My old school favorite, not counting Pokémon, is Monster Rancher. I always liked how raising the monsters worked in those games and battling was its own thing that you did to show off the fruits of your training.
A modern game that I loved was Monster Sanctuary. The battle mechanics are very satisfying. The battles are 3v3 and move quickly. The mechanics make for multiple viable strategies. Every monster has 2-4 skill trees and 3 forms, meaning there is a very high level of customization too. On top of that, it’s a metroidvania, so you have a map to explore and areas you can’t access until you find a monster with the map action to get you through
Seconding Final Fantasy X and Trails. Turn-based systems that remove the concept of turn cycles governed by rounds are great. These systems allow for speed stats to actually mean something and make things feel dynamic even though there are pauses every turn. It’s so much more interesting to give a ninja-like character multiple turns instead of multiple attacks to present the illusion of speed. The Atelier games have a similar system too (although I’ve heard Ryza went to something like ATB now).
If we’re including ATB and ATB-like systems, Final Fantasy X-2 and Panzer Dragoon Saga are my overall favorites.
You can look up lists for the definitive classics. I’ll throw in one of my personal favorites, Wild Arms. I still whistle the opening theme every so often.
Absolutely loved DQ9. Never finished it, but I played the hell out of it as a kid. Revisited it recently and it still holds up pretty great. Kept me playing more than 11 did, which is the only other one I’ve really played. 11 is awesome, but I just don’t vibe with it as much as 9.
Never played any in the original consoles but tried one of them on an emulator at some point (don’t remember which game anymore) and found it very uninspired and grindy
I mostly follow Dragon Quest out of interest in its greater place in the genre at this point. After playing through DQ8 a few years back, I decided the series is not for me at this point.
I do have a long history with Dragon Quest, with the original game being my first JRPG back in 1989. I played DQ2 a few years later and didn’t care much for it (the Cave to Rhone has a well-deserved reputation). I didn’t touch the series again until much later with the PSX version of DQ7, which I still regret putting 110 hours into. I suppose I can thank that game for breaking me of the habit of having to finishing long games I stop liking halfway through.
I still ended up going back and playing through the DS versions of DQ4 through DQ6, and the mobile version of DQ3 more recently. Dragon Quest has had a knack for getting me into dungeon-crawling flow states with the explore-battle-victory-explore rhythm, and it generally wasn’t tough for me to get started and rolling in the games. Unfortunately, they burn me out quick: almost all of them ended up overstaying their welcome by about ten hours or so. I almost didn’t finish DQ4 because of how difficult the boss was.
I do have very nice things to say about DQ5, though. The story in that one still feels well above Horii’s other works in the series (at least the ones I’ve played), and the time progression is something I’d like to see more of in the genre. That one–and the original, years back–are the ones in the series I wanted more of when the credits rolled.
I loved 1-3 as a kid but finished none of them, then dropped the series until 11 and it’s def my favorite now. Great story, characters and having a jump makes it feel so much more free
I've only played a few of the older titles. I was introduced to the series with DQ8 on the PS2 and really liked it. I played DQ9 a few times and enjoyed it. I played both the DQMJ games on the NDS and had a lot of fun with them. Honestly I had the most fun with the DQMJ games.
Not a fan, the artwork is great, can’t say much about the story as I don’t think I’ve ever made it more than 10 hours into one of the games…
The music really throws me off, it doesn’t fit the setting or the going-ons at all. There will be this big dramatic scene, lots of tension, and fucking upbeat circus music plays.
I loved playing Dragon Quest 4 oh about 20 years ago. I thought the chapter system was really well done. You got to focus on the story of many different characters. When they finally all get together into one party, it just felt amazing.
Always wanted to get into the series more, but just never really came up. I recently went though DQ1 throught 3 on my phone and really enjoyed them although the ending of 3 was getting to be quite the slog and I needed to look up help on where to go quite a bit.
I would love a recommendation on what to try next to get back into the series.
I just finished DQ9 on my DS. Overall I’d say it’s pretty bad. I really can’t think of any redeeming qualities of the game. Just a long list of complaints. I played many of the earlier games and liked them all much more.
Yay, we’ll be one game behind for almost three whole months! 🙄
How long Daybreak 2 and Kai will take for us in the West is fully up to NISA at this point. They’ve seemed to be more interested in their own greater release schedule than catching up on the series. I figure we’ll probably get Daybreak 2 in late 2025.
The Switch ports of Reverie and Daybreak 1 took at least a year, so I’m guessing this is going to end up on the next-gen Nintendo console (especially considering the Switch ports haven’t been great).
One game behind is probably the best state we ever had? I thought it get better with Ys IX, which only was a few months after the jp release. But Ys X doesn’t has a release date so far. We probably get one Trails game per year at current pace
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