The follow-up to the classic PS2 game Dragon Quest VIII is another fine level-grinder, with cheerful, colourful graphics and mesmerising gameplay. Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies was developed by Level-5 and published by Square Enix on the Nintendo DS in 2009.
Getting straight down to it: Dragon Quest IX (nine) is similar to the previous game in the series, but with a few fundamental changes…
Published by Square Enix in 2007, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII is a Sony PSP exclusive that pays tribute to the classic Final Fantasy VII, but with a different style of combat. It was released for the 10th anniversary of FF7.
Final Fantasy VI Advance was released in Japan in 2006, and 2007 in English language territories. It’s a remake of the Super Nintendo original, developed by a Japanese company called Tose.
Final Fantasy V Advance is the third Tose-developed remake for the Game Boy Advance and was first released in 2006.
Again: it uses the same refined interface and beautifully-drawn and coloured graphics of the previous two Tose remakes and somehow manages to make the Super Nintendo original look a little drab in the process.
In the mid Noughties Japanese developer Tose undertook the task of converting and updating the early Final Fantasy games to the Nintendo Game Boy Advance for Square Enix (as they were known then).
Looking a little primitive compared to the 2005 remake for the Game Boy Advance, this original, 1991 Super Nintendo adventure nevertheless is a pioneering game. It was the first Final Fantasy game released for the Super Nintendo (the previous three all being Famicom releases), and the first to use the “Active Time Battle” system.
Dawn of Souls is a GBA remake of the first two NES Final Fantasy games, and they take advantage of the Game Boy Advance‘s enhanced capabilities (enhanced over the NES, anyway).
Continue reading Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls, Game Boy Advance
Sony‘s PlayStation 2 has had its fair share of decent RPGs, but Grandia III – first released in 2005 by Game Arts and Square Enix – is one that sticks in my mind clearly.
Okay, so I couldn’t just leave it at that with regard to Dragon Quest VIII, so here’s another set of screenshots showing later in the game. In particular: the Dragovian Trials – an unlockable quest in which you take on a series of ever more powerful dragons, for unique rewards at the end of the game.
There is no doubting that this 2004 release from Square Enix is the best JRPG on the PlayStation 2. At least, in my mind.
Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King is a colourful and detailed re-imagining of the Dragon Quest franchise, with Cel-Shaded graphics and tons of monsters – many of them familiar – to fight it out with in turn-based combat.
The King of Grabs 