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• Dragon Quest X and the Wii Lifetime Equation

  It didn’t hit me until today just how long the Wii is going to stick around. Forget the fact that Nintendo have sold millions upon millions of consoles in record time or that the box continues to sell in vast quantities on a monthly basis. The real metric is Dragon Quest. Read More... Posted Apr 08 2009, 05:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, nintendo, wii, square-enix, dragon quest, enix, yuji horii

• Getting Medieval (and Evil) on PSP: Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman!

  Well, Sony, it’s about time. You publish two versions of Yuusha no Kuse Ni Namaikida for PSP in as many years and you don’t release either outside Japan? Come on, man! What could it hurt? Patapon and LocoRoco are weird, original PSP games and they’ve done okay. American nerds love RPGs and retro style. Where’s the love? WHERE IS IT?! Ah, there it is. It’s understandable if you missed Yuusha no Kuse Ni Namaikida (You’re Pretty Cheeky For a Hero, if you prefer) when it came out back in 2007. Even amongst import gamers, it was still pretty obscure. Here’s the score: you play as the evil, world-menacing bad-guy-demon-lord from Ye Olde JRPG. You build a large maze-dungeon on a 2D plain, fill it with monsters, and then hide in it. Eventually a hero will show up to try and kill you. You, naturally, aim to avoid him. Think Tecmo’s Deception meets Dragon Quest. Here’s a trailer to get your mind rolling. Read More... Posted Mar 31 2009, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, psp, sony, dragon quest, scea, locoroco, patapon, holy invasion of privacy badman, scej, tecmo’s deception, Yuusha no Kuse Ni Namaikida

• Box Art Worth Remembering: Dragon Warrior III (NES)

  Gamers are a resourceful species. We play our games, and then sharpen our claws on the box art. This has been our way for decades. It's an old practise, rich with tradition. I mean...look at this stuff. North American box art has only recently stopped trying to hide the flavour of its innards. Anime character designs, for instance, were used very sparingly until the latter half of the PSOne's life. Instead, A-list titles like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Suikoden received jewel case covers that would have been well-suited for a “Count With the Count!” Sesame Street soundtrack, and an instructional CD on 108 ways to draw a generic hero. Regardless, I think some interesting design choices came out of that strange era. When box art illustrators put forth an effort, the end result was comparable in quality to the original Japanese work. One of my favourite examples is from a title that remains one of my all-time beloved: Dragon Warrior III for the NES. In 1991, Dragon Ball Z was still millions of years away from American audiences, thus rendering Akira Toriyama more or less nameless on this side of the pond. For Dragon Warrior III Enix of America chose a box design that was absent of any title characters—an interesting choice, given Dragon Warrior III's emphasis on character classes and large parties. Read More... Posted Mar 26 2009, 10:30 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: dragon quest, retro, dragon warrior, nadia oxford, Suikoden, dragon warrior III, box art worth remembering, castlevania symphony of the night

• Please, JRPGs, Let Me Run Free

  One of the Internet's favourite hobbies is complaining about the senility of the JRPG genre. The behemoth genre is in fact staggering, and it might not be long before its chest touches the ground. I think the wolves are feeding a bit early, though: JRPGs are a huge market, and it takes a long time for a disease to run its course through a big animal. Besides, there's very little wrong with JRPGs that can't be chased off with a few shots. The rambling stories can be re-written with a more consideration for subtlety, the characters can be given goals beyond being spokesgirls for moe, and random encounters don't have to, y'know, exist. Where no such improvements are possible for whatever reason (laziness, fear of change, a deal with the Devil that ended with the developer being forced to play cruel jokes on players), I would settle for just one tweak. It's not hard to implement, and it's not too scary, but it could help save the genre. Please, please, please, JRPG developers—all RPG developers—if you're going to make me suffer through random battles, at least guarantee that I will be able to run from them. Read More... Posted Mar 19 2009, 11:37 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 7 comment(s) Filed under: dragon quest, final fantasy iv, nadia oxford, jrpgs

