Games I Beat: Dragon Quest VII Fragments of the Forgotten Past

Dragon Quest VII Fragments of the Forgotten Past
JRPG
1 Player
System: 3DS
Developer: ArtePiazza
Year of Release: 2016
Beaten: March 31st, 2017

It genuinely upsets me that it's taken over a month to finally get around to writing this. Dragon Quest is a long running series that I have become a massive fan of over the last several years. The main line series is a very true to it's roots series, mechanically the games are all very similar to one another. And yet they manage to appeal to so many people despite that. That being said, Fragments of the Forgotten Past here is the longest game in the franchise (X, an MMO, not included), is it worth sinking upwards of 80 hours into this game?

That's a little difficult to answer flat out. Dragon Quest VII is a phenomenal experience. I cannot recommend it as an entry point to the series however. Dragon Quest VII, to me, feels like a game for fans of the franchise. It isn't overly reliant on fan service, nor does it devolve into a self-referential mess. Instead it leans heavily on what makes the series so endearing to so many. A solid combat system, a charming look and wonderful little vignettes that push the larger narrative forward.

Gameplay in the Dragon Quest series can be described as formulaic, normally that would be a negative, but there is something about the series where the sum is so much more than the parts. You run around talking to NPCs to learn hints as to what you should be doing, you battle monsters in the field and dungeons which drop experience, gold and items, you use that gold to rest and purchase better equipment. There isn't too much more to it than that. In VII there is a heavy emphasis on the class system, although you won't be unlocking it until around twenty hours in. You can assign each character a different class and they level up separately from your character level, eventually mastering them. Mastering specific classes in combination will unlock advanced, and eventually even master classes which are far more powerful. Allegedly there are level limits in areas that make it so you can't over-grind in an area, but I never ran into any sort of limit. Like the rest of the game, the class system is simple, yet still manages to be very engaging.

The biggest draw is the world, characters and story. Dragon Quest VII has one of my favorite set ups in the entire series, if you want to avoid all spoilers skip to the next paragraph. You play as a fisherman's son on this island, the only island in the world. The prince of the nearby kingdom is one of your few friends and together you quickly uncover the truth, there should be islands in the world. Eventually you start collecting shards, which let you travel back in time to around the end of each of these islands. One by one you experience multiple end of days scenarios and manage to save these lands in past, making them appear in the future. One point of confusion for me was not ever being sure if people suddenly remembered these islands, or always knew of them, or what was going on there. Either way, it comes to light that the demon king Orgodemir is behind all of this after going toe to toe with God himself, leaving both forces very weakened.

There are so many islands, and thus stories, to play through. Admittedly some are weaker than others, but none were outright bad. Some scenarios require a bit of running back and forth which can get annoying, but nothing that truly detracts from the overall experience. I won't talk about any of the specific stories you'll encounter, but some of them truly pulled me in and lead to real happiness, sorrow, relief and worry multiple times throughout.

I feel like there's more I should say, but that might be because I just want to gush about the different plots I really loved, and the ones that left me wanting. Without that, what's left is yet another highly enjoyable Dragon Quest game. If you love JRPG styled games and you haven't played a Dragon Quest you really owe it to yourself to dive in. While I don't necessarily think VII is a great starting point, after getting into the series proper it's well worth a full play through. Besides, the 3DS version actually improves on the original PS1 version in almost every conceivable way, oh, yeah, this is a Playstation remake.

Oh, and here's some recommended starting points: Dragon Quest 1 (GBC/SNES/Mobile) is actually still a really solid game, but the most archaic. 4 (NES/DS) focuses more on the plot side of things. 8 (PS2/3DS) is beautiful, and overall a wonderful experience.