Could have been great, but just settled with good.
Dragon Quest has always been a classic, and its great to see that its made its way even onto the Wii, forging itself into the future of gaming, but sadly its doing it at a slow pace. DQS is a very interesting game but is unfortunatly a bit shallow compaired to the rest of the DQ series.
The game is rather stright forward, and the gameplay follows that trend very well. This is a blessing and curse for the game as a whole, because its easy to pickup and just play it for an hour or so but at the same time if you grind away and burn the midnight oil you'll find yourself wishing for more.
As you've read in previews and offical reviews you swing the Wiimote like a sword slaying numerious beasties all in glorious first person. You even get to push the be button and hold up a sheild to block enemy attacks, which is actualy very cool. The combat system is basic but its probably the major focus of the game, and its deffently well done and solid. The downside is outside of combat the game lacks in all other areas.
The world as a whole is one big bath, even the town which is made to feel like its open is generaly a path with many areas (as in off the pathway) that you just can't go to. The town is also extreamly basic which is very sad and disapointing, if your going to have one town in the whole game then it'd better be amazing. In this case its so patheticly small I could consider it a military outpost rather than a town. You've got a collection of shops, wepons, armor, iteams a church, castle, your house, and some random spots where minigames and odd iteam collection happens. Other than that the town is empty and lifeless. Its sad because even one of the characters who finds her way into your house mentiones that she knew it was yours because "you wouldn't live in a shop or church"... yep even the characters in this world realise that there is NO other house in the town other than yours... so where does this kindom live?!?
Aside from the lack of a solid village, the downers continue in the form of the dongeons. They are basicaly paths that you can walk up and down (forward and back) but you can't turn your view or go in any other direction other than when you reach a fork in the road. Every now and then you'll find a rock that you can move and find some nice treasure, or a cheast filled with better treasure, but sadly the game is one big path you walk down.
The graphics are nice and pleasent but sadly could have been done better. Since the player is only able to see what is infront of them I'm amazed they didn't make it stunning! Instead you get a nice 3D anime style world, but even then I've played PS2 games that have looked nicer.
All in all I feel that DQS is an average game, it saves itself from the doom of being crud because of its very interesting combat system. DQS is almost like a foundation, or a test on SquareEnix's part to see what they "could" do on the Wii, almost like a tech demo for the Wii's RPG possabilites. Hopefuly when DQS2 comes out you can move in 360 dagrees in the dungeons, have the nunchuck so you can even look up, down and all around and even have the ability to have more than one party... possibly co-op. Also I'd hope DQS2 has more content, and a world that feels worthy of the Dragon Quest name.
Overall if your looking for a new experience on your Wii and you have money to burn go for DQS, but if you just want a fun quick RPG then I'd rent it first... heck you may beat it before you even decide to buy it. Overall its just a "good" game and hopefuly leads SquareEnix down a path of making "great" games on the Wii.