Long-running franchises having a lackluster 2nd game that is still considered the "black sheep", name a more iconic duo.
At first, I was thinking this'd be a bit better than DQ1, but as I kept playing, I realized that DQ2 really does kinda suck. The entire design philosophy was very clearly "let's just make Dragon Quest but bigger!".
The original game was nothing but a grindfest but it was over in about 5 hours (at least in these modern ports) - DQ2, with very liberal use of a guide, took me about 10 hours. And speaking of guides, this game requires one, it's nearly unplayable without it.
DQ1, if you talked to every NPC, was a very straightforward adventure that always gave you a direction (with one or two exceptions). DQ2 starts out that way, but as soon as you get the boat you are thrown into a massive overworld with zero direction to speak of - I think the devs expected players to just explore every portion of the map which I guess made sense in that particular time frame? NPCs give you only hints about where to find the plot MacGuffins, many of which are just... lying on the ground in an arbitrary piece of the land.
Even the dungeons are "the same, but bigger", they are absolute mazes, with very high encounter ratios. After a while, I got tired of getting into a lot of dead ends, and resorted to guides for the dungeons as well.
Even as a piece of history this game is not interesting. "oh it introduced parties", then you realize that: 1, this game's party is merely the DQ1's Hero split into three characters and 2, Final Fantasy came out the very same year, and featured a 4-character party, where each could be one of six different classes.
And narratively, Phantasy Star also came out in 1987, and was arguably the very first JRPG to take a step forward in the stoytelling. So Dragon Quest II is nothing but a side step or, at most, half step forward - just a footnote in JRPG history, especially since Dragon Quest III came out a mere year later.
I only finished this because I played it on my phone during any downtimes I had. Credit where credit is due, I never actively stopped to grind in this game, I just went with the flow and that made me strong enough to defeat the final boss - a rather intense battle. I was several levels below what the guide I followed recommended me, so it is perfectly doable to just not grind in this game.
But yikes. If it was 5 hours like the first game, I'd probably have enjoyed it more.
If you are curious about DQ2 though, don't even consider playing any other version other than the mobile/Switch port
In this version, Zoom just gives you a list of every town you ever visited so you can teleport there
In every other version, Zoom merely teleports you to the last town you saved at. That sounds like a fucking nightmare.
At first, I was thinking this'd be a bit better than DQ1, but as I kept playing, I realized that DQ2 really does kinda suck. The entire design philosophy was very clearly "let's just make Dragon Quest but bigger!".
The original game was nothing but a grindfest but it was over in about 5 hours (at least in these modern ports) - DQ2, with very liberal use of a guide, took me about 10 hours. And speaking of guides, this game requires one, it's nearly unplayable without it.
DQ1, if you talked to every NPC, was a very straightforward adventure that always gave you a direction (with one or two exceptions). DQ2 starts out that way, but as soon as you get the boat you are thrown into a massive overworld with zero direction to speak of - I think the devs expected players to just explore every portion of the map which I guess made sense in that particular time frame? NPCs give you only hints about where to find the plot MacGuffins, many of which are just... lying on the ground in an arbitrary piece of the land.
Even the dungeons are "the same, but bigger", they are absolute mazes, with very high encounter ratios. After a while, I got tired of getting into a lot of dead ends, and resorted to guides for the dungeons as well.
Even as a piece of history this game is not interesting. "oh it introduced parties", then you realize that: 1, this game's party is merely the DQ1's Hero split into three characters and 2, Final Fantasy came out the very same year, and featured a 4-character party, where each could be one of six different classes.
And narratively, Phantasy Star also came out in 1987, and was arguably the very first JRPG to take a step forward in the stoytelling. So Dragon Quest II is nothing but a side step or, at most, half step forward - just a footnote in JRPG history, especially since Dragon Quest III came out a mere year later.
I only finished this because I played it on my phone during any downtimes I had. Credit where credit is due, I never actively stopped to grind in this game, I just went with the flow and that made me strong enough to defeat the final boss - a rather intense battle. I was several levels below what the guide I followed recommended me, so it is perfectly doable to just not grind in this game.
But yikes. If it was 5 hours like the first game, I'd probably have enjoyed it more.
If you are curious about DQ2 though, don't even consider playing any other version other than the mobile/Switch port
In this version, Zoom just gives you a list of every town you ever visited so you can teleport there
In every other version, Zoom merely teleports you to the last town you saved at. That sounds like a fucking nightmare.