Dragon Quest I is the Ur-JRPG. It's missing a lot of what makes JRPGs what they are, and it definitely shows that this was a new type of RPG. That said.... oh my God I love this game. It's so simple, yet so fun. I went in expecting a slow, plodding grindfest, and.... that's exactly what I got.

See, you're not really supposed to play Dragon Quest I the way you play your average modern JRPG. The way I see it, you're supposed to play it in short bursts, playing only a little at a time, as well as with a dozen or so sheets of graph paper for mapping dungeons and taking notes. It breaks up the grinding and makes it less tedious. Though strangely enough, I found that I was strangely okay with grinding in this game. Though that has more to do with the combat system than anything.

The combat is nothing special, and it's even a bit simpler than other NES JRPGs. You can basically just clobber enemies until they die in most cases, so there's not much incentive to do much else. Not that that's a bad thing, at least not for me, but it makes grinding a lot easier when you can mindlessly button-mash while doing something else.

All in all, this game is really nice for what it is, and while it may be a bit primitive nowadays, I'd still recommend it to someone if they asked.