Dragon Warrior (or Dragon Quest as it was originally known) was released to North America in 1989 (but made for Japan in 1986) making it one of the earliest RPG’s made for the NES. Final Fantasy came out at the end of 1987 in Japan. At least a year later. Keep this in mind as we review this game. For all its shortcomings it is one of the original console RPG’s and is responsible (along with Final Fantasy) for the birth of the console RPG.

Graphics 7/10 – the graphics for this game are quite good (again, consider the time it came out). I like the style that the first castle takes when you start in it. The over world is simple in design but I think it looks about as good as can be hoped for. The sprites in the towns and castle are fairly simple but clear in their design which is about as much as you could hope for.

Where the graphics really take off are in the monster design. There aren’t tons of monsters in this game but they are all very nicely designed and colored. The later iterations of the same monster usually takes on a different color, name and maybe a flip in the picture. This may seem a bit lazy on the creators’ part but remember this is one of the first games of its kind for the NES.

Sound 9/10 – I seem to review games that I think very highly of their music. Maybe it’s because so many of these games were developed either in Japan or very closely with the Japanese. Nearly every Japanese made or influenced game comes with amazing soundtracks. This game is no different. The music does get a bit repetitive as you play through the game but switching between the towns, the over world and fights keeps the song you hear fairly fresh. You don’t spend more than a few minutes hearing any one song most of the time.

The music really excels as you go into the final dungeon though. Each level is given its own varies version of the dungeon theme and the further down you progress into the dungeon the more sinister and evil sounding the music becomes. By the time you get to the last level the music is a lot slower and more sinister sounding. It’s a subtle effect but should become obvious as the player progresses. I also really like the battle theme. There is this sort of frantic nature to the music even though the battle is turn based so there shouldn’t actually be any hurry needed on the player’s part to participate in the battle.

Addictiveness 5/10 – I personally have come back to this game several times to play it through again. The game is pretty simple in its overall design and mechanics which makes it easy to learn and fun to play in my opinion. Part of why I could see other people not wanting to come back to this game is that it is quite grindy in places. In order to move on from one area to another it is quite often mandatory to go back to the easier area and grind an extra level or 2 as well as collect enough cash to buy the next level of weapons and armor in order to survive. The balance issues can be a pain and can easily make the game less enjoyable.

Story 5/10 – The story of Dragon Warrior is simple. You start the game in Tantegel Castle and you must speak with King Lorik in order to progress. He tells you about the Dragonlord who has stolen the Balls of Light and that you must defeat him in order to get them back in order to save the world. The Princess is also kidnapped and must be rescued. After rescuing her she gives you this useless ability to see how far away from the castle, and from her, you are. I’ve never really found this useful by the time you rescue the Princess because you can use a teleport to get back to the castle (I believe).

This isn’t the most creative story ever, but in the context that it is one of the first games like this for the NES I forgive its simplicity and rate it higher than it probably deserves.

Depth 8/10 – while there isn’t TONS to do in this game it is an open world game and you can wander around anywhere you want. The obvious limitation is the strength of your character which prevents you from venturing out too far early on. Also, this is an early RPG for the console so while there aren’t tons of weapons or spells or things like that there is enough of it to keep the game progressing. I also find that there aren’t useless or extraneous items that you quite often find in newer games which is kind of nice. I dislike getting armor or weapons that are only useful in very strict circumstances or are worse than things you can buy or find in earlier areas. Just seems strange to do that.

Difficulty 7/10 – this game isn’t overly difficult to play. The mechanics are pretty simple. There are only a certain number of weapons and armor to collect and you can only gain a handful of spells. The difficulty comes in progressing through the over world. The starting area is quite simple and killing green and red slimes becomes easy quite quickly. However, moving on from there can get you killed if you aren’t fully prepared. The game is not balanced to give you the required levels from beating an area to progress smoothly on to the next area. This is one of the worst flaws of the game. A lot of time is spent grinding easy enemies in order to be strong enough to take on the enemies of the later areas. If you skip doing this then you’re basically asking to die over and over and that can be really frustrating.

Overall 6.8/10 – this game is a good game. It has a simple story and the progression is fairly linear even though the world is wide open. The mechanics are straight forward and easy to learn. The obvious flaw I mentioned earlier is how much grinding is required. That is probably the biggest problem the game has. If you don’t take the time to grind through the current area you are in you risk dying a lot trying to beat monsters that are far superior to you. There are other positives though. The graphics and music are great for the era this game was made. It also spawned multiple sequels (5 I think) on the NES alone which goes to show how much of a success it must have been when it was made. Still, not sure how well it would translate to a gamer today who has never played an old RPG like this.

I didn't really notice it before, but yea... you seem to review games with great soundtracks for the most part.

This is by far one of my favorite RPG series.
I would compare it to Pokemon and I think fans of those games would like this if they gave it a chance.

One minor correction, there were 4 DQ/DW games on NES. :3