F,E, D, C, B, A, S, SS (in that order from weakest to strongest). The main storyline can be beaten with B/A monsters ~Lv25, the secret boss will require an A/S level monster.
Accolades:
>> Simply put, the best graphics on the DS to date.
>> No Random battles
>> Great usage of both screens and touch screen (I found myself doing a lot of things simply using my thumbs)
>> Well developed story compared to other DQ:Monsters games (but nothing to write home about)
>> Captures the Dragon Quest experience very well on the DS, the game also captures Koichi Sugiyama's music scores very well.
>> There are a lot of monsters (a lot), including bosses/secret bosses from other DQ games up to DQ8.
Criticisms:
>> Game world is relatively small. After you beat the game there are no new areas and no new enemies to fight other then the secret boss. You can level up and get S/SS level monsters, but there really isn't anything to do with them.
>> A lot of the post-game stuff is impossible to figure out if you don't have the guide or without help from online faqs. People still haven't figured out how to make JOKER (for which this game is named).
>> Most of your leveling after the first 20 hours of the game will be done via repetitive Metal Slime-type enemies (There are no other high-level monsters you can fight to level up). Here is the largest fault of the game, you have to essentially level up in the "Miwaku no Metal area" in the later-half of the game that becomes tedious and frustrating. Basically you have to kill 24 slimes in 300 seconds, which will allow you to fight in the metal area for 150 seconds. There is dumb luck involved becomes sometimes the slimes cast Astron and become invincible and that eats away your time. You will spend many hours doing this over and over since there are no other place to level up the only other alteranative is the last dungeon where Hagure Metals appear with 10% probability (this is also tedious).
Some online faqs that I think are the best (in Japanese):
http://zapanet.info/dq/dqmj/
http://www.dm-joker.com/index.html
http://kyokugen.info/dqmj/
Possible Soilers: If you don't want to see somewhat high-level monsters (A & S-rank, not SS-rank) don't scroll down
. . .
pics (from my previous post):
Accolades:
>> Simply put, the best graphics on the DS to date.
>> No Random battles
>> Great usage of both screens and touch screen (I found myself doing a lot of things simply using my thumbs)
>> Well developed story compared to other DQ:Monsters games (but nothing to write home about)
>> Captures the Dragon Quest experience very well on the DS, the game also captures Koichi Sugiyama's music scores very well.
>> There are a lot of monsters (a lot), including bosses/secret bosses from other DQ games up to DQ8.
Criticisms:
>> Game world is relatively small. After you beat the game there are no new areas and no new enemies to fight other then the secret boss. You can level up and get S/SS level monsters, but there really isn't anything to do with them.
>> A lot of the post-game stuff is impossible to figure out if you don't have the guide or without help from online faqs. People still haven't figured out how to make JOKER (for which this game is named).
>> Most of your leveling after the first 20 hours of the game will be done via repetitive Metal Slime-type enemies (There are no other high-level monsters you can fight to level up). Here is the largest fault of the game, you have to essentially level up in the "Miwaku no Metal area" in the later-half of the game that becomes tedious and frustrating. Basically you have to kill 24 slimes in 300 seconds, which will allow you to fight in the metal area for 150 seconds. There is dumb luck involved becomes sometimes the slimes cast Astron and become invincible and that eats away your time. You will spend many hours doing this over and over since there are no other place to level up the only other alteranative is the last dungeon where Hagure Metals appear with 10% probability (this is also tedious).
Some online faqs that I think are the best (in Japanese):
http://zapanet.info/dq/dqmj/
http://www.dm-joker.com/index.html
http://kyokugen.info/dqmj/
Possible Soilers: If you don't want to see somewhat high-level monsters (A & S-rank, not SS-rank) don't scroll down
. . .
pics (from my previous post):
