Dragon Quest XI S (PS4) has finally wrapped up after 120 hours, although there's plenty of side content left unfinished. To me, DQ XI feels like a comforting retreat for those seeking a straightforward adventure to save the world after a long day at the office, without the need for complex storylines or frustrating gameplay mechanics. It's pure escapism into high fantasy that feels refreshingly charming and heartwarming, with a well-paced gameplay and story progression that you can feel even if you only have 2-3 hours to spare each day.

I highly recommend playing the Definitive Edition for the enhanced quality of life features. The improvements are substantial, from the orchestrated soundtrack to the ability to fast forward through battles and craft anywhere, significantly enhancing the game's pacing. The story and character arcs also feel more fleshed out and complete, with elements that would feel sorely lacking if absent. Unlike some other re-releases like Ni No Kuni, Persona 4 Golden, and Persona 5 Royal where additional content can feel shoehorned in, DQ XI's additions seem more like cut content that should have been there from the start, making it truly deserving of its "definitive" title.

However, I do have several criticisms, particularly regarding Act 3. While it offers insights and interesting moments, it often undermines the dramatic writing and character arcs established in Act 2 for the sake of a premature and overly tidy closure. There's also a noticeable amount of reused areas with minimal cosmetic changes for post-content, and the spread of recipes right before the endgame forces players into a last-minute scavenger hunt for ingredients. Additionally, the forced grinding towards the end feels rather unnatural and disrupts the flow of the narrative.
One other disappointment is the lack of vocal OSTs during scenes where characters are shown singing. It's a missed opportunity considering how memorable such moments can be in games like Grandia 2 and Ar Tonelico.

Overall, DQ XI is a JRPG that "overstays its welcome" in some aspects, but it's also undeniably complete and packed with content that justifies its full price. My score: 4/5.

It's really tough coming off of a marathon of RPGs right into this, having just played Persona 5 and Final Fantasy X. Both have incredibly intricate stories and characters, plus a couple neat quirks to keep the turn-based combat fresh. Dragon Quest has very little of this. The Pep Powers learned by each character feel like slightly upgraded Limit Breaks that somehow feel more random and less powerful. There's just not enough consequence for choosing to fight one way or the other. I love the different weapon classes you can choose from, but I don't love that all of them kind of feel the same to use and upgrade. I acknowledge that some of this was due to the game being incredibly easy. Easy games don’t usually demand much variety in approaching combat situations if one or two spells or techniques do the trick for every fight, and the same can be said here. I think replaying the game on “Draconian Quest” mode next time would greatly enhance this aspect.

The story evokes a Saturday morning cartoon with its villain-or-new-town-of-the-week structure that eventually builds up to reveal an overarching evil force at play. It's definitely charming, and I love that this colorful world is juxtaposed with splashes of really, really dark and sad moments to create a pretty compelling contrast. At the same time, when Rab or Erik show an inkling of growth or an opportunity for us to get to know them better, I always felt like the game shied away from it before we got in too deep.

Every ounce of me wants to adore this game. I love the art style, I love the traditional RPG tropes that it capitalizes on and doesn't apologize for, I love the voice acting, and I even love some of the characters too. But for me, the aesthetics do so much heavy lifting for an overall experience that's otherwise just "OK".

2024 EDIT: All things considered, in 2022 I was stranded with my partner in Kingman, AZ for 3 days with not much else to do aside from staying in at the Motel 6 and playing this game on my Switch. For all its flaws, Dragon Quest XI will always hold a special place in my heart for this.

I have had over 5 playthroughs of this game between my first playthrough on 3DS and all the other versions, I never actually got around to playing the Definitive Edition till recently and man, They weren't lying when they said this was a "Definitive Edition" except for ONE thing I'll get to later.

Battle Speed selector is great, Fun-Size forge being used anywhere(Also being able to get buyable items even if you don't have them on hand), I played with JP voices and thought they were great, I actually used a mod for more variety in the music which if you're on PC I highly recommend that but if not the music is fine.

As for that one thing I have an issue with is The World of Tickington and really it's just a small nitpick, in the DS version of the game when you went there if you for example enter Dragon Quest IV world, the cast would look like DQ IV sprites and so on, was such a cool little feature that I'm sad is gone from the definitive edition, also I'm sad the monsters in Tickington weren't animated like the DS remake Dragon Quest games but outside of that it's really cool to see this brought back for console!

Onto the meat, I feel like this cast truly is an all-star cast, No one is really wasted and everyone contributes something. It's REALLY REALLY hard for me to choose a favorite character in this game it's just such a well balanced cast. Probably my favorite in any video game. I also like the small things they do with the Hero in cutscenes to kinda give him some flavor.

There is so much I want to say about this game but it really is a near perfect game and it's flaws don't really bug me that much, I have an even bigger appreciation for this entry after playing through every single mainline DQ(Including DQ X) It really does reward those who have played every entry.

Here is to hoping that in the future we get older DQ games preserved and on modern hardware so more people can experience this legendary series.