Hold onto your hats
By Russ

I’m the world’s laziest RPGer. I haven’t completed a single one, nor, and I’m quite proud of this, have I ever worn the right helmet. This probably explains my lack of success and why, for the first couple of hours, I found playing Dragon Quest: The Journey of the Cursed King not at all unlike being beaten up repeatedly by something that looks like an eye in a Wellington boot. In fact, it was exactly like this.

I’m told, by reading other peoples’ reviews, that this is old school Japanese role playing. I don’t know what that means. Well, I do now. It means "run around knocking easy stuff over repeatedly so you can knock harder stuff over a little easier in the long run" The wise man built his house upon the rock. The wise gamer would do well to build stronger foundations because, and trust me on this, it’s absolutely no fun to walk three hundred miles to be mugged by a fox that looks suspiciously like a Muskehound, especially one that can do a disturbing dance.

"One for all and all for one, helping everybody" Except you. I'm going to kick your arse, hmmmm?

"The world’s prettiest RPG", says someone else in a review that I thought about pasting into this one. It certainly is pretty and very green and you can walk for miles and miles, if you don’t mind your walks being interrupted every three minutes for a minor scuffle. It’s a little bit how I imagine Nottingham. Charming and violent. But with axes instead of guns.

"Back when I were a lad, all this were fields...."

Here’s the good part, because up until now you’re probably wondering how we’ve managed to cock up the score at the bottom of the page. It’s British (plus one mark). It doesn’t pretend to be a movie (plus one mark). It’s a game (plus two marks).

Allow me to elaborate.

The three curses of modern gaming are:

- I don’t know what to do (and actually, isn’t it a bit too dark in here?)

- I can’t remember what to do

- I can’t be bothered to play for an hour while the game teaches me what to

Forget about modern gaming - it’s rubbish. All the best RPGs were 16-bit anyway.

Right from the off Dragon Quest greets you with the ugliest controller help page you’ve ever seen. I gave myself a little hug and did a dance of joy. The neighbours were disturbed. The message is simple. Get on with it and don’t tit about.

Afraid I am, old bean. And you're deuced ugly, too.

Observant readers, and I’m trusting you’ve actually read down this far, will have noticed above that I gave a mark for British-ness. You may have looked at the screenshots or the box-art or noted that the developer is Square Enix and called me an idiot. Well, hear me out. Or rather, hear the game out because somebody, somewhere took the inspired decision to do a proper English translation. Not all wrong American English. English English - with "cor blimeys" and "crikeys" and English humour. And it works really well because the art style is so charming it makes absolute sense that the characterization should be so charmingly English too.

So, charming then. Like an English visit to church on a Sunday morning followed by a cream tea in the afternoon. I’ve even gone out of my way to buy everyone the right hat.

June 2006

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