There was an honest attempt to make something different. However, player progression and engagement takes a back seat in order to make way for this experimentation. It's an early rogue like. And because it's still a JRPG you lose alot of the feeling of progressing with both your characters and story. As you will have to sit through the same cutscense and level up your heroes from zero over and over again. This one was not for me at all.
Being one of the two games I bought when I first started collecting all those years ago, this game fell into the backlog abyss because of the other title (Persona 3 FES). I've always loved the style and the art direction of this game, though I think for me and a lot of people the D-Counter system scares everyone off.
Once I learned about D-Charging to one shot pretty much everything that's an obstacle, the game became pretty easy. The real fun was when I was treating the SOL system like a rougelike. Slowly building up my Party XP bank, and investing in my Ant Colony to passively make me money to buy those super weapons were fun to grind for. On my first run, I got to the boss right before the final dungeon. On my second run, I got to the third to last boss before maxing out. Understanding the systems in place and how to exploit them is built into the design of Dragon Quarter. You are meant to learn about how to abuse the Dragon Form to get past road blocks. You are supposed to master layouts and trap placements to quickly navigate dungeons. You're supposed to overlevel yourself with your Party XP to blitz through early environments.
My final run I did in one sitting after grinding took about 3.5 hours to do. My equipment was amazing, I had the right skills to kill anything that stood in my way. I had only 7% at the boss that ended my run the first time, allowing me to use my Dragon form to obliterate the final dungeon. It's a feeling that only a game like this can achieve after burying yourself into mastering its systems.
When I talked about this game, I used this head ass term "osmosis of confusion", which a lot of people probably went through in the early hours of this game. Trying to figure out "Do I restart each time, is this a rougelike, what carries over". If there are any tips I can give you while playing this game is: The SOL System is New Game+ as a mechanic, treat it as such. Just like with NG+ with any other game, you get reworked dungeons, loot, enemies, and minibosses that now spawn. New story segments that better explain the narrative are only shown if you interact with this system.
After finishing this game last night, I breathe a sigh of relief. This game truly challenged me to think more than I usually would with a JRPG. The world is beautiful. The art design is at its best during the cutscenes. I didn't expect these characters to be so animated, specifically with their facial expressions. I knew the exact emotions the cast were feeling without the annoying trope of outright explaining it out loud. These characters are quite introspective and that omission of telling the player what to feel, makes this narrative more compelling. Does Ryu come to terms with this being a doomed quest? What other horrors have the council orchestrated? It's all a bit weird, but it pays off at the end with a gorgeous ending.
Yada yada ~battles could be faster, there could be more varied level design~
Though I feel the battle system fits the world of this game. This world is cold. They live underground, with monsters as their main source of food and energy. Everything fits is what I'm trying to say, and the more uncomfortable you are with a certain idea, the more it makes sense once you master that aspect.
Once I learned about D-Charging to one shot pretty much everything that's an obstacle, the game became pretty easy. The real fun was when I was treating the SOL system like a rougelike. Slowly building up my Party XP bank, and investing in my Ant Colony to passively make me money to buy those super weapons were fun to grind for. On my first run, I got to the boss right before the final dungeon. On my second run, I got to the third to last boss before maxing out. Understanding the systems in place and how to exploit them is built into the design of Dragon Quarter. You are meant to learn about how to abuse the Dragon Form to get past road blocks. You are supposed to master layouts and trap placements to quickly navigate dungeons. You're supposed to overlevel yourself with your Party XP to blitz through early environments.
My final run I did in one sitting after grinding took about 3.5 hours to do. My equipment was amazing, I had the right skills to kill anything that stood in my way. I had only 7% at the boss that ended my run the first time, allowing me to use my Dragon form to obliterate the final dungeon. It's a feeling that only a game like this can achieve after burying yourself into mastering its systems.
When I talked about this game, I used this head ass term "osmosis of confusion", which a lot of people probably went through in the early hours of this game. Trying to figure out "Do I restart each time, is this a rougelike, what carries over". If there are any tips I can give you while playing this game is: The SOL System is New Game+ as a mechanic, treat it as such. Just like with NG+ with any other game, you get reworked dungeons, loot, enemies, and minibosses that now spawn. New story segments that better explain the narrative are only shown if you interact with this system.
After finishing this game last night, I breathe a sigh of relief. This game truly challenged me to think more than I usually would with a JRPG. The world is beautiful. The art design is at its best during the cutscenes. I didn't expect these characters to be so animated, specifically with their facial expressions. I knew the exact emotions the cast were feeling without the annoying trope of outright explaining it out loud. These characters are quite introspective and that omission of telling the player what to feel, makes this narrative more compelling. Does Ryu come to terms with this being a doomed quest? What other horrors have the council orchestrated? It's all a bit weird, but it pays off at the end with a gorgeous ending.
Yada yada ~battles could be faster, there could be more varied level design~
Though I feel the battle system fits the world of this game. This world is cold. They live underground, with monsters as their main source of food and energy. Everything fits is what I'm trying to say, and the more uncomfortable you are with a certain idea, the more it makes sense once you master that aspect.