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Dragon Quest IV footage not making the wait any easier
While Japan goes absolutely nuts for Dragon Quest IV, these videos landed on the 'net over the weekend, giving us our longest look yet at some of the meaty gameplay currently being enjoyed by over 600,000 Japanese gamers.Truth be told, we're still not totally sold on the slightly jarring combination of 2D heroes and 3D environments, especially as the cheaper-than-ever Final Fantasy III and forthcoming Final Fantasy IV are both depicted in full 3D. On the other hand, we'll happily concede the environments do look rather spiffy. We reeeally need that western release date though, Square Enix.Embark on a quest past the break for the second trailer.
Dragon Quest IV boosts DS sales in Japan
Let's be honest, DS sales didn't really need a boost in Japan, but it seems that the handheld got one anyway with the release of Dragon Quest IV. DS hardware sales went up by over 55% for the week of 11/19 to 11/25, jumping from 76,069 units sold to 116,694. Hardware for all other platforms went up, too (perhaps in response to the upcoming holidays), but none rose as significantly as the DS.The sales for the week ending 11/25 are as follows: Nintendo DS: 116,694 PlayStation Portable: 75,027 Nintendo Wii: 54,362 PlayStation 3: 50,564 PlayStation 2: 14,875 Xbox 360: 7117
Dragon Quest IV rocks sales, magazines at debut
Dragon Quest IV for the DS hit stores yesterday in Japan, and since that nation seems to still exist, apparently there was a large enough supply to at least stave off Armageddon. Per Jeux-France, gamers in Japan snapped up a rumored 360,000 copies in the first day, so we can only assume that there is a whole lot of questing going on today. But what's a release without a few last minute pages in Famitsu? The magazine laid out a sweet new spread to welcome the title, and you can see it for yourself after the break.
City planning in Dragon Quest IV
The DS remake of Dragon Quest IV introduces some content new to the game: the Immigrant Town, seen in some form in both Dragon Quests III and VII. In this mode, people you meet during the game can be recruited from other towns to come live in yours. Their professions shape the services available in your town.Of course, the DS version takes this idea a little further, adding the ability to use the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection to send people to other players' towns bearing messages. You can customize your emissary's appearance and message, and even assign him or her a skill. If you're less practical-minded, we suppose you could send a legion of creepy children over to your friend and enjoy a little laugh as his party wanders, unsuspecting, into the Village of the Damned.
Dragon Quest IV poised to cause riots, hair-pulling
Uh oh -- a Japanese retailer posted this sign, warning Dragon Quest devotees that supplies of Dragon Quest IV for the DS may be limited. The game, which goes on sale November 22, is likely to be somewhat popular in Japan, and retailer Tsutaya is encouraging people to pre-order as soon as possible, because there's not likely to be enough copies to go around. This could become serious business; after all, no one wants to see cosplayers fighting it out in the streets. In the meantime, maybe we should start a betting pool on sales predictions ....
RPG magazine scan time: DQIV, Card Hero, Soma Bringer
It's time again to reap the bounty from, uh, some dude with a scanner and access to Japanese magazines! Three games are shown off in today's crop (to continue the farming metaphor for some reason), all RPGs of various kinds.Most interesting (to us) is the first real blowout of images from Intelligent Systems' Kousoku Card Battle Card Hero, which we haven't heard from in about a month. Also in the "somewhat mysterious RPG project from Nintendo-owned developers" department is Soma Bringer, Monolith Soft's new RPG, which, according to NeoGAFfer charlequin, "has possibly the most generic character designs ever seen in a JRPG." It's probably going to be a pretty good game and all, but it does rather look like they put some money into a JRPG Character vending machine. "One EVIL LONGHAIRED GUY, and ... hmm, maybe GIRL IN ELABORATE DRESS."We initially thought it was a strategy RPG, but the magazine description pegs it as an action RPG.Finally, Dragon Quest IV gets a seven-page preview, which is thick with screens of, well, basically running around on the overworld and then also battling, which is what happens in Dragon Quest IV quite a bit.
DQIV: better than actual questing, says commercial
The adorable little layabout in this Dragon Quest IV commercial sells the central message quite well: playing the garish, hokey adventures of some medieval types on the DS is way better than stepping into a real cartoon adventure.This silly commercial nails the Dragon Quest aesthetic and mood: always goofily happy and bright, with that endless, bouncy march music. We also definitely get a Famicom-era vibe from it: if not for the, you know, Nintendo DS, the ridiculous live-action interpretation of game graphics could easily have tricked us into thinking we were watching a commercial from the late '80s. This is one of the rare cases in which we don't mind the relative lack of in-game graphics in a commercial!