• Question of the Day: Valkyrie Profile and the Need for Voiced Dialogue

  My backlog is becoming untenable. There are games, games that I started months ago, sitting in a pile that appears to be growing of its own volition. Where the hell did that copy of Pro Evolution Soccer even come from and why is it sitting in the “to play” pile? No one in my home even likes soccer! The worst of the lot is Persona 4. Rather than hide myself away like some horrid realization of gamer stereotype, refusing to venture into the sun until the game is complete, I’ve been working through Persona since early December, taking it a bit at a time. It’s starting to drive me crazy. A few days ago, I fired it up for the first time since mid-February and was treated to one of its scarce animated cutscenes. Turns out that bear suit made a dude! Yeah, not a dude wearing a bear suit. The bear suit formed a dude inside of it. More startling than spontaneous dude generation was hearing the characters’ voices. I had forgotten they could talk you see. This is because, with very rare exceptions, I always turn off the voice acting in RPGs. Why? Because the voice acting is almost always terrible. Dragon Quest VIII’s British cast and Final Fantasy XII’s gang of breathy stoics are exceptions to the rule. Most of the time, you have to deal with screeching whiners who insist on naming every single thing they do and I’ll have none of it. Honestly though, I wonder why voice is considered a necessity in modern design. Read More... Posted Mar 19 2009, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 3 comment(s) Filed under: legend of zelda, twilight princess, square-enix, dragon quest, persona, atlus, final fantasy xii, question of the day, persona 4, dragon quest viii, valkyrie profile, eiji aonumal john Constantine, covenant of the plume

• The 61FPS Review: Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride

  It may have taken 20 years, but Dragon Quest fever has finally hit the United States. True, it'll never be as intense--and, at times, frightening--as Japan's fascination with the series, but we only have to look at the past few decades for a reminder of how Dragon Quest used to be a forgotten and overlooked RPG footnote in comparison to cross-cultural hits like Final Fantasy. We've gone from Nintendo Power giving away unwanted copies of the first Dragon Quest (then known as Dragon Warrior in the States) in 1989, to Enix's American branch closing up shop in the mid-90s, to a small push for the outdated and subpar Dragon Quest VII back in 2001; but in 2005, shortly after the Square-Enix merger, the series was essentially re-launched with the phenomenal Dragon Quest VIII for the PS2. Now, nearly four years later, we're in the middle of a DS trilogy remake, the latest release being Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride. And, just like DQ's last DS remake (Dragon Quest IV, released in September), DQV stands as proof that there's never been a better time for American Dragon Quest fans. Read More... Posted Mar 17 2009, 10:00 AM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: 61fps review, ds, dragon quest, dragon warrior, bob mackey, dragon quest iv, dragon quest viii, dragon quest iv: chapters of the chosen

• Dragon Quest III Remake Translation Patch Released

  Today is a great time to be a Dragon Quest fan, but the mid-90s... not so much. Enix did their best to bring Dragon Quests II, III, and IV over to the States during the early years of the decade, but the series was poorly received by a populace who wouldn't really figure out what this whole RPG thing was about until Final Fantasy VII. And since DQ never really caught on in America until 2005's release of the phenomenal Dragon Quest VIII, we missed out on quite a few games in the series--most of which we either have now or are coming soon to the DS. One of these games, a Dragon Quest III remake made late in the Super Famicom's life (1996) didn't come here for reasons that should be obvious at this point--though it's important to note that a Game Boy Color port of this remake (stop me if this gets confusing) actually did make it out here in 2001, but it wasn't nearly as pretty as the post-DQVI work done on the Super Famicom version. But now, thanks to the work of talented people in the rom hacking scene (notably, DaMarsMan), the fantastic Dragon Quest III Super Famicom remake is now fully-translated in English for the sake of DQ freaks like me who don't want to learn an entirely new language to play a 13 year-old game. There's a limit to even my free time. Read More... Posted Mar 02 2009, 02:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: dragon quest, remakes, bob mackey, dragon quest III, super famicom, dragon quest vi

