Greenstone Chronicles

Dragon Quest XI is widely considered to be one of the quintessential fantasy RPG experiences, and has had a big influence on countless titles throughout the last few decades. I, being a bit of an RPG newbie, have had the pleasure of embarking on this adventure and would like to share my experience with you as someone who primarily enjoys platformers. Is Dragon Quest XI worth playing for those who don’t play RPGs?

Right at the start, Dragon Quest XI introduced me to a rush of action that shows the main character’s origin and some context for the setting, kicking off the story nicely with some questions and suspense. I then went through some introductions – learning the main character’s humble and peaceful origins and discovered that he is the reincarnate hero of light.

A token childhood friend cheered on the main character (me) as I went through some movement and combat tutorials. Later, I smacked Big Bird’s ugly cousin with some crispy lightning, courtesy of some special main character powers, then the adventure officially begins! From that point on – without giving away any major spoilers – the mission is to search for answers, rid the world of darkness, and recruit allies to help along the way. I’m disappointed to spoil that the dog does not stay in the party after the tutorial, though I am delighted that he doesn’t die! I’ll take a win where I can find it.

Pretty much everything you’d need to know about the game play is exhibited in the first few hours. You have your objectives to complete, maybe with some extremely light platforming along the way such as jumping on a ledge or walking atop a log or steep cliff, then engage in combat.

The game isn’t a simple rinse and repeat of that formula, more like a healthy remix of those elements throughout the three acts, and surprising me with the occasional tangy twist and heart-warming stories.

Putting my opinion right out there though, the rest of the game is boring if you’re expecting a more ‘edge-of-your-seat’ gaming experience. I know it’s silly to compare Dragon Quest XI (or any RPG for that matter) to games like Celeste or Hollow Knight, it’s not meant to be that kind of game, but I love those games because I enjoy the “lock in” gaming experience they offer. Simply put, I felt like it dragged on with the grinding elements that are commonly found in RPGs.

Dragon Quest XI provided little between the combat and plot driving points in the story. The progression of the game was thus: head over to one objective, catch a morsel of plot, run over to the other side of the map, combat, go back to where it started, then repeat. At one point, I was running laps around one area a few times for the same quest line without anything to break it up, and all I did was pick up dialogue from one point and moved on to the next several times. Twenty hours of gameplay in, the weight of this grueling gameplay landed on my head like a sack of potatoes when I realized that I was still only half-way through act 1.

Which brings me to the biggest rock in my shoe about RPGs: the looooong play time. Now, I grew up playing video games and loved playing as often as I could, which I still do, but I’m a family man at heart now, the time I have outside of normal working hours is valuable to me, which means the game needs to be dang good to pull me away from enjoying spending time my wife and children. I wretch when I see an average play time of 50 hours or more for a casual play through, so unless it’s a highly recommended or anticipated game, I take my wallet elsewhere. Dragon Quest was constantly strumming those dissonant chords of long hours grinding with few enjoyable nuggets within. A lot of walking, a little exploration, and a LOT of combat encounters couldn’t justify the hundred plus hours it took me to play through the first two acts.

Regarding the combat, if you’ve played any Pokémon games, you’d know how it roughly shakes out in most turn-based RPGs. In Pokémon you’d have a large number of playable characters to choose from with each having a small move pool to use at one time, whereas in Dragon Quest you’ll have a smaller number of playable characters each with a larger move pool. That contrast brought a pleasant simplicity to this core mechanic of the game for me.

Each character has their own unique skill tree, effectively outlining what roles each character will play in the campaign (yay, simple for brain). This made it easier for me to determine what moves I should focus on for each character while in battle. So, for those out there who don’t find extreme customization attractive, fear not, I’ve been told that this game provides some relatively straightforward team building.

Throughout the whole game, I only put a lot of my attention in the first several battles and in the boss fights, but for the rest, I switched to the auto-battle feature, which was very nice for when I needed to grind some levels. I don’t know if I’m in any minority here, but the combat wasn’t always something I found enjoyable after a dozen or so encounters. Yes, the monsters were fun to discover, but pretty makeup can’t hide a personality you just don’t get along with.

I might be a hypocrite on this point, however, because I deeply enjoyed the vibe of listening to some music or watching a movie while I EV trained my Pokémon back in the day. That being said, maybe I needed to go about grinding in DQXI from a different angle, but then again, why should I need to depend on external media just to get through a portion of the game? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of playing the game?

That being said, I didn’t do an excessive amount of grinding, which meant I needed to stay on my toes for the big battles, which were actually pretty fun. There were some gimmicks that kept the game fresh, like when I battled a giant golem made of solid gold that had stupid high defenses, forcing me to be clever with my moves instead of simply mashing the attack buttons each turn.

Setting aside my quarrels with Dragon Quest XI, there were plenty of points that made me see why so many people adore this game. For one, the visuals were undeniably gorgeous and a nice little novelty of modern programming. I enjoyed the casual strolls through the overworld picking up tidbits here and there and taking in the digital scenery. Honestly, it helped with some of my other gripes mentioned earlier. I love it when a game provides a lot of nice things to find or look at after demanding a lot of exploration or walking around. Though, I confess, it did lose its savor after a while, but the Zoom ability mitigated that unpleasantness nicely, allowing me to explore whenever and however I pleased. So I’d still call that a win for DQ11 in the visual department.

The crown and jewels of the game for me was definitely the story and characters. For one, the design and animations on the allies are so energetic and unique it was a joy to discover the next member of the team and how they contribute to the main plot. The story itself didn’t do anything groundbreaking – big bad guy of darkness wants to take over the world and rebuild it to his liking – but that didn’t stop me from rooting for the characters at every trial they endured. There were even some twists that had me guessing and hoping for a happy ending. One quest line involving a mermaid literally left me in tears once I reached the end of it, but I shan’t spoil anything, because I think it’s best going in blind.

One of my favorite parts of exploring was finding the unique enemies for each area, which had no shortage of quirkiness and flavor. The slimes were and always will be cute to find, and the bones of the golden vikings in a later quest line are always chilling after figuring out their origins. Everything about the art style of this game was a Mona Lisa out of ten.

Another gem that I found surprisingly enjoyable to break up the grind was the Fun-sized Forge. It’s a mini-game that you can access at any point through the menu where you forge your own weapons and equipment using materials that you’ve gathered in the overworld. The game is played by dexterously distributing hammer strikes across the molten material to get each part as close to perfection as you can – hitting too little or too much will result in a lower quality item. I played it so often that most of the gear I used throughout the game was forged rather than bought, and much of the money I had was a result of selling the surplus I made. This mini-game is so simple and can be overlooked if you stick to buying and collecting all your gear, but I found myself engrossed with this delicate style of game, and it gave me a nice respite whenever I grew weary of the grind.

To conclude my thoughts, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the plot and characters more than how much I disliked the gameplay. The grinding, errand-like feel of the quest lines and intermediate combat may not have been to my taste, but the stories and characters more than made up for it. Plus, there were several much appreciated peripherals that leavened the parts that I didn’t like as much, such as the auto-battling feature, the Zoom ability, and the fun-sized forge.

To those who don’t regularly play RPGs, I would say that the major enjoyment points come from the art, plot, and characters. If those aspects are high on your list of what makes a game great, then this is absolutely a must-play game for your collection.