Eh...it's decent.
Review 12
Just to let you know, I beat this game out of boredom.
Graphics
Dragon Warrior was originally a Nintendo game, and so the remade version on the Gameboy Color has pretty much the same graphics.
Gameplay
Typical Nintendo gameplay. One character that walks around the world and fights monsters. The battle system is very simple, just the typical fight, cast, item and flee options. With only one character throughout the whole game, it’s pretty lame.
Controls
“A” interacts, “B” brings up the menu, the D-Pad moves, and the “Start” button saves your game in the field log.
Story
You are “insert name here”. The evil DracoLord has captured Princess Lora and wrought havoc on the world. You have to kill him. Yippee.
Durability
Yeah right.
Frustration Rate
The game can be very frustrating if you don’t know what to do. It starts out simple enough, but it is very hard to find your way around the world. Very hard. Not only that, but there are secret treasures that you have to find in order to complete the game, and those are almost impossible to find. A very frustrating game that isn’t even worth playing unless you are like me and love a simple RPG. And have a lot of free time on your hands. A lot. Like being on Spring Break, for example. Which is where I was when I beat this game.
Game Review-Gameboy Color-Dragon Warrior II
Review 13
This game is so much better than the original. Read below to find out why.
Graphics
The graphics are still standard gameboy color graphics, but they are much better than the original Dragon Warrior graphics.
Sound
I didn’t do a “sound” category for the original because I turned it off after about 2 minutes and never turned it on again. The sound in Dragon Warrior II is almost exactly the same, but because the gameplay in the sequel is so much better, I actually listened to the sound quite a bit more. The sound mixes with the gameplay well.
Gameplay
A classic RPG. Walk around the world map, trying to find stuff and then kill the main bad guy. A lot of the gameplay is going to be discussed in the “Improvements” section of this review, but I’ll cover a bit here.
There are 3 characters used throughout the game, and each have different classes. One is a knight who doesn’t know any spells but is very strong, another is a paladin who is somewhere in the middle (not too strong but knows some average magic, such as “outside”, which takes you outside of a dungeon, and “return” which warps you back to the last point you saved at), and the last character is a mage who knows a lot of powerful magic but is an incredibly weak attacker.
Most of this game is a giant puzzle. The world map is humongous and there are so many places to find that it can get incredibly confusing, but all in all, the gameplay itself is very good for a gameboy color game.
Controls
Standard controls and not confusing. “A” interacts, “B” cancels, the D-Pad moves. “B” also brings up the menu, and “Start” saves in the field log (like a quick save when a king is not around to record your journey).
Story
Another standard story. Prince “insert name here” Lorasia meets up with Prince Eric Cannock and Princess Gwen Moonbrook and attempts to defeat the evil spreading across the land. This time it is not DracoLord, but a guy named Hargon (leading to an amusing conversation with the grandson of DracoLord, who is jealous of Hargon). A simple story, yet very complex and intriguing at the same time.
Improvements
Here’s the long category. So much has improved from the original that I won’t discuss it all because it would be a seven-page long category. To begin with, there are now three characters to battle with. Lorasia is the powerful knight, Cannock is the slightly less powerful paladin, and Moonbrook is the very weak mage. It is, however, very hard to find either of them. Cannock leads you on a wild goose chase (not that hard, but rather frustrating if you can’t find him) and Moonbrook has been cursed and needs to be uncursed with a mirror that can be very difficult to find. Batting has gotten more complex, but not too much. The only differences are a few new spells, the fact that you now have 3 characters to battle with, and there can also be more than one enemy in one battle.
The world map is now at least 10 times bigger. It contains Alefgard, the continent of the original Dragon Warrior, plus 5 or 6 more, along with many assorted small islands that contain shrines and secret items. The improvements were pretty impressive overall.
Durability
There is hardly any want to replay the game, but the game lasts a very long time. It took me almost three days of total time, and I even used a walkthrough.
Frustration Rate
Wow. If you love frustrating games, then this is for you. I can almost guarantee that even the most advanced gamers will need a walkthrough at some point in this game. There are a TON of secret items that you need to find, and this is incredibly difficult with the giant world map and the confusing dungeons. Incredibly difficult game.