Dragon Quest X: The Possibilities
How to make the Wii RPG a perfect X.
by Daemon Hatfield
December 10, 2008 - Yesterday the minds of Japanese gamers collectively exploded when Square Enix announced Dragon Quest X is being developed for the Wii. One of the most popular franchises in Japan, Dragon Quest releases are phenomena that find people skipping school and work to line up as far as the eye can see. While not quite as feverish about the series here in North America, role-playing gamers still love their DQ (that's Dragon Quest, not Dairy Queen
although we're pretty sure gamers love Yule Flip Peppermint Blizzards, too). Looking out over the vast sea of Wii games you'll find plenty mini-game collections, licensed kiddie titles, music games
but not too many hardcore role-playing games. The announcement of Dragon Quest X is very good news for Wii owners and our minds are already racing considering the possibilities.
The Dragon Quest series has never strayed far from its roots, and we dare say it is one of the few Japanese role-playing games (JRPGs) that are still engrossing despite the lack of innovation. You usually know what you're getting with a Dragon Quest game, and there is something very comfortable about a design that, while dated, is probably the pinnacle of the genre.
Nintendo is no stranger to the series, as it was home to DQ's birth back on the Famicom/NES in the late '80s (the series was called Dragon Warrior in North America until the 2005 release of Dragon Quest VIII). The first four entries arrived on the NES, and IV-VI are being remade for the Nintendo DS. While the series moved over to Sony's consoles for VII and VIII, IX is a DS exclusive and now X will be the property of Nintendo's white wonder. It was surely a simple business decision for Square Enix: the Wii and DS have each sold forty billionty thousand units, and the company is shooting its high-profile games where the gamers are. It's a long ways off (2010 at the earliest), but it is very nice to know there is an enormous hardcore RPG waiting for us in the distance.
We had a false start back in 2006 when Square Enix announced a Dragon Quest game for the Wii. Of course, this turned out to not be part of the true DQ canon, and rather a spin-off called Dragon Quest Swords that was watered down for the kids (IGN gave it a 7). It was a more accessible affair that fit into Nintendo's philosophy of trying to attract new gamers. That's all well and good, but RPG fans want an epic adventure they can sink 50+ hours into. Based on what the main series has always offered, Dragon Quest X should be that game.
Here's what we know about it so far: nothing. Square Enix held a press conference in Japan yesterday to make the announcement, but didn't share any details other than it is being built for Wii. So without anything official to go on, here is our best case scenario for the tenth entry in the series.
First of all, they need to keep the cartoon visuals they established with Dragon Quest 8. One of our favorite aspects of Dragon Quest is that it never takes itself too seriously, something we'd argue Final Fantasy has been guilty of from time to time. If there is anything we've learned about the Wii in its two years here on Earth, it is that it does not do realistic visuals well. But stylized, exaggerated graphics like what we saw recently in Shaun White Snowboarding can look truly fantastic on Nintendo's console. So we're lucky that Dragon Quest has already been doing the cartoon thing for a while. In no way would we call DQ's visuals "kiddie." The character designs by Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama are some of the most iconic images in gaming, and the lush, vibrant world of DQVIII was a vision to behold -- it still looks great today. Cel-shaded visuals appear to be somewhat future proof and can hold their own against the more powerful consoles. Dragon Quest IX is being presented in a similar style to VIII, so it's a good bet X will adhere to the standard.
We are guilty of chastising modern JRPGs for refusing to give up random battles, but darn it all, this archaic system just feels right in Dragon Quest. We wouldn't mind too terribly if X arbitrarily throws slimes at us without warning. Of course, we wouldn't mind too terribly if the developers do want to give us fair warning, either. Monsters are visible on the battle field in Dragon Quest IX, so it's certainly possible encounters won't be random in X.
It would be nice if the story were made more open-ended. Rather than a linear progression, we'd like to have a hub area from where we can accept a variety of missions. Over time, the story would reveal itself regardless of the order in which we tackled quests.
Dragon Quest IX has a few interesting tricks up its sleeve we think would be nice additions to the Wii game. Four players can get in on the action in co-op, and we'd love to see multiplayer features in DQX. We're not talking about a full, massively multiplayer online game, but some sort of online community features would be welcome. Maybe a drop in/drop out co-op mode like The Secret of Mana where you have several members in your party controlled by AI, but friends can jump in and takeover at any time. This may push the game more into action RPG territory, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. We know that DQIX features a pub that serves as your base of operations in the game. It would be aces if people playing DQX had a community pub hub. Players could meet, barter items, and maybe start a bar fight.
The upcoming DS game also includes character customization tools that should definitely be kept in for part X. Western RPGs are much better than their Eastern counterparts at making players feel like they are taking part in the adventure, rather than being forced to play as another emo kid with bad hair. Letting players customize their character in Dragon Quest IX is a big step forward for the series and JRPGs in general. Providing loads and loads of items to find and dress/equip our characters with also opens new gameplay possibilities. There can be extremely rare items that are only found when playing cooperatively.
We know DQIX will also include a class system similar to what Final Fantasy uses from time to time -- another feature we would welcome in DQX. It should heavily affect the gameplay, though. Certain missions should be easier to tackle based on whether or not you play as a thief or a fighter, for instance.
While we're mentioning all the nice features of Dragon Quest IX on DS, how about some sort of connectivity between it and the upcoming Wii game? Maybe the characters we customized in DQIX could be pulled into DQX.
We're going to go ahead and say we don't need any waggle controls in DQX. Turning the press of a button into imprecise swings of your arm is a good way to dumb down a game. Obviously, next year's WiiMotion Plus technology makes things like sword combat more enticing. But in order for a game to make the best use of the tech it would have to be built around the idea of 1:1 motion controls, and that's not what Dragon Quest is about. In fact, we're going to hope for Classic Controller support so we can just sit back, relax, and enjoy hours and hours and hours of role-playing. Ultimately, Square Enix should provide a fairly traditional but exceptionally executed JRPG that innovates just barely enough to make it feel fresh and exciting. You don't want to muck with a pedigree like Dragon Quest too much. It's a fine line, to be sure, but the development team hasn't made a bad DQ game, yet (at least not in the official DQ canon).