• Whatcha Playing: Guadia Quest

  “But Nadia! 'Guadia Quest' is just one part of the magnificent whole that is Retro Game Challenge!” You're right, you little mathematician! But as fans of Retro Game Challenge are already well-aware, this DS title isn't merely a half-hearted mini game collection. That goes double for its RPG "parody." Both my husband and I intended to play through Retro Game Challenge, but there is only one save file. We decided we'd split up the experience. I've been letting my husband to the lion's share of the work while I sit by and witness the outcome. I want to see what comes of Game Master Arino, the lonely Wizard of a digital Oz who went as far as to outfit himself with a paper crown from Burger King. But I cannot chicken out by the sidelines for the entirety of the game. Someone needs to take up the sword and hack away at Guadia Quest. My husband doesn't know a hilt from a blade, whereas I was weaned on unicorn milk (and cocaine). Read More... Posted Feb 26 2009, 08:29 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: nintendo ds, dragon quest, retro, nostalgia, nadia oxford, dragon quest iv, Retro game challenge, dragon quest ii, guadia quest

• Old Man, Take a Look At My Life

  Somewhere over the American Midwest, on February 7th, I was playing through Retro Game Challenge. Five hours on a sold-out airplane, stale air, more screaming kids than tranq-ed adults, and surly Delta Airlines employees shoving headphones and stale bagels in your face every ten minutes makes for the perfect gaming atmosphere. You put on the best headphones you’ve got, jack up the volume, and play until the power runs out. The flight allowed me to access almost all of Retro’s faux-NES games. It wasn’t until I was plodding about its Dragon Quest homage, Guardia Quest, that I noticed my audience. Aaron was about five or six years old, a quiet kid peculiarly calm for such a long trip. “I have a DS too.” Read More... Posted Feb 17 2009, 06:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, nintendo ds, legend of zelda, nes, dragon quest, wii sports, famicom, Retro game challenge, phantom hourglass, guardia quest

• Remakes I Never Got to Play: Dragon Quest V

  The DS remake of Dragon Quest V is out this week, and that's an event worth celebrating--especially considering 1UP's recent beaming review of the game. Dragon Quest V, along with VI, are the two installments in the series we Americans missed out on thanks to Enix's lack of business luck in the States with winning titles like Brain Lord. But V is perhaps the sweetest plum in the Dragon Quest basket due to the fact that we missed out on playing the game two whole times: once on the Super Famicom, and again on the Playstation 2. Continuing the work they had done on the original Playstation back in 2001 with the first Dragon Quest IV remake, the Enix side of Square-Enix employed ArtePiazza, current developers of the DS remakes, to bring out a revamped version of DQV so the Japanese gaming public would have something to do until the release of DQVIII many moons later. I've recently come to discover that the Dragon Quest games work best in a handheld format, but part of me still wants to play the other DQV remake in English. Read More... Posted Feb 17 2009, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: dragon quest, remakes, bob mackey, dragon quest iv, dragon quest viii, dragon quest v

• Roundtable Discussion: The Relevance of Japanese RPGs

  Roundtable Discussion takes the intrepid 61FPS blogging team and pits it against itself in the search for deeper truth. The moderator for today is Bob Mackey. This week’s conversation deals with the mythical and possibly endangered beast known as the Japanese RPG. The genre really seems to be suffering during this generation, for two major reasons: 1.) escalating development costs due to the new necessity of high-polygon, HD resources and 2.) developers’ inability to combat the most damning problems of the genre. Over the past few years, we’ve seen quite a few JRPGs hitting the shelves that feel half-finished at best; and even when a fully-realized JRPG comes along, I worry that the absolutely abysmal pacing the genre is infamous for will end up sucking all the fun out of what could be a fantastic game. To start us off, I have two basic questions: 1.) What does the genre need to do to become interesting again, and 2.) what do you think it will do? On a side note, the only RPGs I’ve been interested in lately have been ports of remakes of classics. Is this a sign that the genre is becoming antiquated and only accessible to those (admittedly, quite a few at this point) with an understanding of its unique grammar? Read More... Posted Feb 13 2009, 03:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 9 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, final fantasy, rpg, japan, chrono trigger, cole stryker, square-enix, dragon quest, square, jrpg, bob mackey, mother, squaresoft, joe keiser, roundtable discussion

