You start the game as the Hero (the blue-haired one), who is resting in an outside campment. You and two allies are about to storm Mudo's castle and restore peace to the world. A blond female uses an ocarina that summons a dragon (?) that flies you to the castle. Unfortunately, as you approach Mudo, the foe levitates your whole team and make it disappear.

You then wake up in Lifecod, fallen from your bed. Your sister Tania got worried! But no time to recall; you must accept the Elder's request of selling some goods in a neighbouring town in order to pay for the Crown for this year's festival. And so you go to that place and sell the goods, only to find out that the crown maker is missing. You go look for him and find him hanging from a cliff! As you try to rescue him, you fall in that hole... Once on the ground, you are all blurry and no one (except a dog) can seem to see you. Fortunately, you quickly find your way back to your world and have the Crown made.

As you go back to Lifecod, the festival begins, and Tania gets to wear the crown and present the offering to the Mountain Spirit so the village may be blesses for protection for one more year. But as Tania makes the offering, the Spirit appears and tells the Hero he will be on a life-changing mission. Which one? Does it have to do with this "phantom world"? And will he be able to beat Mudo?

Graphs: 7/10
The graphics are substandard for the time. They are more detailed than Dragon Quest V, but not as much as games like Final Fantasy VI or Chrono Trigger. However, enemies move more than SNES Final Fantasys, although even Final Fantasy IV exploits the 3D of the overworld map better. From the looks of the magics I was able to obtain, they are also inferior in look to Final Fantasy VI

Music: 8/10
The music was pretty decent and realistic-like. It's not the most memorable of the soundtracks, but it is enjoyable. My favourite is the castle music, which really sounds majestic with its cellos. Interesting point : many tracks are the same, just played with different instruments. I though it was a good idea.

Story: 2/10
Oh boy, now we're going down, down, down. It is the most confusing RPG I've played in my life. The other Dragon Quests had clear goals; even Dragon Quest 5 had an interesting plot. But 6... about 1/3 into the game, there is basically no plot line. You just wander around the world, hoping to find something that will make you progress. And the link between the world you start in (with the slower overworld music) and the "phantom world" (with the quicker-tempo theme) takes such a long time to understand. I don't think I could have completed it without a walthrough; too many places are too well-hidden.
I grant that every main character does play a role, and we do learn a little about their lives - "little" being the key word. I didn't care much about Hassan, Muriel, Barbara or Chamoro; Final Fantasy IV and VI had more attaching characters.


Addictiveness: 3/10
On a brighter side: since it's Dragon Quest, you do see old favourites : Copper Sword, Zenethia Castle, Medal King, slimes/metal slimes (they're as scary cats as usual), the same sound effect for door opening, joining the party and resurrecting, etc.
But it does not give substance to a game. The job system comes rather late in the game, and trying to pursue all of them is such a waste of time. Also, the sidequests aren't that numerous and interesting. Plus, the casino is much smaller than Dragon Quest V; I would have kept the monster arena. And once the game is over, you will probably not feel the rush to restart it again.

Difficulty: 9/10
Even with save states, this game requires an insane amount of leveling up. Even at level 44, I was barely able to finish the final boss. And as I said, finding your way is almost impossible without a walthrough after the first 1/3 of the game since there is no real plot line. 

Conclusion: I don't recommend the game. But hey, it's just my opinion. Maybe you will get in the plot better than I have. But I will say this : hadn't the music been enjoyable, I wouldn't have finished the game

PS to admins : I said the game wasn't working probably. I was only able to play with Mednafen

 This is a pretty good review, you have nice solid detail and good information in here. I like the way you presented your information, gave good detail, and evidence and also categorized your review and gave a good amount of information on each topic of the review. It is neat, easy to read and very well put together.  This is a good length, I like your explanations and overall I think that this is a pretty well made review and I think that you did a good job of writing it. Keep up the great work and keep making more reviews, this is a good read!

This is a very well written review. It all had meaning, and all of it was on topic. Oh, and yes of coarse you are going to get confused, this game is in Japanese I think. I would be confused on things that I cannot understand. It would be hard for people to tell me directions, and where to go. So yes that is correct. Over all I think it was basically a good review, and you should keep it up. Nice work, and I can't wait to see more work like this coming from you. It had detail, and depth. So nice work .

I played the Viz hack, which was translated to English. However, even that was poorly done. Sometimes, the dialogue make absolutely no sense in the context they are. Other times, it's just a bunch of numbers...