Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen (Nintendo DS)


Story:
Dragon Quest IV is a game about several heroes who all end up banding together to defeat an evil. At the beginning of the game, the player is prompted to chose a gender and name, which will represent the "main" hero of the story. But shortly after being introduced to the main character, the player is then taken through different chapters following different characters, before they eventually return to the hero and band together the other "Chosen" characters that they saw previously. Each character has their own motivations, such as wanting to avenge someone or even just trying to grow their business. They eventually unite under a common goal.



Gameplay:
As I mentioned, DQIV is separated in to chapters. The first chapters follow different characters, who will all start out at low levels and need to be built up. The battles are random and take place in a similar fashion to other DQ games I have played. The battles are in first person, and at the beginning of the turns, the player will choose commands for the character to do, such as "Heal" or "Attack" or "Item". Characters have different roles they fulfill in battle, with some being adept at healing magic, or attack magic, or just good physical fighters, or a combination of all of those.



Time does pass in game as you wonder around the world map and some dialogue or story or other things will be dependent on if it's day time or night time. It should also be noted that this is an older RPG and as such there aren't many scenes and it's not always clear what the goal is or how to achieve it without talking and exploring on your own. This can be a good thing for those who don't like "hand-holding", or a bad thing for those more accustomed to a lot of newer RPG' where goals and solutions are made much more clear. The game is also on the more difficult side (for me) because it isn't the most generous with funds and requires a good bit of grinding.



World:
The world is pretty big and fun to explore. You'll go around the world map and enter town, talk to people, explore buildings. The camera can be rotated to find hidden entrances, chests, or people. There are some diverse locations, as well as some locations that are very similar. There are towns as well as dungeons, where enemies can be encountered. Some parts of the world will be blocked off until a certain event has been completed.



Characters:
In order of favourite to least favourite:
Taloon: A weapon's merchant who works hard to open his own store one day.
Meena: The more grounded and younger sister of Maya, she is a fortune teller. Her father died under mysterious circumstances.
Alena: A tomboy princess who wants to travel the world and often causes trouble for her father.
Ragnar: An honourable Knight who is going to explore the case of the missing children.
Hero/Main Character: An avatar for the player. MC grew up in a small, sheltered town until they were thrust in to an adventure.
Maya: A dancer and older sister of Meena. She's flirty and more careless. Her father died under mysterious circumstances.
Kiryl: A priest that travels with Alena and has feelings for her.
Borya: A magician and tutor to Alena. He promised her late mother he would take care of her.

Overall:
This game has the typical Dragon Quest humour, which I quite liked. The story being told through several people was also interesting, and I really liked Taloon, Meena, and Alena. However, while I didn't dislike any characters, some of them were rather forgettable. I'm also a person who prefers more scenes and dialogue explaining where I need to go and I often got lost in this game. It's also on the more difficult side. But the gameplay is fun enough and the world was good and there were no bad characters. It did kind of lack a certain charm to it that I really loved in DQV though and was largely on the forgettable side, unfortunately.

Verdict:
IT WAS OKAY