• The Why, God, Why Report: Dragon Quest IX Delayed in Japan

  I shouldn't have to point this out here, but Japan takes their Dragon Quest seriously. Very seriously. It's been quite a long time since the country has seen an installment of the franchise that's such a national craze; the mega-awesome Dragon Quest VIII came out in late 2004, which means that fans have now been waiting over 4 years to destroy cute little slimes in a whole new incarnation. And, unfortunately, it looks like they'll be waiting just a bit longer with today's announcement (via a NEOGaf tip) that Dragon Quest IX's release date has been pushed all the way back to July 11--quite a ways away from the intended release date of March 28th. It goes without saying that this is bad news for Japan, and bad news for us; I was personally hoping for a Fall 2009 release in the States, but this substantial delay could make that a bit tricky. Read More... Posted Feb 12 2009, 07:30 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: dragon quest, dragon quest iv, dragon quest ix, delays, square enix, dragon quest iv: chapters of the chosen, dragon quest v

• On the Importance of World Maps

  One of the major reasons JRPGs lost me a little during the last generation was the stripping away of one of the genre's most defining features: the explorable world map, which was taken out of many games in favor of less resource-intensive travel options. Now, I'm still a little conflicted about this; on one hand, I do like the intuitive menu-based exploration of games like Persona, and I've repeatedly learned (especially this fall with Opoona) that making a player traverse large expanses of land is an excellent way to pointlessly stretch out a game for dozens of hours. On the other hand, including a Super Mario World-ish map in an RPG always felt a little cheap and cop-outey to me; when I saw this choice show up in Final Fantasy X, I assumed that Square had signed some sort of contract with The Devil himself (little did I know they had done this a few months prior with Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within). It seems that the whole world map issue is entirely about fooling players into thinking your game world is more than a bunch of "rooms" stuck together, all while making sure not to bore them with interminable traveling. It's a tricky balance. Read More... Posted Feb 09 2009, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 4 comment(s) Filed under: rpg, dragon quest, earthbound, jrpg, bob mackey, square enix, design

• WTFriday: Dragon Quest Crotch Buddies

  Ridiculous accessories for video games have always existed--and if you think this trend ended with the Power Glove, then you probably haven't seen the chainsaw or slime-themed controllers that were actually designed and released for consumers to purchase. Yeah, that chainsaw controller has its own web site. Anyway, gimmicky video game accessories are still around and successfully targeting the demographic of "people who have no idea what to do with their money;" but until I had read this recent 1UP story about a baffling Dragon Quest-related peripheral, I had no idea how bad things had become. Friends, allow me to introduce you to the Dragon Quest Crotch Buddy. Read More... Posted Jan 30 2009, 02:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: dragon quest, bob mackey, wtfriday, accesories, peripherals

• My Top 10 of 2008 in No Particular Order: Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen

  It's the end of another year, and that can only mean one thing: it's list season. Inevitably, you're going to see top ten lists by the thousands; and, as an official member of the enthusiast press, I'm afraid I can't violate my directive. But, to make things a little more interesting, I've decided to assemble my 10 favorite games of this year in non-hierarchical form because--let's face facts--it's hard to pick a favorite. And unlike other top 10 lists, this one will be doled out to you in piecemeal over the next several excruciating days! Please enjoy. It seems that surprise has been a common factor in nearly all of my top ten of 2008 entries; with quite a few of the games that ended up as my favorites this year, I either didn't know what to expect, or I wasn't expecting much.  But the DS remake of Dragon Quest IV was a little different--after all, it was a Dragon Quest game, and those buggers are about as familiar as you can get.  Of course, I assumed the same thing of Square's Final Fantasy IV remake earlier in the summer, only to find the impressive technical improvements outweighed by a baffling new skill system and an unwarranted increase in difficulty.  Thankfully, Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen took a markedly different path; instead of warping its gentle features into the twisted form of a more modern RPG, the Enix side of Square Enix (and I can only assume the company is run this way) decided to preserve the super-fast, super-addictive game play of the original title by sprucing up the graphics a tiny bit, and generally making the already-simple NES RPG even more user friendly than it was in 1990. Read More... Posted Dec 19 2008, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: dragon quest, bob mackey, dragon quest iv, top 10, top 10 of 2008, square enix

• Looking Ahead: 6 DS Games that I'm Looking Forward To in 2009.

