(I really like this game, and only shelved it because God Hand has taken over my life.)
Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter is most well-regarded for its unique loop that preceded similar designs in Dead Rising and FromSoftware's Souls games. At any moment during Dragon Quarter, you can reset to your last save point (using the Give Up option in the menu, then selecting SOL-Restore), which are typically placed at the beginning of dungeon sections and before bosses, or to the very beginning of the game (using the SOL-Restart), while maintaining your equipped weapons and armor, all of your skills, your money, and any items you place in a storage locker.
Most importantly, your characters "D-Counter" gets reset to whatever it was before your last save. The "D-Counter" is a percentage on your HUD that is constantly on-screen, which raises slowly as you move, but balloons in huge chunks when you activate the "D-Dive," which transforms your main character Ryu into an extremely strong and invincible dragon form. What this means is you can save at the start of the dungeon, use the D-Dive form to very easily stomp your way through the dungeon, collecting all the new skills and equipment, then use the SOL-Restore option to go back to the start of the dungeon with all those new skills and weapons but with your D-Counter reset to what it was when you saved earlier. Besides the new abilities you gained from completely clearing the dungeon, you also learn how to get around—the route to go directly to the end of the dungeon, and what enemies are absolutely required to get there. Dragon Quarter's encounters can be very difficult and item draining—enemies hit hard—so this knowledge is as important as the power ups you've found. I've played through all From's Souls games, and found this loop really familiar.
After you do the SOL-Restore, you can use the new power-ups you collected to fight your way directly to the end of the dungeon. For the initial D-Dive dungeon or boss runs, I would also set each of my characters shield skill to use the "steal" skill, which collects items, equipment, money, and, most importantly, skills, from the enemies that attack them; then on the regular run, I'd switch the shield skill to the "counter" skill or higher defense, and use the new skills to strengthen my characters. Since you can usually save right before bosses, you have as many chances as you want to steal unique items or skills they might be carrying. You can use one of your characters to profile enemies and see what items they might have; this list is updated as items are taken from them. As well, you will also find single use items that raise characters stats—physical attack strength, magic strength, and health points—and these changes carry over after SOL-Restoring.
Items and unequipped equipment that are in your inventory disappear during SOL-Restore, but in some levels you can find an Item or Weapon Locker vendor and place them there to save them. Your inventory gets reset to 5 Heal Kits, 1 Tonic, and a Save Token, and in fact you could conceivably farm these by SOL-Restoring or SOL-Restarting, placing your refreshed inventory in an item locker, then SOL-Restoring or SOL-Restarting again. If you find any "backpacks", which add more inventory slots, since the last save, these are also removed when resetting.
Dragon Quarter doesn't ever force you to SOL-Restore or SOL-Reset. You can scrape by going from encounter to encounter without ever resetting, but playing this way is miserable. I know, because I played this way for about five hours. A few hours in, I never had enough money to buy enough health items to offset the level of damage my characters were taking; as well, the damage I was doing to enemies was in the low 10s, making fights a totally unfun slog. I eventually hit a wall during an encounter with a bunch of humanoid enemies that overwhelmed me. I wasn't doing much damage, I didn't have enough health restoration items, and I didn't have any money to get more. I bit the bullet and used the SOL-Restore option to go back to the start of the game. I didn't exactly fly through the game to get back to where I was, but it was significantly easier to get there.
The game is really balanced towards using the SOL-Restore method, and when going through a section again after using it, you are also shown a new cutscenes, denoted by the SOL icon beside the Skip Scene icon in the corner. These tend to show different characters perspective, filling you in on what the supporting cast knows.
I had a good time with Dragon Quarter, and I might pick it up again sometime. I like the characters and the dreary, depressing tone; the game wears its Evangelion influence on its sleeve. However, the downside to its fascinating loop is that you have double the JRPG to playthrough, and I just don't have time in my life right now to feel comfortable spending that time on a single game that I don't completely love. However, it is absolutely worth checking out, and it's easy to see why this game clicks with people so much harder than it did for me.
Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter is most well-regarded for its unique loop that preceded similar designs in Dead Rising and FromSoftware's Souls games. At any moment during Dragon Quarter, you can reset to your last save point (using the Give Up option in the menu, then selecting SOL-Restore), which are typically placed at the beginning of dungeon sections and before bosses, or to the very beginning of the game (using the SOL-Restart), while maintaining your equipped weapons and armor, all of your skills, your money, and any items you place in a storage locker.
Most importantly, your characters "D-Counter" gets reset to whatever it was before your last save. The "D-Counter" is a percentage on your HUD that is constantly on-screen, which raises slowly as you move, but balloons in huge chunks when you activate the "D-Dive," which transforms your main character Ryu into an extremely strong and invincible dragon form. What this means is you can save at the start of the dungeon, use the D-Dive form to very easily stomp your way through the dungeon, collecting all the new skills and equipment, then use the SOL-Restore option to go back to the start of the dungeon with all those new skills and weapons but with your D-Counter reset to what it was when you saved earlier. Besides the new abilities you gained from completely clearing the dungeon, you also learn how to get around—the route to go directly to the end of the dungeon, and what enemies are absolutely required to get there. Dragon Quarter's encounters can be very difficult and item draining—enemies hit hard—so this knowledge is as important as the power ups you've found. I've played through all From's Souls games, and found this loop really familiar.
After you do the SOL-Restore, you can use the new power-ups you collected to fight your way directly to the end of the dungeon. For the initial D-Dive dungeon or boss runs, I would also set each of my characters shield skill to use the "steal" skill, which collects items, equipment, money, and, most importantly, skills, from the enemies that attack them; then on the regular run, I'd switch the shield skill to the "counter" skill or higher defense, and use the new skills to strengthen my characters. Since you can usually save right before bosses, you have as many chances as you want to steal unique items or skills they might be carrying. You can use one of your characters to profile enemies and see what items they might have; this list is updated as items are taken from them. As well, you will also find single use items that raise characters stats—physical attack strength, magic strength, and health points—and these changes carry over after SOL-Restoring.
Items and unequipped equipment that are in your inventory disappear during SOL-Restore, but in some levels you can find an Item or Weapon Locker vendor and place them there to save them. Your inventory gets reset to 5 Heal Kits, 1 Tonic, and a Save Token, and in fact you could conceivably farm these by SOL-Restoring or SOL-Restarting, placing your refreshed inventory in an item locker, then SOL-Restoring or SOL-Restarting again. If you find any "backpacks", which add more inventory slots, since the last save, these are also removed when resetting.
Dragon Quarter doesn't ever force you to SOL-Restore or SOL-Reset. You can scrape by going from encounter to encounter without ever resetting, but playing this way is miserable. I know, because I played this way for about five hours. A few hours in, I never had enough money to buy enough health items to offset the level of damage my characters were taking; as well, the damage I was doing to enemies was in the low 10s, making fights a totally unfun slog. I eventually hit a wall during an encounter with a bunch of humanoid enemies that overwhelmed me. I wasn't doing much damage, I didn't have enough health restoration items, and I didn't have any money to get more. I bit the bullet and used the SOL-Restore option to go back to the start of the game. I didn't exactly fly through the game to get back to where I was, but it was significantly easier to get there.
The game is really balanced towards using the SOL-Restore method, and when going through a section again after using it, you are also shown a new cutscenes, denoted by the SOL icon beside the Skip Scene icon in the corner. These tend to show different characters perspective, filling you in on what the supporting cast knows.
I had a good time with Dragon Quarter, and I might pick it up again sometime. I like the characters and the dreary, depressing tone; the game wears its Evangelion influence on its sleeve. However, the downside to its fascinating loop is that you have double the JRPG to playthrough, and I just don't have time in my life right now to feel comfortable spending that time on a single game that I don't completely love. However, it is absolutely worth checking out, and it's easy to see why this game clicks with people so much harder than it did for me.