A child is born with a symbol on his hand marking him as the "Luminary", a legendary hero chosen by the world tree Yggdrasil to save the land of Erdrea from evil. As soon as the Luminary comes of age he leaves his home to meet with the king of Heliodor, who had arranged to train him. Upon arriving at he castle the king accuses the Luminary of being a herald of evil because an entity known only as the the "Dark One" only ever appears when a Luminary does. The Luminary is thrown in Heliodor's dungeon but escapes to follow his destiny.
The narrative is presented in a three arc format that is easy to follow, with the first half following a pretty standard routine of visiting X town and completing a sub-story there. It's not particularly exciting and usually involves something along the lines of running a horse race, fighting in an arena, or solving a local disappearance before moving on to the next town. The second arc starts off with a mini solo-adventure for each of the companions and then a trip back to every location you've previously visited to fight an additional boss. You'll also have to collect the same six orbs twice - once in the first half and again in the second. After the credits roll there is a third story arc with 20+ hours worth of post-game content. In the third act you travel back in time to alter the events of the second act and get the true ending.
Collect the same 6 orbs multiple times and travel back in time.
The plot was far too by the book (and thus transparent) for my liking: the protagonist is a "Chosen One" destined to defeat the bad guy and the bad guy is an "evil-for-evils-sake" villain. Can you guess who wins? Even the plot twists they tried to throw in were easy to see coming: the king of Heliodor is actually possessed, Jasper was in league with the bad guy the whole time, Hendrik's not so bad after all, etc. At times the narrative even felt a little padded out, like when the group travels back to Dundrasil to fight with the tormented ghost of Eleven's father. This segment didn't reveal anything the player didn't already know and could have been removed from the game entirely without impacting the story. Its also a shame they didn't do more with the idea of a "Chosen One" being the cause of strife in the world rather than the remedy. It was an interesting take on an exhausted concept that just didn't go anywhere.
A major annoyance for me was the "de-humanization" of human enemies, usually through possession or a transformation just prior to battle. Maybe it would have affected the rating if you fought human enemies? Regardless, the fights are always followed up with an "oh, he isn't really evil, he was just possessed" or "she froze an entire kingdom and nearly killed everyone, but she's actually a really good person at heart" line. It got predictable and old fast. Maybe I'm just peeved that the game couldn't acknowledge that humans are capable of terrible deeds without being a literal monster. I m not too keen on the sexual objectification so common in anime either. Like dressing a female party member up in a risque bunny outfit just so a complete stranger with a fetish can ogle her.
Erdrea's map is surprisingly linear despite how open it is; the player is always being funneled from one story point to the next. Most of the environments are generic fantasy-RPG stuff you've probably seen a million times over - fields, swamps, desert, etc. Nothing outstanding or noteworthy. The towns switched it up a little, featuring unique aesthetics inspired by places in Japan and Italy, among others. Visuals aside, every town had the same commodities: an inn, item/armor/weapon shop, and church. Any feature(s) unique to that area like a mural or arena, were always tied to the main storyline.
The world is large but linear. You will travel by horse, boat, and flying whale.
Enemies visibly roam the map and some of the weaker ones may run away from the player. Combat uses a basic turn-based system where each party member auto-attacks in secession. You can select specific attacks, spells and more for the protagonist from a drop-down menu on your turn. The group is pretty good at attacking and healing on their own, or you can take full manual control of the entire party. There is also a quasi-real time option to "Free Roam" within the combat area if you like, but it doesn't serve a purpose; just an illusion of freedom. Every so often members of the party will randomly become "pepped up", which grants a temporarily boost to the pepped character's attributes and unlocks special powers called "Pep Powers". The bonuses and triggers are different for each character and some enemies can become pepped up in battle as well.
Left: Combat is turn-based. Right: Attack.
Left: "Pepped" up. Right: Abilities.
Dragon Quest XI was my first foray into the much-praised Dragon Quest franchise and it frankly left me feeling underwhelmed. I mean, the gameplay is technically sound and elegantly simple, but I like deep characters, an engaging story, or interesting world to explore. Aside from the charming art style, Dragon Quest XI was sorely lacking in originality or a sense of identity in almost every element of the game. Too often I felt like I was just going through the motions, to the point that it became hard to find the motivation to continue. I did manage to stick with it until act 3, then had to quit because of the huge difficulty spike and hours of level grinding required to overcome it. The constant game crashes didn't exactly help either (I didn't even know that Switch games could crash). I guess what I feel is apathy. Its a good game if your looking for something that callsback a bygone era, but for someone like me that was never really invested in that period of gaming it comes off as a humdrum experience.
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