  Yeah, this list didn't quite make it to 10. Maybe if I were more of a virtual pet fan I'd have had an easier time filling this list up. Talk about your over saturated genres, yeesh. I never even picked up Nintendogs. Well, without further ado, here are 6 upcoming DS games that I am interested in. Read More... Posted Dec 18 2008, 10:00 AM by Amber Ahlborn with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: fire emblem, amber ahlborn, ds, dragon quest, scribblenauts, top 10, moon, rhythm heaven, big bang mini

• And Now Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Love: Atlus Reprints Persona 2

  I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: I’ve got issues with Japanese role-playing games. I tend to, well, disappear into them. And as much as they make our own Bob Mackey OCD within the confines of their battle systems, item management, and quaint townships, they tend to make me OCD in my waking life. When I start one that really gets its hooks into me, I don’t do much else with life until it’s done. Much like the troubles I had with Dragon Quest VIII back in 2005, Persona 3 ruined me for September 2007. Eighty-nine hours of level grinding, managing completely fictional friendships (whilst ignoring real ones,) and bouncing J-pop that nearly drove my roommates to murder me. It was my first time with the Shin Megami Tensei franchise and I couldn’t have been more impressed, or obsessed, with it. Needless to say, I’ve been dreading Persona 4. Not because I think it won’t live up to Persona 3. No, I’m afraid of what it’s going to do my brain. And now, for seemingly no other reason than they are awesome, Atlus is making everything worse. The publisher sent out an email today announcing that they are reprinting Persona 2: Eternal Punishment, a Playstation 1 game, “to commemorate the upcoming release of Persona 4 and to thank you for your interest, dedication, and support of the SMT series.” Who does that?! Who reprints an eight year-old game for a long-dead console? Someone who loves you, that’s who. Read More... Posted Nov 13 2008, 07:15 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, shin megami tensei, love, dragon quest, persona, atlus, persona 2 eternal punishment, persona 4, persona 3, dragon quest viii

• Trailer Review: Dragon Quest IX

  As October wears on and the fruits of game season, grand experiences like Dead Space and Fable 2, start to illuminate my living room with an incandescent and warming light, I find myself not looking forward, but back. 2008 has been, to date, a year overflowing with great games and even though it’s been less than a month since I finished it, I’m already looking back at Dragon Quest IV fondly. The characters, the leveling, the music; it was glorious. But, as it is with JRPGs, it will be a very long time before I ever attempt to complete that particularly glorious remake again. (If ever. Role-playing games are a steep time investment as is, a fact I’ve discussed many times in the past.) But this trailer, only recently presented in high-quality after its debut at Tokyo Game Show, fills me with hope for the future. Dragon Quest IX will be awesome. Oh yes, it will be so, so awesome. Read More... Posted Oct 20 2008, 06:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, trailer review, square-enix, dragon quest, fable 2, dead space, yuuji horii, dragon quest iv, dragon quest ix

• The 'Bout Time Report: Dragon Quest IX Gets a Release Date

  The Dragon Quest games have never been known for their timeliness; Dragon Quest VII in particular had a development time so troubled that when it eventually came out, the game had a sorry first-gen aesthetic in a world where both Vagrant Story and Chrono Cross existed. But according to Kotaku, the upcoming Dragon Quest IX finally has a release date--nearly two years after the shocking announcement that the game would be exclusive to the DS. In this case, the DQ team's lack of promptness won't affect them much--as if it ever did before. The passing of time has only seen millions more DS systems sold, which means that Square-Enix is well on their way towards taking over the world. The reveal of DQ on the DS two years ago was a bit of a surprise, but it actually made sense when you stopped to think about it. Dragon Quest was never a series that prided itself--or relied--on visuals; despite what a show-stopping blockbuster VIII ended up being. When it comes to the franchise in general, VIII was a definite deviation; all of the standard DQ trappings still existed, but they were dressed up in the trappings of a lavish late-gen PS2 game--and even more so in the renovated US version. As much as I'd love to see another game in the same vein as DQVIII--which felt like the only authentic RPG of that generation--the format of IX doesn't really matter. Even with a game as relatively ugly as the DS remake of DQIV, that same addictive DQ formula is present regardless of the graphics. Read More... Posted Oct 01 2008, 12:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with no comments Filed under: ds, square-enix, dragon quest, bob mackey, dragon quest ix

