My mind has been consumed with thoughts of finishing my solo challenge on Dragon Warrior III, but there's not much more to say on the topic. But there's plenty more to say about Dragon Quest III in general, so I thought I might take a diversion.
Before my lear-long hiatus, I gave a list of projects I was excited to start. One of those was attempting a run of the game without using magic. Another was trying out the various remake versions of Dragon Quest III. I ended up doing all of those side by side, similar to how I played the remakes of Dragon Quest II while doing one of my challenges. In fact, I played so much Dragon Quest III that I burned myself out on Dragon Quest for a bit, just recently recovering from it somewhat.
It turns out, there's not that much to say about a no-magic "challenge" on Dragon Warrior III. To prepare for the challenge, based on what I'd read online and my own experience leveling each of the different character classes, I decided the best party for the quest was a Hero with three Fighters.
Well, it turns out, this party actually decreases the overall difficulty of the game over the party I'm used to using. There were a few parts where not using the Hero's magic presented some extra difficulty, but I'm not sure it was enough to offset how easily I plowed through everything else with this party. This game actually is easier if you use Fighters over magic-using classes. Most of the game's non-healing spells are just not necessary with the raw power and speed you get from this party. Even healing spells are less necessary, as most of the enemies drop before they significantly damage you. Most dungeons I did not use all of the herbs I brought.
The only real issues I had were: longer dungeons, since I wasn't using Outside to escape (this mostly wasn't a difficulty issue; just a tedium issue); a longer run through the Navel of the Earth (partly because I still insisted on killing the Mimics without dying and going down every corridor); and several runs to make it through the Necrogond cave (again insisting on "exploring" every corridor rather than going straight through, this was one of the only dungeons where I typically used all of the herbs I brought, and still found it not enough). None of the bosses presented any difficulty whatsoever. I might have had one of my characters die on Baramos or one of the Orochi fights (I can't quite remember), but it didn't stop me from beating them within a few rounds regardless.
Playing the remakes was pretty interesting. The Super Famicom remake, and its derivatives for Game Boy Color and Smartphones, are more extensively overhauled than the previous two games in some respects. Although the actual game mechanics seem more similar, the equipment lists have been completely changed. All of the original equipment is still there, but it is not always available at the same places in the game, with certain items being delayed to later shops, while many new pieces of equipment were added in. Additionally, like in the previous two games, many items that were only available as rare item drops in the original have been added to treasure chests or are otherwise obtainable. They added quite a bit of new content as well, with a mini-medal NPC and corresponding medals hidden throughout the world and prizes to trade them for, a board game minigame with many prizes to collect (this is absent in the Smartphone version, with its prizes relocated to the mini-medal NPC or sometimes to new treasure chests), and a new dungeon with a dragon-god super-boss at the end, available only after completing the game once. There's a new Thief job that adds a bit to the overall party mix, with abilities from Dragon Quest VI's thief job that help locate treasure (useful for finding the new mini-medals). The Merchant and Goof-Off have some new abilities added to them. The Game Boy Color version also adds monster medals associated with each monster in the game for the player to collect, and supposedly another dungeon associated with that (though I did not get far enough to unlock that).
It was a lot of fun to dive into all of that and digest it. I can see why the Game Boy Color version of this game was so popular, being the only version available in the U.S. until recently. It really seems overall to add to, and not detract from, the original experience, which was one of the best RPG's of its era.
Unfortunately, since I didn't keep up on my blog, most of what I might have noticed comparing and contrasting the translations has been forgotten. I don't know that there was too much notable. One thing I remember that was significant was that the smartphone version completely redid the village of Soo. The village name was always meant to reference the Sioux Native American Indians, and in the Super Famicom version (I think the Game Boy as well) the character sprites of the villagers were actually drawn to resemble Native Americans. I imagine the more recent Smartphone translation redid them to stay in the politically correct realm and avoid any potentially offensive caricatures. They are now modeled after the Puritan settlers and the village is renamed "Persistence."
I was a little surprised to see that the newer versions named the optional post-final boss Xenlon (whose name is Shin-Ryu in romanji), mostly because I'd already encountered this name in Dragon Quest IX. I hadn't realized it was a reference to this game.
I was more than a little disappointed that I didn't get to finish my Game Boy Color game. Something happened that caused my cartridge to start glitching out. The game file seems to be intact, but the graphics won't display correctly and the game freezes when you select the game file (but once and only once I got it to load normally). I don't know if I'll be able to get it repaired without losing my game file, or even repaired at all.
I never beat Shin-Ryu/Xenlon, but from time to time I've been plugging away at the version on my phone to move closer to that goal. At some point I'll revisit the game on Super Famicom, too, but I'm focused to heavy on my NES game challenge to consider that strongly now.
After I beat my solo challenge I hope to finally start my Minimalist Challenge, which I am currently quite excited for.
No comments:
Post a Comment