Tantegel Castle is the only save point in the game.The overworld can only be traveled on foot, and the Chimera wing and Zoom spell only return the player to Tantegel Castle. All battles are one-on-one there is only one player character, and enemies never appear in groups.This game formula was replicated in most, if not all, console RPGs.Īs the first game in the series, Dragon Quest heavily differs from its successors in several aspects. Ultimately, the hero must defeat an evil boss marking the end of his adventure. As more enemies are defeated, the hero becomes stronger and able to explore greater distances as he completes his quest. He can equip various weapons and armor and battles enemy monsters in one-on-one combat. The player controls a single character who is able to travel from town to town exploring on his quest. Along with Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest would spawn a successful franchise that would become the de facto standard for role-playing video games.ĭragon Quest is one of the first console role-playing games. Nintendo was impressed with the Japanese sales of the title and massively overproduced the cartridge the end result was that Nintendo gave away copies of Dragon Warrior as an incentive for subscribing to Nintendo Power, the company's in-house promotional magazine.ĭragon Quest was one of the first turn-based role-playing games to have widespread success and is considered a pioneer in the development of the genre.
#DRAGON WARRIOR SOUNDTRACK PASSWORD#
The North American version of the game was greatly improved graphically over the Japanese original, and added a battery-backed save feature, whereas the Japanese version used a password system. The game was localised for North American release in 1987, but the title was changed to Dragon Warrior to avoid infringing on the trademark of the pen and paper game DragonQuest. Dragon Warrior originally released in 1986 in Japan for the MSX and the Famicom. It was developed by Chunsoft and published by Enix. Good to see Ryan back on OCR, and wish the best to him given the circumstances in which the mix was produced.Dragon Quest (originally localised as Dragon Warrior) is the first title in the Dragon Quest series. Quoth the zyko: "it's a very emotional and inspired performance and although this needs some refinement i enjoyed it for its raw edge and power." If you're looking for some emotive, slow rock with acoustic and electric guitars flavors, you'll dig it. But this is one small part of an otherwise excellent effort that some on the panel didn't object as strongly to or at all, so form your own opinions. Having an acoustic guitar overpower a symphony orchestra in terms of mixing is usually not an effect that sounds particularly good. I think of this as a mostly successful concept piece that does a great job of arranging the original in a hybrid acoustic/electric rock format but has some issues in terms of execution and the afforementioned orchestral injection. Like Gray says, some of the "unbridled" nature of the performance lends charm and impact. However, the rest of the mix, from the very melancholy strumming of the acoustic-dominant portions to the electrified refrain at 2'04" does click in a way that makes natural sense and is expressive enough. Doesn't really click, and is never referenced again to make it more cohesive.
The issue is that, from 1'12" to 1'38", the slow-rock motif is invaded by an orchestra that also happens to be mixed pretty low. To me the orchestral section is actually more problematic than any guitar concerns, because it more significantly impacts the tone of the piece. I thought it added a sense of charm to some degree here.
I also feel that clinically correct performances sometimes take away from the live and spontenous feel. Gray articulated the majority opinion here well: "Still, I really like the arrangement here overall, and I think the performance is passable enough where I don't feel it's necessary to force a resubmission. However, the attitude prevailed that even with these (debatable) issues, the whole outweighed the sum of its parts. All felt it had high points - the arrangement and overall concept were complimented - but several felt that some performance flubs, the recording quality on the guitar, and the orchestral section's abrupt appearance and disappearance were, combined, enough to hold it back. The judges had mixed feelings on this one. It was inspired by my feeling sad about the death of my grandmother and I couldn't really express it in any other way than just by arranging this song." Ryan8bit writes: "I don't know if I meet the standards of this site anymore, so I thought I would test this one out to see.