Dragon Quest IX is full of juxtaposition and contrasts. It’s familiar to veterans of the series yet different. It’s welcoming to casual newcomers, yet never condescending to old hands. It offers an extraordinarily social multiplayer while not at the detriment of the single player mode. It’s a tricky formula to master but it really does work. It’s the everyman of the DS RPG world and worthy of a place in anyone’s collection.
Like almost all RPGs, you really need to play Dragon Quest IX for a few hours before you realise the brilliance. I say this fully in the knowledge that when I first started playing it, I was underwhelmed. The story felt shallow and excessively lightweight, the fact that unlike the previous Dragon Quest game, all the other controllable characters are faceless drones. This wasn’t what I wanted in an RPG at all. I play them for the deep and emotive storylines, with characters that I can become attached to. As time went on however, I realised that this method was to Dragon Quest IX’s advantage.
