Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen (2007)

Preliminary: Welp 1990 seems to have a lot of RPGs! We shall see, since this is another NES RPG and the Dragon Quest formula felt quite dull for 2 and 3 imo (but I loved the first one), and I feel ready for the more advanced next gen RPGs. But I will give it an earnest try! I didn't find a fan translation of the original version so I read up on the regional differences and they are primarily bug fixes and graphical changes. Fortunately there is a fan hack to restore the original graphics.

Pretty epic beginning tune. A bit concerning it doesn't even have the basic 1990 RPG feature of pressing start to go to END automatically when entering your hero's name.... cmon now. You can update the DQ1 engine it's been uh a few years lol. Oh my goodness and tho it is a bit nostalgic, the castle/king look the exact same as 4 years prior...

Yeahhhh I'm not sure about this... I thought Ganbare Goemon Missing Pipe felt dated... but this feels extremely dated. I have to go into menu and click Search to search? The music feels blah (so far). And I move so slowly. I will try to give it an earnest try cuz the first DQ is important to me but... I'm trying my best to resist the feeling I have to give every RPG an earnest try. Especially since DQ3 I did that and still gave a 2.

Time for my first grind. I'm already planning to drop this cuz everything is unchanged from DQ1... and the size of your inventory....

Maybe I'm just in a sour mood cuz a) summer break ends today and b) the OSRS boss Nex continues to deny me good drops (lol), or I just don't like DQ3 and 4 I suppose... Thing is every time I drop an RPG I start to crave it after, that feeling of the medieval fantasy world and the classic NES Look and Sound. But I dunno. Something too slow and tedious about DQ3 and 4.

playing Dragon Quest IV (NES)

Date: May 22-23, 2020

Start Time: 9:30 PM

End Time: 12:30 AM

Approximately: ~3 hours

Save Time: --:--:--

-Notes (+Images):

today's goal (and a soldier tell me that the king is in trouble/can't speak & the old man in the shed behind the castle can help. Of course, he is behind a locked door. I believe next time, I can use the Thiefs Key to talk to him and figure out what to do there)

So i spoke to the old man in the shed and i needed a nectar item to heal the throat of the king. According to merchants in the night at the bazaar, it was located in a tower to the west. The country of Endor to the east was blocked by a soldier who wouldn't let me use the portal until he got permission from the king, who could not speak (whoever heard of a letter)

after levelling up some and many single party deaths but luckily not full party deaths, I managed to finish the tower & get the nectar. Now that the king can speak, I got permission to go to Endor. The castle town has a tournament going on & a bridge to the north which was broken.

There's a casino in this town, and I entered at night, dialogue in the casino doesnt seem to change, but after sleeping, and getting my upgrades I look around. There's a guy who walks in front of townat night and randomly lies down it's really funny. There's a hallway in the castle on the left with an entrance to the outside. I enter the king's chambers who regrets giving permission to the winner of the tournament the permission to marry his daughter. Well, I'm Alena. Awesome.

However the lesbophobia of it all... if a woman wins she doesn't have to marry the winner. Well. I was hoping I could just give her hand back in marriage bc the situation is just not fair, but if you want to fall in love with me I'm not going to stop you. Let's pretend the developers homophobia doesn't exist here. Anyway they ask me to win the tournament so i do. The Necro-whatever his name is doesn't even appear and the princess is set free from the king's awful promise. Seriously. Just take it back? You're the one willing to save your reputation by keeping her to your dumb promise. Anyway. She says if I were a man she would marry me. Listen, that solves the problem of only marrying me if I won the tournament but hating it... she wants me....

Oh yeah, when i gave the king his voice back, he mentioned having nightmares & weird dreams. I'm told to go back home immediately after the tournament, so naturally, i take a look around and talk to everybody. That hallway i mentioned earlier, there's a staircase outside the castle that takes me to a treasure chest. My brother also says that gold doesn't transfer between chapters but casino coins do, so I spent all my gold to get about 1150 casino coins.

Going home to Santeen, is a bit eerie. No one is there, there isn't even music. The chapter ends here. Next up is Trader someone's chapter, but this is where I end for the night

playing Dragon Quest IV (NES)

Date: May 22, 2020

Start Time: 5:15 PM

End Time: 6:15 PM

Approximately: ~1 hour

Save Time: --:--:--

-Notes (+Images):

today's goal (go further into the cave + level up)

ok so i went further into the cave, learned snowstorm which kills enemies in succession, and got the bracelet. And learned the story of what I was doing lmfao. There was an actress impersonating me, the princess, who got kidnapped. Her ransom was the towns treasure which was hidden deep in the cave. So i saved her, she left, and i got a Thiefs Key. Also stocked up on my items and upgraded my armours

What's left is that after talking to the townspeople, they tell me of a bazaar, which i have already been to. The people at the bazaar tell me of a tournament, and a soldier tell me that the king is in trouble/can't speak & the old man in the shed behind the castle can help. Of course, he is behind a locked door. I believe next time, I can use the Thiefs Key to talk to him and figure out what to do there

playing Dragon Quest IV (NES)

Date: Feb. 14, 2020

Start Time: 10:15 PM

End Time: 11:45 PM

Approximately: ~1.5 hours

Save Time: --:--:--

-Notes (+Images):

Well, I haven't played since august so it was difficult to remember what was happening & what I was doing. Had a bunch of trouble a few hours ago setting up to play DQ4 earlier as well. I spent today figuring out what my spells do, how to play, and even forgot that there are separate "search" and "door" options, how to equip my items etc. Saw familiar enemies! Love those slimes. Will continue to recall with the help of my brother. Last session Brey had levelled up and learned a new spell but i also died pretty badly in the cave and restarted at an earlier save, so now I suppose I should be working on leveling them back up. He had a pretty great spell too, sigh

Anyway, I started today at the Bazaar so i upgraded my armour & items, then gave another try into the cave b/w Frenor & the Bazaar. Cristo died (funny, where my entire party died last session) so I had to leave the cave and transport to the bazaar to revive. Except, haha, the bazaar doesn't have a save/healer priest, and I used Brey's MP to leave the cave & transport to the bazaar. Ended up buying a wing of wyvern to transport to Frenor town to revive and sleep. Much better than trying to walk through random encounters and potentially dying.

Afterwards, i made the trek back to the castle for the king who apparently can't speak now. Don't know what's going on there but they have an old man sleep in a shed? Went back to Frenor to save and end for tonight. Nothing much done today but now i have a goal (go further into the cave + level up) and can use these status updates to help with my memory :3