• Chiptune Friday: Bed ‘N Breakfast

  It’s been raining today here in New York, a cold harbinger of October keeping us city dwellers indoors, putting on sweaters, and craving hot cocoa. Personally, I’m trying to gear myself up for tonight’s Presidential debate, but I’d be lying to you if I said that I wasn’t truly desperate for a nap, one preferably under a thick comforter and near my DS for some more Dragon Quest IV. It’s in that spirit that we present this week’s Chiptune Friday, not a single track, but a compilation of soothing tones to ease one’s weary soul and refill their hit points. Read More... Posted Sep 26 2008, 06:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, chiptune friday, animal crossing, dragon quest, xenogears

• The 61FPS Review: Dragon Quest IV – Chapters of the Chosen

  I’m not going to lie to you. Dragon Quest and I have history. It goes back some twenty years at this point, but our relationship today isn’t one based on nostalgia. Back in 2005, you could say that Dragon Quest and I were in, to put it delicately, an unhealthily codependent situation. Dragon Quest VIII had just come out in the United States, fresh faced and full of gorgeous cel-shaded graphics, newly minted menus and music, and voice work of unprecedented quality. But Dragon Quest has never had much clout on this side of the Pacific, and this was its first time going by its real name instead of Dragon Warrior. It needed someone, anyone to play it. Me, I was a recovering role-playing addict, coming off of a decade of Squaresoft devotion, trying my best to stay off the ability trees, the melodrama, and the menus. I lapsed occasionally into turn-based adventures to save the world. I’d been doing good up until that November, hadn’t touched a JRPG since Shadow Hearts: Covenant the previous winter, but I could feel myself weakening. I just wasn’t strong enough. So Dragon Quest VIII and I found each other at our weakest. Between November 15th and December 1st, I clocked just under ninety-six hours playing Dragon Quest VIII. Yeah, that’s right. Four days of my life. And I loved it. Each Dragon Quest, since the first game sprung from Yuuji Horii’s succulent brain in 1986, is an exercise in purity, a defining marquee in a genre known today for its decadence, bombast, and tedium. Dragon Quest is more often noted for its resistance to change rather than its consistent quality across the years. It’s true, Dragon Quest has remained, across its sequels, spin-offs, and numerous remakes, largely the same game it was two decades ago. The essential play – explore a large fantasy world, fight monsters in a first person perspective, collect items, talk to every single person you meet – has never changed in the core titles. But every iteration finds its elegant formula incrementally refined, and to great effect. Dragon Quest II introduced multi-character parties, III a job system that went on to become a genre staple, and so on and so forth. Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen, a DS remake of a Playstation remake of the NES original, could be viewed as a step back from the lavishly produced (though still familiar) Dragon Quest VIII, a retreat meant to acclimate players to the series’ transition from home consoles to portables. Surprisingly, Chapters of the Chosen isn’t a retreat at all. It is instead a perfect model of the JRPG as Horii envisioned it, immediately accessible, streamlined from the menu-juggling, command-selecting rigor moral, and trimmed of the excess narrative fat that’s typified the genre since Hironobu Sakaguchi began emphasizing drama over play in Final Fantasy. Read More... Posted Sep 22 2008, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, nintendo ds, final fantasy, 61fps review, square-enix, hironobu sakaguchi, dragon quest, jrpg, yuuji horii

• Games You Keep Coming Back To

  There are a few games out there that I know I'll never finish, but will continue to perpetually play for the rest of my life.  The greatest offender (in the nicest of terms) for me is Final Fantasy XII; I bought it the day it came out in 2006, and to this day I still play it ten hours at a time in shifts five to six months apart.  Even now, nearly two years later, I'm thinking of picking up my old save to try out some of those trickier hunting sub-quests, mainly because my brain has been completely ignorant of the game's story since pre-2007.  I know it has something to do with evil twins, but I might be confusing FFXII with an episode of The Patty Duke Show. Honestly, I can blame Final Fantasy XII itself for my bipolar feelings; director Matsuno gave the franchise a much needed shake-up (which will be all but forgotten by FFXIII), but the game's skill system is in dire need of refinement--which is why it was refined, in a Japan-only re-release.  As things currently stand with America's only version of the game, all the characters in your party are basically the same, and any kind of planned specialization soon falls apart when you realize just how counter-productive this strategy is.  With the addition of refined license boards built for specialization in the aptly-named Final Fantasy XII International Zodiac Job System, it's possible that XII might actually be my favorite Final Fantasy; but I'll really never know. Final Fantasy XII isn't the only game that I've had an on-again, off-again relationship with; while there are many games that I never finish and which subsequently haunt my dreams, I've come crawling back to quite a few others after months of downtime. Read More... Posted Sep 11 2008, 01:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 9 comment(s) Filed under: dragon quest, addiction, bob mackey, the wind waker, final fantasy xii