Torneko's Great Introduction
Chapter 3 of Dragon Quest IV introduces one of the series' most famous characters, the jovial merchant Torneko. How famous is Torneko? Pretty famous. How famous is Torneko, with illustrative examples of his fame? He got two spinoff games of his very own. In fact, the first Torneko game, Torneko no Daibouken: Fushigi no Dungeon, was the first game in Chunsoft's Fushigi no Dungeon Roguelike series.As in those games, Torneko embarks on a quest to improve his shop by finding rare items. Along the way, he traverses dungeons and fights monsters-- you know, basic Dragon Quest stuff. But, unlike most Dragon Quest characters, Torneko is brave enough to face down the slimes and whatevers all alone-- probably because he doesn't care to share his earnings.
The heroes of Dragon Quest IV
In case you missed out on Dragon Warrior IV the first time around, or if you did play it but can't distinguish any Dragon Quest characters from one another unless they're Slimes, Famitsu has posted an introduction to the characters found in the DS remake of Dragon Quest IV. These are just some of the people who show up over the course of the game-- in particular, these folks show up starting in Chapter 2.Not counting the "Hero," who is, of course, a big blank, we have: Clift, a priest of the Santheim Kingdom who performs recovery magic; Alena, princess of the Santheim Kingdom with a desire for adventure-- and, of course, a natural talent for fighting; and Brai, a magician who serves as Alena's tutor, teaching her the art of having hair like Larry Fine.In the course of introducing these characters, Famitsu naturally posted a bunch of screens of the game. And it must be "Japanese RPG Remakes With 3D that Actually Looks Kind Of Okay Day", because the 3D actually looks kind of okay! Seriously, the more we see of Dragon Quest IV's look, the more we like it.
Dragon Quest IV boxart, screens
The boxart for Dragon Quest IV (it's a remake don't you know) has made its way onto the internets, but as you can see above, it is the Japanese boxart. We have a feeling, however, that the general layout won't change as it hits other territories outside of Japan. And, should you want some new screens to gawk at, there are plenty of those to check out, as well.So, who's on the train headed for Excitementville with us?
V-Jump scans aplenty: Final Fantasy IV, Dragon Quest IV, and more!
NeoGAF's wonderful neo2046 has extracted all of the delicious DS essence from within the pages of the latest V-Jump. Thanks to his largesse, we can gawk at some new images of upcoming Japanese games, including both Square Enix remakes of fourth entries in famous RPG series. In addition to Dragon Quest IV and Final Fantasy IV (above) you'll find Tales of Innocence, Bleach: The 3rd Phantom, which stubbornly continues not to be a Treasure fighting game, and Digimon Championship 2008. Enjoy looking at some incomprehensible magazine pages! And check out the Bleach game in particular, since this is the first good look we've had.
Nintendo conference screenshot roundup
We posted a lot of DS screens revealed at or to coincide with yesterday's Nintendo conference, but there's no way we could do an individual post on them all. Three screens of something we've already seen tons of screens of doesn't exactly warrant its own post. Some of the screens listed have been previously released. Some of the games, we just didn't get to. But we can link to a Japanese roundup post that's loaded with screens, and list the games shown within by title! We promise that as soon as we get more information on this stuff beyond a few screens in a roundup, we'll post it. Until then, check after the break for every game in the roundup, organized in order of appearance on the GAME Watch page.
Dragon Quest IV remake bridges generations
Being a port of a Playstation remake of the NES game, Dragon Quest IV falls between the old-school presentation of the older Dragon Quest games and the more detailed 3D in Level-5's Dragon Quests VIII and IX. The environments are all 3D, but your party is composed of sprites.Nowhere is the somewhat awkward dichotomy more evident than in the battle system. While exploration takes place in the aforementioned 3D landscapes, which can be fully rotated, you're sent right back to the beginning of the series in a battle. 2D monster sprites, narrative text windows, and all. It would be interesting to see how the DS audience reacted to having both IV and IX on the market at the same time, as we thought would happen for a while, but that's not to be. This way, we'll have plenty of time to buy both.
TGS07: New trailer for Dragon Quest IV
Having just received a release date and price for Japan, we knew the game would be on-hand in Tokyo, but nothing in the way of video managed to climb out from under the already suffocating amount of news. That is, until now. And, while the above video is mainly just some pan shots of concept art with small portions of gameplay tossed in for good measure, it's still enough to get you pumped for the game. [Via NeoGAF]
DQIV gets release date and price for Japan
Square Enix let loose details on the Japanese release of Dragon Quest IV. The title, which will release to the Japanese gaming public on November 22nd, will demand a hefty price of 5390 Yen (comes to about $47). Based on what we've seen, this game is going to take our socks and rock them right the hell off.See also: Dragon Quest IV website launches[Via NeoGAF]
