I'm not much of a JRPG fan. I enjoyed games like Persona 4, FFX, and FFXII. I think it was mostly the story and the size of these games that drew me in. Dragon Quest 8 joins my list of favorite JRPG's, and this is the best one in the list.
The people who made this game were dead on with using cel shaded graphics. The characters are from the guy who did Dragon Ball, so cel shaded fits in perfectly. And the graphics look amazing for a PS2 game. Not to mention this game is also open world! One of the best looking PS2 games ever made.
DQ8 plays well... standard RPG gameplay i guess. I never considered RPG games to have good gameplay. There is grinding to level up, buying new weapons, armor, and the usual turn based fighting stuff. I do like how the world is fully open for you to explore on foot, by ship, or even by... air.
The story is not the best, but its ok. It does get more interesting half way into the game. At the start of the game i found it a bit boring.
This game wont win any sound awards. Your main character doesn't even talk, and the people who do talk mostly sound bad. The rest is reading text.
Long game with lots to do. I put over 100 hours into it and did pretty much everything there is to do. It was cool after you beat it not only do you continue playing before the last boss battle so you can continue to explore with all your items, but it also unlocks a new area to play and explore. If this game was released today... that area would be... DLC lol.