• Anticipation Time: Dragon Quest IV

  For as much as we like to bitch and moan about innovation in gaming, sometimes it's just nice to be face-deep in a big ol' nostalgia pie--especially if said pie was almost given to us six years ago and then snatched away without the promise of future pie time.  What I'm trying to say with this strained analogy is that the remake of Dragon Quest IV is finally coming to the US on September 16th, and we should all be thankful. If you're unaware of the scandal behind the Dragon Quest IV remake, it's important to know that we almost got it six years ago; released for the Playstation in Japan, Enix promised to bring the game to the States on the back of the instructions of the US-released Dragon Warrior VII.  Unfortunately, Heartbeat, who "programmed" both VII and the IV remake, folded, making the necessary localization re-programming more trouble than it was actually worth.  But honestly, Heartbeat's implosion was really for the best; it allowed Enix to pass the game to a much more qualified team (Level 5), and Heartbeat's take on the series kind of buried the magic of Dragon Quest under a load of crummy graphics (even for a game rooted in nostalgia) and sloppy, buggy menus.  VII was already a turd of a game, but Heartbeat didn't help matters much. Read More... Posted Sep 04 2008, 03:00 PM by Bob Mackey with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: ds, dragon quest, final fantasy iv ds, remakes, bob mackey

• Time Investment

  Nerve, that monolithic purveyor of literary sex and cultural commentary that spawned 61 Frames Per Second from its lurid brain, has, broadly speaking, a pretty open mind about everything. We are free wheeling folks accepting of both things that are not stupid and many, many things that are stupid but still fun. Great cultural criticism and stunning new fiction? We love that heady stuff. Brainless celebrity gossip? We love that too (well, some of us. Frankly celebrity culture confounds me. That is, unless the celebrities in question are, like, Brenda Brathwaite. Or Prince. Or Optimus Prime.) What I am trying to express is that we are not easily shocked. Earlier today, videogames managed to shock our fearless editorial leader, Will Doig. He stumbled upon a story that’s been making the internet rounds of late concerning the discovery of a boss in MMORPG Final Fantasy XI that takes close to a full day of constant play to beat. Not just one player, mind you, but an entire team. The intrepid adventures in Beyond the Limitation, the name of the FFXI crew in question, spent eighteen hours straight fighting the Pandemonium Warden, stopping only because, according to one member, “People were passing out and getting physically ill.” They also apparently vomited later on. They didn’t even win the fight. This staggered Commandant Doig to the point where his only comment about the story was, “Physically! Ill!” I’m right there with him. But it concerns me that I can imagine spending that kind of time playing a game. Read More... Posted Aug 20 2008, 05:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 4 comment(s) Filed under: john constantine, final fantasy, rpg, brenda brathwaite, dragon quest, will doig

• Trailer Review: Riz-Zoawd

  I like me a good Japanese RPG. Actually, let me rephrase: I love Japanese JRPGs. Like many a youth twenty years back, I received a free copy of Dragon Warrior with my Nintendo Power subscription. I didn’t actually play Dragon Warrior myself, I played it with my older brother, start to finish. It was, as I believe was the point of the game, epic. The experience from level one to defeating the nefarious Dragon Lord really did feel like a vast journey, a true hero quest. But I never got around to playing another JRPG until I was fourteen. That game was Chrono Trigger and it turned me into a slavering addict. These days, I only get to play one JRPG a year. They typically require a massive investment of time and, so, I’m forced to pick and choose. I’m not sure if it’s going to come to the US at this point, but if it does, I might have to make Ris-Zoawd the JRPG I play next year. Read More... Posted Aug 08 2008, 05:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, nintendo ds, trailer review, final fantasy, chrono trigger, dragon quest, jrpg, riz-zoawd, wild arms, dragon warrior

• Good Grief: Snoopy DS

  Square-Enix has obviously found a great deal of success in the Nintendo DS with six Final Fantasy titles (including Tactics, Fables and Crystal Chronicles), four Dragon Quest titles, two Mana titles, The World Ends With You, Space Invaders Extreme, Arkanoid DS, Super Mario Hoops, and many others. With at least two more Dragon Quest titles on the way to the dual-screened portable, along with Kingdom Hearts, Valkyrie Profile, and Chrono Trigger, you might think the kids at S-E had just about run out of old and new properties to fit on those tiny game cards. Well you would be wrong, because Square-Enix is hard at work bringing Charles Schulz's classic comic strip to the party with Snoopy DS: Let's Go Meet Snoopy and His Friends! Read More... Posted Aug 06 2008, 05:00 PM by Derrick Sanskrit with | with no comments Filed under: the world ends with you, nintendo ds, derrick sanskrit, final fantasy, chrono trigger, square-enix, dragon quest, snoopy

• E3 Day One: Microsoft, Sony, Final Fantasy, and For Whom the Bell Tolls

  There was a very brief period of crossover time, between 2002 and 2006, when E3 was still a gargantuan, money-wasting event and high-speed internet access was ubiquitous. During these years, gamers across the English speaking world regularly crashed websites following videocasts and liveblogs of press conferences as the biggest game announcements of the year hit the public. In the wake of the old E3’s dissolution and 2007’s lackluster event, the press cycle for the games industry seemingly changed forever; game announcements, platform holder initiatives, and publisher events have been spread out over the last eighteen months, no longer restricted to only a handful of days in the summer leading up to the usual holiday deluge of high-profile releases. The days of “breaking the internet” appeared to be over. Then Microsoft announced that Final Fantasy XIII would be coming out for the Xbox 360 and it was the good ol’ days all over again. Read More... Posted Jul 14 2008, 07:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, nintendo, microsoft, xbox 360, wii, final fantasy, sony, gran turismo, monster hunter, dragon quest, god of war, e3

• The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History, Part 1

  More than any other creative medium, videogames rely on sequels. Unlike serial fiction (television, comics) or film franchising focused on continuing narrative and familiar characters, videogame sequels — at their best, mind you — are not just the next chapter of a story or the return of a popular protagonist. The most successful gameplay designs are perfected through revision. Practice, as they say, makes perfect. And while sequel-as-business-model more often than not leads to stagnation, sometimes pandering to the audience reveals a vein of creativity richer than that found in the source material. Sometimes, a good idea needs to be demolished and rebuilt over its original foundation to become great. This week, 61 Frames Per Second takes a look at gaming's ten most adventurous sequels: direct successors that significantly alter the fundamental design, aesthetically and mechanically, of their predecessors. Some of the entries on this list are great successes, others failures. But they all broke the mold to change our ideas about play. — John Constantine Adventure Island IV Even as an old-school die-hard I've always been pretty indifferent to the Adventure Island series. Sure, it's solid hop-and-bopping, but without much aesthetic or architectural distinction. Does anyone feel passionately about Adventure Island, really? More people might if Adventure Island IV had come out in the States. IV melds the series's standard run-around-whacking-stuff-with-other-stuff mechanics to an ambitious Metroid-esque superstructure, in which newly acquired items must be used to open previously inaccessible sections of a large, continuous map. (The snowboard you pick up in one area gives you passage through a snowy field, and so forth.) This is a familiar tactic today — see recent Castlevania games, for example — but at the time it was unusual, and certainly not where you'd have expected a staid platforming series to go. — Peter Smith Read More... Posted Jun 05 2008, 08:30 PM by Peter Smith with | with no comments Filed under: john constantine, peter smith, metroid, top ten, castlevania, list, akitoshi kawazu, the ten most adventurous sequels in gaming history, hironobu sakaguchi, final fantasy II, dragon quest, adventure island iv, doki doki panic, super mario bros 2, shigeru miyamoto